School Board

Cesar Rainho address the school board after he was named to his new position. The Board of Education welcomed the new head of the district’s arts programs at its December 16 meeting Cesar Rainho was named as Supervisor of Fine, Visual, Performing and Practical Arts at the meeting. He begins the $92,500 position on December 17, or soon thereafter, according …

Schools Superintendent John Ravally on December 14 sent a letter to parents delineating some of the steps the district has taken to ensure student safety. (File photo.) An online threat against a Franklin Middle School campus discovered the evening of December 14 – the second in a week – was deemed by township police to not be credible, a school …

Franklin Middle School – Sampson G. Smith campus principal Evelyn Rutledge, foreground, told parents that an “indirect” threat against the school was found to be not credible. (File photo). Township police are investigating an “indirect” threat made against Franklin Middle School’s Sampson G. Smith campus. The threat was found to be not credible, and did not interfere with the school …

Franklin Middle School football coach Blair Wilson, seen here after his team captured the 2019 Middle School Championship, is the pick of many members of the Franklin football community to become the new high school football head coach. Coaches, parents and players showed up en masse at the November 18 Board of Education meeting to lobby for their pick for …

Newly appointed Conerly Road principal David Heras address the school board at the November 18 meeting. The Board of Education appointed one new school principal, and accepted the resignation of another at its November 18 meeting. The Board appointed David Heras as the top educator at Conerly Road School. Heras, who assumes the $128,000-a-year position on January 1, 2022, succeeds …

Elizabeth Avenue School principal John Haney honors Donna King, a school paraprofessional, during the breakfast ceremony. Nearly 40 of the school district’s teachers and educational service professionals were honored November 3 at a special breakfast. For some, the ceremony was a year in the making. The district has been honoring its Teachers and Educational Service Professionals of the Year with …

Board of Education member Pat Stanley, seen in this file photo from 2020, was forced to leave the October 21 school board meeting for refusing to properly wear her mask. Board of Education member Pat Stanley was forced to leave the Board’s monthly meeting October 21 under the watchful eyes of township police after she refused to properly wear a …

Elizabeth Avenue School has reported nine cases of Covid-19 infection, the most in township schools. (Photo: Franklin Township Schools.) Two people affiliated with the school district are in quarantine, and there are 28 total Covid-19 cases in district schools as of October 4. The coronavirus cases are spread out among all district schools save one – Claremont Elementary School – …

The oversight of school district guidance services will now be handled by two people instead of one. The Board of Education at its September 23 meeting voted to create two new positions: Supervisor of Guidance Pre-K-8 and Supervisor of Guidance 9-12. The positions replace the former district-wide guidance director position. The former Director of Guidance, Dana Karas, left the job …

Vimal Sodhani presents the donation check to Board of Education president Nancy LaCorte at the September 23 meeting. A local charitable foundation made the first of what will be sustained donations to the school district’s Innovation Competition. Sodhani Foundation founder Vimal Sodhani donated $3,000 at the Board of Education’s September 23 meeting. The Innovation Competition is a STEM-(Science, Technology, Math, …