Hawthorne High School
5/29/2009 Faculty Advisory Committee Meeting Minutes
Meeting notes taken by D. Barnes. Minutes written by Daniel Barnes and edited by Sandra Goins
CVSTA Representatives Present: D. Barnes
Administrators Present: K. Dragone, E. Hirata (came in just as we were leaving), M. Newell
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1. CUSTODIAN COMPLAINTS: Because of the recurring and widespread nature of teacher complaints regarding custodial performance, principal Newell said that he was going to meet with Mr. Connoly (the district admin in charge of “business”, which includes custodians) on Wednesday, 6/3/09, and would lobby for the institution of a new yearly custom. To wit, Mr. Newell will request that at the beginning of every school year, each teacher shall be provided with a memo/email containing the following information: (1) the name of the custodian in charge of the teacher’s room, (2) what other rooms are in that custodian’s “run”, (3) what exact tasks custodians are required to complete in the classrooms they service, including how often, and (4) whom the teacher can call/email if his/her custodian fails to meet those minimum requirements. Mr. Newell will advocate also for regular (surprise/random?) site visits by next year’s new district-level custodian supervisor, who, during these visits, should carry a clipboard w/checklist to physically record custodian performance data. Mr. Newell, like many teachers, feels that there is little or no accountability at present, since there is no in-person monitoring of night shift custodians. He also believes that their start and stop times are poorly defined. It was once again mentioned that teachers need to do their part in making rooms more cleanable. For instance, teachers must make sure that there are no textbooks on the floor, since this impedes sweeping. Therefore, the start-of-year email/memo is likely to also include a list of teacher responsibilities. Everybody needs to do their part.
Regarding complaints about specific custodians made during this FAC cycle, Mr. Newell said that there’s not much that can be done this late in the year, especially considering that there is a changing of the guard occurring at the district level. (The two district-level custodial supervisors’ positions have been eliminated, and they will be replaced by a single supervisor next year.) However, Mr. Newell assured us that this month’s particular complaints have been mentally noted. For instance, admin acknowledged that a specific east campus custodian has had an ongoing problem with a specific east campus teacher, who, it seems, is not alone in his/her dissatisfaction with this particular custodian’s performance. (Four other teachers have now given this custodian negative reviews.) Admin also acknowledged a complaint about the 16/17/18/20 custodian, specifically regarding that custodian’s habit of chatting up the complaining teacher when he should be working, with an added complaint that this custodian speaks critically of other teachers during this unsolicited/unappreciated chit-chat. In essence, the teacher felt that the custodian should be emptying the trash, not talking trash. Other complaints were made regarding the building 19/22 custodian, regarding “lurking” and suspicion of theft. In multiple locations, parallel anecdotes arose about a yogurt lid and a green skittle that remained unremoved for protracted periods of time, for so long, in fact, that the yogurt lid and green skittle in question almost achieved proper noun status.
2. DETENTION SYSTEM: One teacher complained that the detention spreadsheet isn’t being updated daily. K. Dragone said that this only occurs on days when Victor Frayre is absent. One teacher complained that the extra 30 minute penalty for failing to promptly serve detention isn’t being enforced. K. Dragone said that teachers need to initiate that process themselves by sending students to the guidance room with a referral as soon as it is clear that the student did not serve his/her detention immediately. (She will re-email the detention procedure to all staff soon.) She said that V. Frayre is very good about contacting the parents of students who are referred to the guidance room for not promptly serving their detention debts. She also said that in-house suspension is, in fact, happening for delinquent detention debtors, and not only for detention debts incurred during administrative electronic tardy sweeps, but for teacher-assigned detention as well.
One teacher expressed the desire that detention should be administered by a central agency, and that teachers should be able to register detention debts online, much in the manner that referrals are already submitable through the school website. K. Dragone agreed that this was a good idea and that next year, teachers will be able to register detention debts online. She said that as part of this centralized system, teachers will be informed whenever the administration contacts parents/holds parent conferences regarding students’ failure to promptly serve detention. She cautioned that it is very much unknown as to whether or not there will be adequate central personnel available to process and enforce those debts. There is a good chance that, due to the financial crisis in which the district continues to flounder, deans and/or guidance room personnel may have their hours reduced and/or their jobs eliminated, so much of this envisioned centralized detention debt tracking/enforcement system may languish, grounded for lack of fuel. The guidance room in particular is not looking long for this world, though it seems likely that the dean positions will still exist, their productivity probably diluted by the deans having to teach one or more academic classes during the day in addition to their disciplinary duties.
3. FRESHMAN ADVISORY SURVEY: One teacher conducted a survey of her freshman advisory class regarding what her kids’ favorite classes were and what classes they are looking forward to taking. (FAC chair would like to apologize for misrepresenting this at the meeting as a favorite-teacher survey rather than as a favorite-class survey . . . gulp . . . It turns out that, contrary to the FAC chair’s faulty memory, many but not all students in the survey mentioned individual teachers as being the reason why they liked their favorite classes so much. Often, something else was cited, such as the nature of the activities in the class.) The suggesting teacher specifically stressed the truancy-reducing benefits of enthusiasm-generating classes, particularly electives but also well-run core classes. Both the FAC chair and K. Dragone expressed the feeling that such a survey would be even more powerful and revealing if it were done on a larger scale. (There seems to be an implicit invitation here for the pioneering teacher in question to orchestrate a larger-scale version of her one-class survey. Will she take up this gauntlet?) K. Dragone bemoaned the likelihood that electives in general are an endangered species in the current fiscal climate.
4. LADIES’ ROOM BLDG 18: One teacher noted that a toilet in the 18 building ladies’ room had a case of of CIBS (commodal irritable bowel syndrome), in that it gurgled ceaselessly, wasting water – a serious issue during our continuing/worsening regional drought. UPDATE: the device in question is now feeling much better.
5. ADMIN T-SWEEPS: One teacher expressed gratitude for the effects that administratively-administered “electronic” tardy sweeps have. The teacher wished that they would happen year-round, not just during STAR testing. K. Dragone said that the institution will continue, but that it’s very labor-intensive, so its frequency may be less than optimal. If anyone would like to volunteer to help with this effort, Mrs. Dragone is receptive.
6. NO GPA for NO-GO: One teacher would prefer that if GPA is removed from the set of criteria for determining go/no-go status (and, it, indeed, has been, as of this writing), that progress reports at the 5-week and 15-week points in the semester allow for pass/no pass marks by teachers who feel there is insufficient data to specify a letter grade and/or by those who feel that giving out D’s that early in the semester would be pointlessly demoralizing to students. The suggesting teacher specifically complained that very few students read the summer reading book, and that, therefore, upon returning to school in the fall, most kids start out with very low English grades upon taking the tests that measure how well students read the book in question over the summer. Admin pointed out that Gradequick does allow for giving a student a “pass” grade rather than specifying whether it was a D/C/B/or A, and that Jeff Ordway probably can tell any interested teacher how to do this. In fact, any teacher with a TA probably already knows how to accomplish this override, since TA’s are always graded on a pass/fail basis. It was stressed by admin that although giving “pass” grades at the 5 week point is just fine, the 15 week progress report MUST specify what letter grade a student is achieving, since students who are passing but are in danger of failing must be warned by the bestowal of a “D” grade. Regarding the alleged widespread failure of our students to comply with over-the-summer reading assignments, Mr. Newell suggested that the English department head could be trained and authorized to issue NTI’s (computer-controlled, automated mass phone calls to our students’ homes) before and during summer to remind parents that their kids do, in fact, have homework over the summer. Regarding teachers who feel that there is insufficient data upon which to differentiate between D’s, C’s, B’s, and A’s at the 5-week point in the semester, K. Dragone suggested that department-wide common assessments should provide ample data for such determination. The suggesting teacher also mentioned that if progress reports were sent home only to those students who are getting D’s & F’s at the 5 & 15-week point, the district/sites could save money, but the FAC chair neglected to bring this up at the meeting, perhaps because he’s getting senile and punchy this late in the school year.
7. PROM NO-GO LOOPHOLES: One teacher complained that certain students who were officially on the no-go list were allowed to buy prom tickets/attend prom. Mr. Newell confessed, accepting full responsibility for this, admitting that he is a “softie”. Mrs. Dragone reported that she had berated him repeatedly for doing this. When the school puts forth rules and regulations and then fails to enforce them, it makes the good kids look like chumps, and it teaches rule-breakers that they can get away with disobedience and lazy mediocrity, unscathed and equally-rewarded. This sends a destructive message to both the wicked and the virtuous, with long-term effects. It undermines the very notion of accountability. It absolutely infuriates those who follow rules and those who believe in them, and prompts many of the disgruntled to advocate for the wholesale dismantling of the rule systems that are circumvented by the very gatekeepers whose task it is to uphold them. It allows a kid to look good in a tux today, but look awful in handcuffs or a cardboard box tomorrow.
8. FAC MINUTES: One teacher (?) wrote an anonymous note complimenting the FAC chair for his hard work in writing the FAC meeting minutes every month. I suppose that’s nicer than a scissor kick to the larynx. Thank you, masked stranger. The FAC chair would like to thank everyone who has taken part in the process this year, including, of course, the administrators, who have been frank when they have disagreed with faculty input, but have been generally very receptive, respectful, community-minded, and sincerely helpful. They helped make a process that could have been pointlessly adversarial into a heartfelt, collaborative mechanism. Everybody, please have a bitchen summer.
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If you have any complaints, suggestions, or praise that you would like added to the next FAC meeting’s agenda, please email , or, if you want to remain anonymous, leave a note in Dan Barnes’ box. Also, please let Mr. Barnes know your observations of how well the promises made in these minutes are being enacted.
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