St Teresa Catholic School

Parish Board of Education Meeting Minutes

March 15, 2016

Call to order at 7:03 PM by M. Nash (filling in as President and VP both excused)

Opening Prayer by Fr. David Darin

Present: Fr. Anthony, Msgr. David Darin, S. Birdsong, T. Gebke, M. Nash, L. Elbe, A. Fries, D. Thro, B. Safarian, C. Pawlow

Excused: S. Whitener, D. Artimisi, P. Schroeder, J. Monken

Minutes were approved and seconded

Correspondence: none

Organizational Reports:

Perpetual Help: no report

PTO: No report

Extended Care: budget reviewed—no issues from the board; Ms. Lickenbrock retiring, S. Birdsong looking to revamp/reorganize program down the road, looking at different revenue sources and making it more educationally driven

STAA: no report

Men’s Club: no report, Fish Fry’s overall went better than last year

Old Business:

STEM Lab Update (S. Birdsong): last update to board; teachers using it often, sign- up sheets in place for use, looking to partner with IMSA Fusion program, S. Birdsong doing observations in the lab the past few days, also looking at protocols for use

Honors Algebra Update (S. Birdsong): follow up meetings resulted in a re-take of a test and some students are going to the teacher before school and at lunch; S. Birdsong has also observed the class in action; going forward a principal’s meeting will be set up with the Belleville schools and Althoff to standardize the Honors Algebra Curriculum

New Business:

Pastor report: (Msgr David Darin)—reviewed recent Presbyteral Council meeting based around what they are doing in Chicago Archdiocese for strategic planning for Catholic Schools. Preparations are underway for Holy Week and an Easter Egg Hunt will be happening this year. Also School Board evaluations of the principal are due.

Principal report (S. Bridsong)—Tuition is set for next year with St. Teresa being the most inexpensive of the four Belleville parochial schools with a $100 increase; work is also underway in the diocese for a Standards Based report card, but they are looking at which standards to use. Registration is coming in but the importance of timely registration to determine next year’s numbers was stressed. Work is also ongoing for next year’s Calendar

Parish Finance Director report (D. Thro)—working on budges/enrollment/registration; awaiting results of STEM raffle which will be important to offset Parish funds used to finance the STEM lab; looking at going with a $43 admin fee for FACTS tuition which will save $7K a year, need board support for this; long term looking at integration Option C as software for school but will take time and effort; school budget numbers are tight; need to be mindful of this as registration and hiring process begins; different scholarships are coming available as well

Director of School Enrollment report (S. Birdsong/L. Elbe)—registration at 145 for the large school, 50 for ECC but registration just beginning and deadlines have not yet occurred

Committee reports:

Annual Fund/fundraising—L. Elbe—reviewed handout with highlights being looking at federal and corporate grant opportunities for STEM lab funding, looking at the “Career Wall” as a selling point; awaiting the results of the STEM lab raffle later this month; also looking at a program where school supplies are ordered for delivery and school gets a 5% cut of the proceeds

Communications—Cindy Pawlow—Mother’s Day mailing going out and Newsletter is resuming soon

Enrollment—Ann Fries—no update other than above

Technology—Todd Gebke –recent meeting was postponed

Building and Grounds—Paul Schroeder and Brian Safarian—mulch was ordered with a 4/1 delivery planned

Long Range Planning—Brian Safarian—2014 plan will be sent to the School board for review, should probably be reviewed quarterly

Curriculum—S. Birdsong—looking at curricular issues such as need for spelling in upper grades, decreasing to 2 lunch periods with recess before, trying to expand class time to 50 minutes especially in upper grades, currently only at 35 minutes

Policy—Mike Nash—will be looking at uniform and maybe class size policy

Grants—Lisa Elbe—no update other than the above

Future Business:

none

Next Meeting : Tuesday April 19, 2016

Adjournment at 8:12 PM

Closing Prayer by Msgr. David Darin

Respectfully submitted by Mike Nash (secretary)