Justice Street Academy Charter School Tuesday – February 23, 2016
Members:
Principal: Cynthia Hernandez Morrison Parent/Secretary: Tali Lerea
Chapter Chair: Betty Bright Parent/Parliamentarian: Aaron Perry
Teacher: Karen Jaeger Parent: David Rosenberg
Teacher: Stephanie Greco Parent: Phuong Tri
Teacher: Sarah Kremin Parent: Cindy Lyle
Teacher: Sunny Miro Parent: Victoria Reid
Teacher: Shelley Ortiz/Mr. Wright Parent: Jaimie Farnsworth
Teacher: Karen Richards Parent: PTA President: Amanda McDaniel
I. Welcome and Sign in: Principal Hernandez Morrison called meeting to order at 3:01pm in Library.
II. Minutes Approval: Amanda McDaniel made a motion to accept the minutes as presented and Stephanie Greco seconded. Minutes approved.
III. Council Open Forum/What’s Working: We have our annual Charter Oversight Visit on April 7th. Next year, will need to renew our charter and write our application for the following year.
Jazz Assembly was amazing! Math Intervention is working well we’re seeing improvement in the kids. ScootPad too is working well.
Miss Sunny had an update on Security from previous minutes (what’s working). She’s helping in the back of the school for drop off and the morning Safety Valet Dropoff works wonderfully. The afternoons however come with a bit of challenges. Parents are double parking, kids are jumping out in the middle of the street to meet their parents who are parked on the opposite side of the street. Certainly not safe. Mrs. Hernandez requested that the safety committee meet and discuss.
IV. PTA Updates:
Amada McDaniel shared the March Calendar for PTA. Nature’s Vision went well, we have Pajama Day on March 18th. Our elections are coming up and we still need a new President. We do have a very strong PTA board already established.
Victoria Reid: This year we are trying something new, Spaghetti Bingo night on April 1st at Knights of Columbus Hall which is free. We will need some security to keep an eye on the cars because of the location/area (Canoga/Roscoe) near Lanark Park. Ticket prices will include bingo cards and food. We are going to have a professional Bingo Caller. We would love the support of having teachers involved. It’s a kid-friendly and family event. It will start at 5:30pm, We’re getting the Knights and Ladies of Cleveland HS to help as well as the Chaminade HS students. 5th grade parents will handle the snack dessert table. Flyers will be going out this week and it will be $15 adults and $10 for kids (which will include bingo cards, dinner, drink and a cookie). We’re excited and looking forward to this event.
V. Updates
A. Safety – We had our Spring Emergency Drill, Shelter-in-Place Drill, Sr. Lead Officer Sean Dinse came out to meet with teachers.
B. Technology - Smarter Balanced Test Prep - kids are taking practice tests in the computer lab. We’re getting them ready for testing and ScootPad seems to be helping as well. Needs assessment, moving forward how to instructions, using tools for analyzing data through Measuring Up to drive instruction.
C. Positive Behavior Support – Mrs. Hernandez and Mrs. Greco went to a training called Restorative Justice, devised program to try to stop bad behaviors before they start. Through Community Building Circle, teachers establish a climate of respect. The rollout of this program will take several years. Next year, we will be trained on how administrators can use the Harm Circle (a way to talk about what the child did, how do you think that person felt). It’s an opportunity to know the children better, to help them deal with their behaviors. They would like to introduce the teachers to this and start implementing this within the next 2-3 years. It’s a community building, coming up with values, using a talking stick. Getting to know the kids better.
Mrs. Greco was discussing how the kids from Chaminade came to her Student Council and they have been working with the kids on teaching them leadership. The kids were very excited and we hope to move on to the entire school and not just student council. They learned about Parliamentarian procedures, learning more about leadership and independence. They even spoke about planning a talent show. The kids are really very excited.
D. Curriculum – Teachers are wonderful in getting attendance in and as a result of havinwe earned about $2000 for 100% attendance submittals. We are working to improve tardy problem. Recently, we had an average of 35 late students per morning. Mrs. Hernandez introduced a reward card program called zoozingoo.com (Spelling?) it gives students a card to collect and learn about. As each student comes on time, they would receive a card for them to collect it. It would be about $1.80 per student and we have about 394 students.
Our tardiness and attendance is also going to count towards our API.
We had a long discussion on these cards. As a group we did not move to approve the cards. There was a question about consequences for tardies. What are the school allowances for addressing tardies? Comments were made that we’re not real sure how well these will go with the kids and we’re afraid it would be a waste of money and we would end up finding them on the floor or in the trash. Concern was also made that this would now give more work for the teachers to keep track of what cards were already given. Suggestion was made for writing out certificates for the kids. Because there were mostly concerns we decided as a group that by the next meeting we would come up with a reward program and bring forth the ideas to our council by the next meeting.
E. Budget – coming up, next meeting. Based on the state’s timelines, we may need to call an emergency meeting to approve the budget.
VI. Public Comments: Question was asked about cell phones on campus; Mrs. Hernandez said that use of cell phones are not allowed during school hours.
VII. Adjournment: Meeting was adjourned at 4:25pm.