Ellis Picked for Board of Ed President

The eight-member Madison Board of Education again voted Lisa Ellis president and Patrick Rowe vice president at the school board's reorganization meeting Tuesday.

Returning school board members Ellis, Kevin Blair and Linda Gilbert, who were elected by voters in November, took the oath of office, and the Harding Board of Education picked member James Novotny to be its representative on Madison's school board for another year,

That means the board's makeup for 2013 is the same as last year.

New Madison Borough Councilman Ben Wolkowitz, the council's liaison to the school board for the year, attended the meeting.

His attendance was welcomed by Ellis, and also by resident Tom Piskula, who said at recent school board and Borough Council meetings it would be valuable to have a council member at the school board meetings.

"At a minimum, a council member's presence at the BoE meetings might signal town leadership awareness of the desirability of maintaining school improvement as a town priority rather than just a priority of the school users," he wrote in a comment on Madison Patch as his suggestion for Madison in 2013.

Superintendent Dr. Michael Rossi said the district is completing its new teacher evaluation system, staying tuned for updated word from Trenton on a number of state curriculum and testing initiatives, and is looking to reduce the district's electric consumption by 5 percent. The district also is moving forward with fixing a retaining wall at Kings Road School and is working with a homeland security expert to have its security infrastructure and policies reviewed.