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District Parent Council Minutes September 18, 2007
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Roman Mica
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Oct 10, 2007 10:19 PDT
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District Parent Council
September 18, 2007
New BVSD website - Maela Moore, Communications, as you all know from BVSD on
the Inside, introduced Eric Howell, the new BVSD Webmaster.
Eric - BVSD will have a new website. We are beginning the listening phase.
We have posted a survey on the front of the current BVSD website and are
soliciting your feedback. Over the course of the next few months, we will
host focus groups to design the new website. If you are interested in
joining a focus group please email Eric at eric.h-@bvsd.org. Our goal
is to make the website more contemporary and user friendly.
Chris - We need your input to build a good website. We will host three
meetings (one virtual meeting) this year. Maela to email Roman the
information (in PDF). He will email to the PTAs, etc. The new website will
have a really robust search engine. It will have a good central contacts
page.
Maela - Parents probably use the website more than any other population.
There will now be a new student section. Email Eric with any suggestions
for the home page before going on to IC, etc. If you know of other
particularly good websites, please submit those sites to Maela and Eric to
review. Eric to forward websites we have looked at (Miami Dade, etc.) to
DPC for their review. We have fourteen schools using Sharepoint 2007
technology within their websites. Eric will send along the list of the
schools involved so DPC can look at what has been done thus far.
There was a request for contact information form online. Next year we
should have online registration capabilities. There seems to be a lot of
interest in this subject, so Chris will invite Planning and Assessment staff
to in the near future to discuss further details.
Tron Bond Update - We met last week and went to Columbine and did a quick
tour. It turns out that Boulder High will need a change from what was
agreed to in the bond. The additional bridge for Reicht Field from BHS
across Boulder Creek and isn't going to physically work out. There is an
elevation change on each side of the bank, which will require 10 feet of
stairs, which is an ADA issue. The initial budget for the project was
$45,000, a recommendation has been made to the School Board to eliminate the
bridge on the bond project.
An email and newspaper article stated the Broomfield High bond project is
over budget. Chris said it's not uncommon at all at the preplanning stage
for projects to come in over budget. Since the email and article, the
figure has dropped one million dollars. The Broomfield High School
principal has written a letter addressing this that will be in the next
issue of the Enterprise.
Several fields already done (Nederland artificial turf field, and Community
Montessori).
Bond Project Managers are made up of some BVSD employees and some contracted
employees. Please mail Tron with any concerns about project managers.
All transcripts of bond meetings are on the website. There was 8 million in
the bond for improvements to Columbine. It would take an additional four
million to raise and rebuild the building. It wouldn't be bond money to
do that because that money is spoken for. It would be another funding
source (the sale of Washington?). It's under consideration but no decision
has been made yet.
There are environmentally conscious people on the bond committee. We
received $1.8 million dollars from the City of Boulder for Casey on the
condition that Casey will be a teaching building and green from the ground
up. We did a sample survey at the beginning of the bond project. Every
project has some elements of energy efficiency. There is a $100,000 budget
revision process to look at which schools have cooling problems. Email
Chris-@bvsd.org with construction concerns. Robert Hammond is the chief
operations officer and Don Orr, who is heading up the bond is under him.
Matt Gianneschi, Senior Education Policy Analyst -Governor Ritter's
Education Policy The governor has placed a priority on education, which he
calls his number one priority. Matt is a former Denver Public Schools
employee with a doctorate in higher education. Prior to his employment with
Governor Ritter, he oversaw academic and student affairs for the state. The
Governor's agenda is not as concerned with things like testing. He believes
in public accountability, but less around punishing schools but trying to
create incentives in the system to make them work better. He has three
stakes in the ground: halving the high school drop out rate; push our
policies to double the production of degrees achieved in the state (over 10
years); and closing the achievement gap, which is much more related to
environmental issues. These have guided his decision making.
P20 Council started on the West Coast and Texas. Governor Ritter got all
the pieces built into the system before names were selected to talk about
education policy. They built profiles before they got names. The Governor
decided on 32 people to serve on council from classroom teachers to college
presidents, rural schools, urban schools, and early childhood. The intent of
this group is to help the Governor fulfill his Colorado promise. We want to
ensure our systems are aligned.
Mil Level Stabilization Plan - opportunity for local jurisdictions that
decided they wanted some override capacity from TABOR and Gallagher laws.
We thought it would be $55 million in general funds. Governor wanted to try
to create an opportunity for universal full day kindergarten across the
state and fund preschool and kindergarten program. Governor sees this as a
critical component. Amendment to the School Finance Act that would have
created full day kindergarten did not pass. Mill Levy Stabilization did
pass. They thought it violated TABOR. General Assembly gave opinion and it
took awhile (4-5 weeks to get the opinion back).
P20 Council has 5 subcommittees evolved from the 32 initial people. A lot
of agencies are providing early childhood, but not tied together
necessarily. Helayne Jones, our School Board President, is on the
subcommittee and Adele Bravo (former Colorado teacher of the year) is on the
group of 32.
Teacher preparation and intention. That group is wrestling with
compensation questions
and retention efforts. High school preparation - should the state provide
some sort of endorsements beyond the standard high school diploma (guarantee
that student gets in college, access to more technical education
(certificate) on a statewide basis).
Looking at testing, in particular through the eyes of a student. Whether
CSAP is appropriate and how it connects to college. Accountability still
needs to be there but how do you get the most out of testing.
We want to realign standards.
The dual enrollment question. There are four sections that deal with dual
enrollment.
Last subcommittee is data and accountability. Higher education and k-12 can
start to begin to share data. It's important because the superintendent can
understand how students are matriculating through. One snapshot. What
about students that drop out and go into the work force. Understand
patterns to tailor policy to see what works and what doesn't. Should the
State of Colorado go this route? That question has exposed all kinds of
fears. Better data will intensify accountability. It's been more
philosophical. Is the state prepared to make use of the information and
understand how the system works and doesn't work.
Dropout prevention and recovery is one of the main priorities. We have
received a $25,000 grant to hold a statewide workshop the first week in
December and figure out what will work at the grass roots level and hear the
same conversations.
Are we doing the right thing for our economy; can we provide returns for
kids. What are we doing to build the infrastructure and honors the work at
the local level but provides better guidance to districts. There is a
narrow time frame for this fall to answer
On the Governor's website (www.colorado.gov/governor P-20
<http://www.colorado.gov/governor%20P-20> ) you can find a copy of all the
questions that were handed out to the committee.
Education Bill - August 6 Governor's office said we know where we want to
go, need public help to get there. On September 17, we had a check-in day,
and on November 16, the final day. The Governor created a council to
refine ideas, come up with new bipartisan policies. 60% of the state budget
is spent on education. 28% of Colorado students have full-day kindergarten
while nation-wide it's 65%. Special populations (Special Ed., Tag, etc.)
are under funded across the board.
Round Robin
Ryan - excited about new computers.
Whittier - 125th anniversary celebration in early October.
So. Hills - At last SIT meeting talked about how to keep from getting
disrupted in schooling with construction projects going on. There was a
lively discussion about blending diversity into the curriculum/life for the
kids. PTO and principal both funded smart boards for all of the classrooms.
Monarch K-8 - SIT program, safety and quality (gender issues) and special
education kids and improving their math scores.
Platt - thrilled about new principal - need to reinform people on physical
safety issues.
Mesa - New principal doing quite well; SIT does it's own school climate
survey with their students. They discovered students are fine everywhere
except the playground. There were a lot of paras on the playground at
recess and paras weren't really part of the bullying conversations to hear
student concerns. Mesa used some sub money to cover for paras while they
trained and have been fairly successful in combating the problems.
Louisville Middle - 7th grade right of passage. Took them off campus and
did overnight at new Y camp for bonding and teachings students be respectful
to each other. Is LMS getting air conditioning? Chris will find out.
Louisville Elementary- installed playground equipment, things are going very
well with the new principal.
Horizons - installed playground equipment; outdoor ed trips are starting (k
- 8 according to age), The trips include a lot of environmental education.
High Peaks - doing a fundraiser - the good fairy - ask teachers for a wish
list and say to the parents and get really good results and parents cut a
check. Check written to PTA. Teachers spend how they want with principal
oversight.
Foothill - excited about the renovations to the school.
Flatirons - launching fundraiser for PTO aiming for the highest level of
participation they can get. Happens in October every year. PTO just
brought in child assault prevention program. There is outdoor education for
the entire school.
Fairview - would like to see enrollment cap raised. Mice have taken over
the senior balcony. Don trying to bring committees together (booster,
sports, music, parents). Currently groups are working separately and they
would like to see groups meet once a month together and do breakouts; and
also do this with teachers to bring unity and communication. Trying to find
creative ways to keep students on campus (with a open campus).
Eldorado - Focusing on how to get students to school safely. Eldorado
sponsored a Safety Seminar last Saturday with food, music, Olympic athletes
to do motivational speaking, fire, police, etc. It was very well attended
all in the effort to keep the kids safe.
Creekside - disappointed in students' assessments of their own safety and
well being and don't know what to do with all that data yet, but is not
unique to Creekside. Garden to Table program going strong and have
convinced representatives to come here and talk to this group.
Broomfield High - They have seen the design of the new building excited
about that.
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