Board grants superintendent new five-year contract

By Mark Rosman
Staff Writer

The Manalapan-Englishtown Regional School District Board of Education has approved a new five-year contract for Superintendent of Schools John J. Marciante Jr.

The contract, which was approved at the board’s March 15 meeting, runs from July 1, 2016 through June 30, 2021. According to the meeting agenda, the new deal for Marciante was approved by the interim executive county superintendent of schools on Feb. 24.

According to the agenda, Marciante will be paid $165,000 in each of the five school years covered by the agreement: 2016-17 through 2020-21. The board and Marciante will select quantitative and/or qualitative criteria for merit increases as specified in the superintendent’s contract.

Marciante became the school district’s superintendent on July 1, 2007, succeeding Maureen Lally, who served as superintendent five years. Marciante was the assistant to the superintendent for pupil personnel services at the time he was named to the top post in the district.

The board voted 8-0 to approve the new contract for Marciante. Board member Gerald Bruno abstained on the vote due to a conflict, district administrators said.

Following the board’s vote, Marciante said, “First I want to thank the board for giving me this opportunity to continue to lead this incredible district for the next five years. The greatest challenge over the next several years will be the financial pressure that years of flat state funding will have on the district. … it was necessary to make cuts to balance the 2016-17 budget and I believe that will become the new normal without increases in state aid.

“While money is important, I am much more excited about where the district is going in terms of instruction. We have become a 21st century district. Our digital conversion is almost complete. One of my goals over the next several years is to extend it into fourth grade (every fifth grade class received a cart of Chromebook laptop computers this past year).
“We will continue to use data from the Partnership for Assessment of Readiness for College and Careers (PARCC) and other assessments to improve instruction as that information allows to meet the needs of individual students. The recent results on the PARCC highlighted the fact that a significant number of students are not where they need to be when it comes to college and career readiness.
“My goal over the next five years is to raise the performance of all students so that when the graduates of the Manalapan-Englishtown regional schools either enter college, they will pass the entrance exams and not be required to take year of remedial courses, or when they enter the workforce, they will have the necessary skills to succeed in the new economy,” Marciante said.

The Manalapan-Englishtown Regional School District operates six elementary schools, one middle school and one early childhood learning center. The district’s enrollment in September 2015 was 5,031 pupils.