Patrick Henry School of Science and Arts PTA

Patrick Henry School of Science and Arts PTA

General Membership Meeting and Leadership Team Meeting

October 25, 2016

Minutes

Before the meeting was officially called to order the first grade teachers, Ms. Morris, Ms. Swift, Ms. Nissenson, and Ms. Starke made a brief presentation about what goes on in an average first grade day.

The meeting was called to order by Sydney Watts, PTA President, at 6:10 pm.

First item of business was the approval of the minutes from the September 13th General Membership meeting. A motion was made to approve the minutes, that motion was seconded. There was no discussion and the motion passed with a voice vote.

Second item of business was a necessary budget amendment. The purchase of the Track-It-Forward software, used for logging family involvement hours, was inadvertently left off the budget that was approved at September’s meeting. Diane Heipel made a motion to amend the budget to include the purchase of the software for $288. Charlotte Bowen seconded the motion. Sydney noted that the PTA agreed to pick up the tab for this software for this first year as a trial period but if it is used in subsequent years, the Board will be expected to pay the annual fee. The motion passed with a voice vote.

President’s Report

• Sydney welcomed everyone to the meeting and noted that tonight’s brief meeting will focus on planning and preparations for the Fall Festival on Friday, October 28 and will be followed by a Leadership Team Meeting to discuss PTA events for November and December. The Leadership Team Meeting is open to anyone who wants to attend. Sydney gave a brief summary of all the wonderful fun to be had at the Fall Festival – Trunk-or-treat, chili cook-off, raffle – and encouraged everyone to come and bring a friend. The cost is $5 for adults and kids are free.

Vice President’s Report

• Ashley reported that the Penny Wars right before Fall Break netted $506.50. The winning House will be announced at the Friday Morning Meeting on 10/28

Treasurer’s Report

• Rose presented the September 2016 bank reconciliation. The beginning balance was $6,529.91 and the ending balance was $6,581.53. We raised approximately $1,000 last month (PTA memberships, Grandparents Day, T-shirt sales, and mostly the Off The Wall fundraiser at The Betty) and spent approximately $900 (T-shirt payments, PTA insurance, Track-it-Forward software, Back to School night supplies). It is important to note that we have not yet paid our annual dues to the National and Virginia PTAs so a portion of the $6,500 in our account right now isn’t really ours.

Events and Fundraising Committee, Fall Festival update, Cathy Durrette

• Trunk or Treat will take place from 5-6pm, along with a spooky storyteller in the garden
• We are really trying to utilize the entire building and grounds this year.
• The main event is from 6-8pm – chili cook-off, games in the auditorium, costume contest for the adults.
• All proceeds go towards the playground.
• Folks don’t need to be present to win a raffle or one of the teacher experiences.
• There are a few spots left for Trunk or Treat volunteers and the clean-up crew. We could use more salads to go with the chili, along with plates, napkins, cups, forks.

Open Comment

• Bunny, the box top lady, introduced herself as “the box top lady” and reported that a promotion that she initiated at the end of last year encouraging kids to make containers for the box tops has gone awry. All of the student creations that were brought to school have gone missing and she is very sorry if any students are disappointed to not see their creation on display. She has another promotion planned to encourage more box top collecting and suggests that we could potentially make $1,000.
• She would love help counting the box tops. They are due next week and the next deadline is in March.
• Please share any ideas for encouraging box top collection. If you have a smart phone, the box top app gives you bonus box tops.

Leadership Team Meeting, 6:30-7:40 (In attendance: Sydney Watts, Ashley Kenneth, Rose Crews, Kristin Kirchen, Cathy Durrette, Diane Heipel, Elliott Jordan, Karen Cramer, Erin Van Vleet, Joe Hunt, Lourdes Post, Ann-Alyssa Hill)

• Spirit wear: Cathy Durrette had mock-ups of T-shirts and sweatshirts from a new company (Positive Promotions) for the team to consider. With this new company parents/family would place the order online directly with the company, relieving the PTA of dealing with taking orders and delivering the shirts. Shirts would be shipped directly to the purchaser. The team was asked if we thought it would be okay to include an option for a hoodie since they are not technically allowed under the dress code. Cathy indicated that Dr. A’s opinion was that the hoodie was fine, the dress code might need to be tweaked but regardless a child shouldn’t wear the actual hood in school and that was up to the individual teacher to correct. The PTA gets 40% of the sales. The team voted to proceed with the designs as proposed.
• Cathy and Kelly Kerr have been working on writing a grant for new playground equipment. With Dr. A, they’ve looked at equipment from a company called Sparks Play and picked out what PHSSA would like. It would cost in the neighborhood of $40,000. The grant they are working on has the potential to be up to $40,000. Based on the outcome of the grant and our Fall Festival fundraising efforts we may need to revisit fundraising in January.
• November events planned
• Spirit Stop for the Richmond Marathon – We need a theme, nothing too complicated, maybe we could get one of the breakfast-oriented food trucks to come, we need lots of people to turn out and cheer. We will be competing for a spirit prize of up to $500.
• International Night – The K-1 International Night is the same night as our November meeting. Sydney plans to have the presentations by the kids to start, then we’ll have a brief meeting and release parents to classrooms. International Night for grades 2-5 is on the following Thursday. Ms. Price has asked for the PTA’s help with International Night but it isn’t clear what exactly she wants us to do. The consensus seemed to be that this wasn’t our event, we were really focused on the Fall Festival, and that the teachers need to communicate with room parents to let all parents know what is needed and how they can help – PTA will not take the lead on this.

• December Events planned

• We had tentatively planned a Kids Night Out event but our tentative date won’t work due to the scheduling of the play. We don’t know if/when there is a holiday music concert this year. We could do a bake sale at the holiday music thing and/or the play but we need to coordinate with the third grade as they are planning on selling concessions during the play to benefit the class trip. Between the play and the (assumed) music concert and the fact that the kids get out on December 9, December is too busy to do another PTA event. We could consider moving Kids Night Out to January when nothing is going on. January 12 was floated as a potential date.
• The PTA is not doing Polar Express Day, the teachers are taking it over.

• 2017 Events planned: Math Games (February), Skate Party (February/March), End of Year picnic (this is the big one).
• Fundraising: Do we want to do another fundraising event in 2017? We had previously mentioned the possibility of doing a Boosterthon event – they organize fun runs, etc. The kids ask for sponsors to participate and that is how we raise money, so it does involve the kids asking family/friends/neighbors for money. The Team agreed it was a possibility but that we should see how the Fall Festival goes (how much money we raise, how successful we are at getting people to help out and to participate) before making a decision.
• Involvement Coordinating Committee – Diane Heipel reported that this committee has just been formed – includes Dr. A, Ms. Marunde, Sarah McLillard,and Diane – with the intent of helping families complete their involvement hours prior to the deadline in December and for the year overall. The committee will be reaching out to those families that are short of the goal for December (there are still lots of families that haven’t met the goal and we don’t really know what the issue is). A few families don’t have email but there are lots that have zero hours. The committee will be communicating directly with families that are short to see how we can get them involved. Sydney made the Team aware that we may be asked to “find” volunteer opportunities for people to do. Kristin noted that the handout that came home in the folder detailing all of the October volunteer opportunities was comprehensive and very helpful. Diane indicated that the goal was to do one of these sheets every month.

The meeting broke up between 7:30 and 7:40.