Chebeague Island Transition Education Subcommittee

Meeting Minutes

January 23, 2007

In attendance: Carol White, Phil Jordan, Virginia Tatakis, Althea Dugliss, Sue Campbell, Tina Runge, Ken Pelton, Marty Trower, Sally Ballarad, Jen Belesca, Donna Colbeth, Jerry Wiles and Carol Lynn Davis.

1. A motion was made, seconded and approved to accept the minutes from both the December 16, 2006 and January 9, 2007 meetings.

2. A motion was made, seconded, and approved to accept the minutes from the January 16, 2007 minutes.

3. Althea offered to take minutes again and Phil was time-keeper again.

4. The superintendent application:

Jerry reported that the Maine School of Management would put our ad on their website but would need to charge us for it. Suzanne asked about using the Serving Schools website instead. She indicated that many people currently working in education go there first for job opportunities. Jerry said he would look into the cost of advertising at the Portland Press Herald and Suzanne offered to find out the cost of posting an ad on the Serving Schools website.

Carol reported that the Transition Committee has indicated it may want to be the party to whom applications are sent rather than Jerry.

There was a discussion of how to tailor the application to our situation. Jerry made note of the suggested narrative questions and other changes. Jerry will put together a consensus of the suggestions and come to the next meeting to get approval.

5. Budget:

Carol handed out a timeline and flow chart of how the budget process should look. She suggested we put the budget together at a Saturday workshop then give it to the Transition Committee and present it at the next meeting. After they make comments and there’s a public meeting on the staffing and structure of the school, we can put the budget in place.

It is our role to operate like a school board until one is elected on July 1. When it’s time to start interviewing, Peter Lowe will come out and prepare the “selection” committee with the proper questions to ask as well as the questions we’re not allowed to ask.

Carol will be meeting with Bob Hassen and Scott Poulin on Wednesday, January 24 to discuss the hiring process.

Carol asked for volunteers to gather the numbers for the various parts of the budget and the following people offered:

·  Personnel: Jen Belesca

·  Facilities (including such unknowns as school bus fuel and heating oil for the school: Tina Runge

·  Transportation: Sue Campbell

·  Special Education budget and process: Sally Ballard and Marty Trower – Need to meet with Anne Nunnery, the Special Ed Director for SAD51) and David Galin for help.

·  Curriculum: Donna Colbeth

The due date for getting the budget to the Transition Committee is February 15. Carol indicated she’d like to have members of the subcommittee help present the budget to the Transition Committee. We would most likely submit our “budget packet” on February 14 and present it at the following meeting on February 21.

We also need to pull together job descriptions. Carol will ask Beth Dyer to do that. David Galin also has “tons” of them. We can customize them to our needs.

We need to identify contracted services. So far the list consists of:

·  Fran’s taxi

·  CTC

·  building and grounds

·  lawn mowing

·  violin teacher

Donna pointed out that at some point we need to discuss tenure. Peter Lowe will help us with this. The teachers will start on a two-year probationary status.

Carol will email copies of the budget to everyone.

Carol reviewed the Transition Committee’s recently communicated hiring policy to give preferential treatment to those currently holding town and school jobs for which they want to apply when we’re our own town. Letters have already gone out to current teachers and staff.

There is a Transition Committee meeting Wednesday, January 24. Members of the Education Subcommittee should try to attend

There was a motion put forward that the Education Subcommittee be authorized by the Transition Committee to conduct the hiring process, including contracts, for school personnel and take the final recommendation to the Transition Committee.

It was seconded and unanimously approved. Carol indicated she can assure them that she will report in on the hiring process regularly.

It was further moved that the Transition Committee authorize the Education Subcommittee to start the selection process for the superintendent of the Chebeague Island School Department.

This was seconded and approved.

6. Other:

·  Anne Nunnery asked that we have someone sit in on the IEP process this spring for next year’s school year.

·  After we have a draft budget, Carol suggested we take some trips to visit both Long Island School and North Haven. This would be in late February/early March. Carol urged people to email her any dates that don’t work for them and she’ll try to accommodate them. CPA can probably cover travel costs.

·  Jerry will work on the superintendent job description.

7. School Consolidations:

Carol advised that this plan has a lot of momentum and most indications are that it’s going to happen. There is a large public hearing on February 5. There will be a revised version of the plan posted online in just a few days. Jim Rier painted a rosy picture of how it would impact us. It would centralize administrative offices and keep small schools small. Principals would be less involved with administration and more involved with instruction and have more community contact. If it went through as it is now, Chebeague students could attend any school in their “district” which would mean they could choose to attend Yarmouth schools.

Carol thinks at some point it might be worth trying to meet with the Susan Gendron or the Governor.

Future topics:

·  Pre-K. We need a sense of the cost. Jen will ask David Galin for help on this. How many days a week, etc.

·  Should the CTC contract cover all students traveling to the mainland for school, including those attending private school?

Meetings:

·  Next meeting of Education Subcommittee will be January 30, 7:15 – 9:00 p.m.

·  Our next workshop will be on February 10 tentatively starting at 9:00 a.m. and running for two hours.

·  There is a PAC/CPA meeting on Tuesday, February 6. We hope to meet with David Galin from 5:00 – 7:00 with the CPA meeting beginning at 7:00 at the CIS. (Jen will advise David of the correct meeting date.)

·  January 31: there is an Island Institute meeting of the Casco Bay Island Schools. It’s at 4:00 – 7:00 at the Casco Bay Lines terminal. It’s a good opportunity for networking. Carol will email the invitation to everyone. They want a response by Wednesday January 24. Carol won’t be attending but others may.

Action Steps:

·  Jerry will check the cost of advertising in the PPH.

·  Suzanne will check on advertising costs for ServingSchools.com.

·  Jerry will put an application together and bring it to the next meeting for approval.

·  Jerry will work on the superintendent job description.

·  Carol will ask Beth Dyer to work on job descriptions.

·  Carol will email copies of the budget to everyone.

·  Carol will get insurance information on the bus driver to Sue for the Transportation portion of the budget.

·  Jen will get financial information on Pre-k from David Galin.

·  Jen will let David Galin know the PAC/CPA meeting is February 6.

·  See Budget section to review assignments of budget pieces.

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