ANDOVER ELEMENTARY SCHOOL

EARLY LEARNING CENTER

School Readiness Council Meeting

Minutes from the September 8, 2016 Meeting

Members in Attendance: Sally Doyen, Superintendent; Diane Kane, Administrative Assistant; Anne Keedy, Speech and Language Pathologist; Leslie Labenski, Preschool Teacher; Jennie Morrell, Preschool Teacher; Marilyn Piecuch, SR Liaison; Suzanne Guglietta, Preschool Administrator; John Briody, Principal/Director of Curriculum

Public Comments: None

[Parents Kate and Mike Greenhouse volunteered to serve on the School Readiness Council. Tuesdays are prime meeting dates for them. The Council will take that into consideration when setting future meeting dates.]

Packet Distribution-Policies/Procedures/Grants/Evaluation:

  • This year’s School Readiness Grant for Andover was cut by approximately $10,000, with the total grant award of $96,000. The QE Grant stayed the same at $3,800 and will be used for a behavioral in-service.
  • Two new policies were distributed: 1) Council Membership and Responsibilities – all members must be listed with the Early Childhood Registry and have background in early childhood education and/or services. 2) Policy for Programs Meeting NAEYC Program Accreditation Requirements – maintaining compliance through policy adherence and reporting.

Enrollment – Current and Potential Changes:

Enrollment to date is 13 and 15 respectively per classroom, a total of 28 preschoolers. Classrooms are comprised of a balance of three and four year olds. A new Birth-to-3 child will be coming in shortly. He has a December birthdate, and we need to determine when he will start, pre or post the date of December 13, 2016.

State Updates:

  • Myra Jones, Head of the Office of Early Childhood is leaving. No news yet of a replacement.
  • Gerri Rowell’s replacement (due to her retirement) is Andrea Brinnel.

Marilyn distributed a Growth Plan to be completed as a tracking tool for professional development (will be kept in a binder). Suzanne distributed a list of potential professional development courses. Paraprofessionals are responsible to attend as well since they are a part of the educational team. We may possibly use funds from tuition payments to pay for training. Both teachers and paraprofessionals must use the professional registry to get credit for the courses they do take and maintain their “ladder” of professional development. Professional development criteria is available in NAEYC paperwork. A lot of this training is already included in our scheduled school professional development days and can be applied to NAEYC training requirements.

Parent surveys/teacher surveys will be reviewed at the next meeting. Suzanne will obtain Hebron’s NAEYC booklet and forward it to everyone. This booklet answers a lot of gray area questions pertaining to the surveys. Specials teachers, for instance, are not required to complete surveys as the questions are more classroom-based. The instructions actually direct that “teaching staff” complete them. The next step is to create an Action Plan based on the surveys and submit it to the NAEYC office.

Establishment of Dates of 2016-2017 SRC Meetings:

All meetings will begin at 3:00 p.m. and will possibly be moved to the Library. The following meetings were set for 2016-2017:

  • October 18 (Tuesday)
  • November 15 (Tuesday)
  • December 15 (Thursday)
  • January 17 (Tuesday)
  • February 16 (Thursday)
  • March 28 (Tuesday)
  • April 20 (Thursday)
  • May 16 (Tuesday)
  • June (TBD)

Next SRC Meeting: October 18, 2016 in the AES Library at 3:00 p.m.

IMPORTANT NOTES:

Work on Policies and Procedures.

Professional Development Videos can be made available for paraprofessionals.