The Meeting Was Called to Order at 6:05 P.M. by Tim Sullivan, Principal
Classical Magnet School
Parent Senate Meeting Minutes for January 14, 2009
The meeting was called to order at 6:05 p.m. by Tim Sullivan, Principal.
Mr. Sullivan gave the Principal’s Report:
One of the parents on the Student Life Committee hasn’t shown up for the last two meetings (November and December)—Deb Fuller will contact them.
Discipline: Suspensions are low, there have been no expulsions, tardiness is being dealt with through Friday detentions.
Teaching: There have been 353 classroom visits. Mr. Sullivan has personally spent 80 hours in the classroom, so 10% of the time Tim is in class with the students. He is generally pleased. There are 2 or 3 teachers that he is considering not renewing for next year. Classes are not as Paideia-ish as he would like—still a little too didactic and traditional.
Attendance: The students have the best attendance record so far this year. There was a spike in absences for certified and non-certified staff (holidays, illness).
There is not as much school spirit lately, so on Friday January 23, the last day of the marking period, there will be a Fun Friday. It is a full day of school followed by a movie at 2:30, volleyball game, basketball game, and then a high school dance in the cafeteria. Kids can wear jeans and any shirt that says Classical (jerseys, hoodies, team shirts, etc).
College admissions information—one student has been accepted at Cornell for next year. (woohoo!!!!) 36% of our seniors have already been accepted into 4 year colleges. Many of the lower achieving students have been accepted into their first choice schools. The top half of the class will be waiting until March because they didn’t choose early decision.
All in all, life is good at Classical.
Transportation stinks—Bus #19 has the worst record from East Hartford.
Applications for next year look strong. Parents need to indicate their first choice on the application. We currently are the first choice of 253 applicants for 140 spots. We will be taking 110 6th graders, 20 9th graders, and 10 10th graders. Private schools will be taking a hit due to the economy. Right now we are short on demographics. 25% of each class needs to be Caucasian and right now we’re only at 21% for 6th grade next year. If you live in a town that sends in a lot of applications, you have no better chance of getting in than anyone else. Right now we have 20 white kids applying for 6th grade. February 17 is the cutoff date for applications. If there is a sibling at Classical, we need to be listed as the first choice for sibling preference to kick in.
Classical has had 15-second ads on National Public Radio.
March vacation is March 23-30.
Snow days can bring the last day of school up to July 1—right now the last day is June 8.
Deb Fuller indicated that the Parent Governance Attendance chart makes the Parent Senate look bad. Tim explained that 700 parents are invited to attend the Parent Senate meetings and tonight we only have 7 here (3 more walked in later), so that indicates poor participation. Deb would like to see a different representation next month.
There are 10 kids from Classical going to the Inauguration on January 20.
There will be a 10% cut in the ECS next year, so this year we’re spending our money. We bought a handicap-accessible van that the theater will be able to use to transport equipment, electron microscopes, teachers are buying $15,000 in supplies to stock up for next year. Regarding the Rock Climbing Wall, we can afford it—the money is set aside, but we can also use that money for other things. It all has to be spent before July 1.
With the budget cuts, we will probably be eliminating $5 field trips to Broadway. We will still be doing college visits.
We will probably do the free trip to Six Flags for students who give their best effort on the CMT and CAPT tests.
CT Latin Day—we used to send 100 students but we’re now limited to 50 per school.
Our new website guy is Mr. Antonio Zea—he’s dormant right now but is working on the website. One year we had students working on the website as enrichment, but the website didn’t improve and became a forum for their favorite things, so we won’t be doing that again.
Jessica Leake, Outreach Coordinator for the Sheff Movement Coalition, gave a presentation. They are a grass roots organization that keeps parents informed about what’s going on in the movement. She offered a sign up sheet to get e-mails about integration issues and any issues in specific towns. The legislative agenda is coming up—a lot of it is budgetary. Right now they are supporting the state’s budget. There is a link on their website to contact your legislators. They support not charging tuition for magnet schools. They are organizing a lobby day on the Spring. There is a comprehensive management plan giving guidelines on how to meet goal—they want 80% of Hartford parents to have their kids in the school of their choice. They’re looking at what marketing works for what groups. It is harder to get Hartford parents involved than suburban parents. Jessica distributed a list of all schools and brochures about the organization. If anyone is going through the application process, they want to hear about it—any questions, complaints, comments, etc. In the budget, they support increasing the amount the sending district will receive from the state, which will encourage districts to send students to magnet schools., which will help schools keep their magnet status by increasing the % of Caucasian students. The governor’s budget comes out the 1st Wednesday after the1st Monday in February, then it goes to the legislator’s appropriations committee who come out with a budget. The Sheff Movement helps fight for supporting increased funding for education. There is a link on their website to find your legislators—please contact them and give then your concerns and opinions. You can also e-mail the governor—the more she hears from people, the better.
Project Choice is where kids are bussed to suburbs from the city—the concern is that people are giving up on the magnet school idea, but all magnet schools are Sheff schools, so they are a priority. We’re running out of space to continue building magnet schools but looking toward the future so there is an option of growing the Open Choice program with no cuts to the magnet schools. We would love to build more Hartford Host schools, but the financial and political climate doesn’t support that right now.
The Sheff Movement holds public meetings once a month on Saturdays—parents are always welcome.
Deb Fuller took a vote on Proposal #12—The Rock Climbing Wall. The proposal passed with a vote of 10 in favor and 0 opposed.
Proposal #14 was read for the first time: Staff will promote solely the usage of Modern Language Association method of citing work on papers. A discussion of the different citing methods was held. Deb will invite Ms. Howard-Bender and teachers from other departments to our next meeting to discuss this issue. Would there be a benefit to using different methods?
Proposal #15 was read for the first time: Semester exam grades will be listed on report cards along with the course grade. Deb will invite the writer of this proposal to our next meeting. Many questions were raised, including Do all classes have the same expectations? What is the weight of the exams? Is it uniform or on a class by class basis?
Other business—Parent Mr. Cephas introduced a program run by the Middlesex Chamber of Commerce: Entrepeneurs Now, Inc.--an after school program for high school juniors and seniors to encourage leadership and entrepeneurialism. They would like to come to Classical to present their program. Deb will look into it.
Leslie Wellman announced that the Summer Reading Committee is still in search of the OneBookOneSchool book. They also need committee members. If anyone has any ideas for the book, please contact Leslie at Books need to be chosen by February so they can be ordered. They need to be very price-sensitive because parents will need to get the grade level book also. The criteria for the One Book is that it needs to be appropriate for grades 6-12 and spark conversation. Generally books geared for 7th grade are appropriate as long as they provoke conversation.
The meeting was adjourned at 7:42 p.m.
Our next meeting is on Wednesday February 11, 2009 at 6:00 p.m.
Respectfully submitted by Cathy Schneider, Secretary.