Important note: due to an ongoing police investigation, a few sections of these minutes have been edited.  The full text, as approved at the April 10, 2012 school council meeting, will be published when possible.

RPPS Home and School Association (School Council) Meeting

March 27, 2012

Library 7:00 pm

Attendance: Elise Zarkadas, Julie Vanderschot, Julie Nightingale, Joel Berger, Michele Hayman, Krys Albrecht, Seanna Kreager, Michael Kreager, Lori Lovett, Diana Carney, Sonja Latifpour, Lucie Bohac, Marianne Harvey, Deb Woods, Lisa Levia, Gillian Campbell

Approval of Agenda:

Agenda approved.

Moved by: Michele Hayman

Seconded by: Joel Berger

Carried

Approval of February Minutes:

Elise Zarkadas noted that Abby DeWolfe was not present and suggested that the February minutes taken by Abby be held for approval at the next meeting.
Moved by: Michele Hayman
Seconded by: Julie Vanderschot

Carried

Ski Club

A question from the floor was raised with regards to a refund for the two cancelled ski club outings. Marianne Harvey said that a refund would be issued. She noted that there was the possibility that if the bus was cancelled early enough, then parents would receive a refund for the transportation too, but that the original agreement stated that in the event of cancellation, the refund would not include the cost of the bus. She further noted that Della Urquhart and Sylvie Quessy were working on it.

President’s Report

Elise Zarkadas mentioned an upcoming cocktail/fundraiser party being held March 31 from 7-10pm at the Ottawa Police Association 141 Catherine Street for Abby Fyfe. Funds are being raised for the Canadian Leukemia and Lymphoma Association. Abby will be running her first marathon in memory of her son, William, a former RPPS student. Elise said that tickets and further information was available through Sonja Latifpour and Trish Moss.

Elise briefly mentioned the Khan Academy. She said it was a free on-line learning option for parents/students to utilize. She said that many parents/students have reviewed the site favourably and it’s worth checking out and spreading the word.

Elise issued [an] update [March 26, 2012 - Letter to council.doc, attached below] in hard copy (most present received the update via e-mail on March 26).

In reference to the above Elise Zarkadas reported that she went to the bank today to get signing authority. She found out that since 2006, the last time signing authority was updated, procedures had changed and the treasurer would need to sign off on adding Elise to the signing authority. It was discovered that past president of Council, Julie Vanderschot, was still on the account and that she still had signing authority. Elise said that she would be returning to the bank with Julie Vanderschot in order to establish herself as having signing authority.

Elise Zarkadas spoke about trust. She said that all present were volunteers at the school, that we should trust each other and be solution oriented. She looked around the room and said she trusts each and everyone in the room because we all want to help the school. She said we should give the treasurer the opportunity to correct the financial issues which have been identified in the February meeting. She added that she thinks it’s fair to give someone who has never had a problem or issue time to make corrections between meetings and would do the same for everyone in the room.

Seanna Kreager asked why the Book Fair cheque which had been given to the treasurer in December was still in his possession in February. Seanna noted that the treasurer was stuck out-of-town and didn’t make the February meeting. Elise noted that the school was in possession of the Book Fair funds now. Elise further noted that the treasurer had explained that problems with the pizza cheques had arisen because of having the funds in an allied account and there being a delay in transferring them back to Council’s account.

Mike Kreager voiced his displeasure about the lack of action in the previous six weeks - the approximate timeframe when Seanna initially became aware of milk and pizza payment problems.

Lori Lovett said that we should wait for the treasurer to arrive as he is the best person to provide information on what he did and why.

Elise asked that everyone please hold their questions regarding the cheques/accounts etc. until the treasurer arrived at the meeting. She noted that from an e-mail she just received he would be arriving late at the meeting as he was stuck in traffic en route from a meeting in Montreal. She further noted that he indicated as late as 4:30pm that day that he would be bringing a cheque book for the School Council account to the meeting to turn over to her.

Elise noted that it was very frustrating – but that the best and most complete information would have to come from the treasurer directly. Elise said that in order to assure everyone about the status of the Council’s books that she and Marianne Harvey had talked about having an audit done on the books. She noted that she and Marianne were looking into how to initiate the whole process and what was involved. Elise stressed that it was important to give the treasurer a chance to respond to the requests for information that she had forwarded to him. She added that the treasurer is the best person to answer all questions since Elise is just repeating what he told her in an e-mail/VM or over the phone and cannot be specific on details. She said that the treasurer could respond to those requests for information and provide details when he arrived.

Lucie Bohac said that looking forward Council should investigate what procedures should be put in place to make sure that Council doesn’t run into this problem again. Council should have easy access to its own records/accounting/accounts.

Julie Vanderschot said that the treasurer had done his job for the last decade without issue and needed to be given the benefit of the doubt and the opportunity to explain. She went on to say that until the last month there was no indication that anything was out of the ordinary.

Elise said that among other new procedures, a new procedure should be put in place for the passing of cheques directly from Book Fair to the school without moving the funds through Council’s accounts.

Elise said that further exploration of the discussion concerning Council’s finances would take place once the treasurer arrived.

Principal’s Report

Deb Woods reported that the playstructure was open. She said that today the Grade 1 class got a turn on it, tomorrow Grade 2 and so on. She noted that the girls’ basketball tournament was on-going. She said that RPPS students were being encouraged to participate in the Kids Marathon that was going to take place during the Ottawa Race Weekend. She noted that a portion of the registration fee that RPPS students pay would go to the Canadian Leukemia and Lymphoma Association in honour of William Fyfe. Deb said that training for the Kids Marathon starts on Monday and that two teachers would be assisting the students with their training. Also, Deb noted that the school was getting all new bathroom partitions and that they were currently being installed.

Marianne Harvey reported on the money the school had spent so far regarding the projected figures discussed during the October 2011 Budget Meeting. She said that in sports they had spent $3000 of the $4000 allocated on the cricket workshops and new gym equipment. She said that for drama/visual arts/music/dance they had spent $8800 which is well over the $3,000 budgeted for that category on the hip hop workshops and the drumming. For field trips so far the school has spent $2500 of the $6000 allotted. For staff supplies $600 was spent so far of the $4800 allocated. For technology they had spent $1000 which was over the $500 allocated this year for screens and USB cables. She said that in the math/science/social studies ($3000) and enrichment ($8375) combined category that they had spent $2800 so far. Marianne said that so far the school has spent $18,000 out of the $29,675 available.

As far as spending the remaining of the funds Marianne mentioned they were looking at the following as possible purchases. Marianne said that Helene had put forward a request for an additional $4000 purchase for books. Marianne said that staff resources would also need to be purchased. Marianne noted that they were exploring the possibility that additional enrichment funds be spent on math textbooks and social studies textbooks. Marianne said that if any textbooks were to be purchased that it would be a decision that she and the teachers would make together. Marianne noted that often there are only a couple of different textbooks to choose from and they must be ordered through certain companies. She also noted that textbooks are not the only resource needed to teach.

A discussion followed regarding the debate as to whether the budgeted funds which originate from Book Fair should go to pay for textbooks vs consumables. It was noted that historically this has been a touchy subject. It was noted that Book Fair is supposed to support literacy. It was further explored that many of the technology purchases of the recent past including the Elmos (which are used often to support guided reading) fall under the literacy blanket.

Marianne noted that at the April 10th staff meeting they will be discussing more smart technology. She said that a smart board can cost $4-5000 and that and I-rover (a smart board on wheels) costs $5000. She said that perhaps one of each with a plan to purchase more over time would be a good idea for RPPS. She said it would be great to finally get one wall mounted smart board for the upstairs classrooms. Marianne noted that another technology purchase they would like to make would be a ceiling installed smart board.

Diana Carney asked about the budget process and specifically inquired about the large drumming expenditure. Marianne noted that the only deviation from the October budget figures was the drumming. It was pointed out that usually once the final figures from Book Fair come out and new needs are established a follow-up to the projected budget is done in the new year to accommodate over-expenditures in some categories and under-spending in others. Diana said that she thought that the budget actually reflected priorities that we have talked about at some length and that showing such serious deviation from this (with drumming/dance expenditure and the non-spend on school resources) made a mockery of this whole process. She said something is wrong – either we can’t budget that way or they can’t spend that way.

Marianne mentioned that should the over-expenditures not be approved she could fund these costs with other money (HST/GST rebates, money made from picture taking, and Board money).

A parent brought up that she had heard about schools that had smart boards in every classroom. It was noted that in some of the newer schools the technology is considerably better. It was noted that RPPS is very fortunate to have Elmos in every classroom. It was further noted that most teachers know how to use an Elmo, and in fact most teachers have not learned how to use a smart board. Marianne noted that teachers are being taught how to use the smart boards and currently RPPS has five teachers who really know how to use the smart boards. Gillian Campbell noted that with regards to technology and the budget process that Council really wants to support what the teachers and administration want.

Julie Vanderschot brought up the current budget process and said that if Council wanted to institutionalize a second “correction to the budget” meeting we should be careful, because we do not want just a small group of people (those that show up to the meeting) making decisions when a larger group should be consulted. She noted that the “correction” meeting should be well publicized to the parent community.

Krys Albrecht commented that too much emphasis was being put on the “budget” when in actuality the school needs the funds and they should just be allowed to spend it. Diana Carney mentioned that if the school is going to keep volunteers engaged the volunteers need to be able to see the benefit of their fundraising.

Lucie Bohac said that rather than line items it would be better if a “centrepiece/project/objective” was identified each year so that volunteers/parents could see and understand the priority/focus of their fundraising efforts. She said that a certain percentage of funds raised would then be directed toward that years general guiding statement.

Marianne said that this was already the case and in fact last year the focus was on math. She said that last year they spent $7-8000 on the math carts, $4000 on mathletes workshop, math resources were purchased and the Board also gave the RPPS teachers PD for math. In total she said that $15,000 was spent on math at the school. She further noted that “yes” it made a difference as far as the comments she has received back from both staff and parents.

Gillian Campbell commented that Council was not realizing its full potential as a tool for communication. Julie Vanderschot said that Council needs to formalize a two budget meeting process and talk about the percentage of change as mentioned by Lucie Bohac earlier. Diana Carney said that additionally we should try to have a focus like the math year Marianne mentioned. Lori Lovett said that there should be guidelines about what we can spend the budget on. Julie Vanderschot said that Book Fair has been approved to be the main fundraiser and that all parents should have input before Council allocates. It was noted that the October budget meeting is advertised to the school population and still doesn’t draw a very big crowd. Diana Carney noted that we could poll the parents as a means of consulting them.

Motion proposed to draw up procedures of a two budget meeting process and distribute written documentation to the Executive before the next Council meeting.

Moved by: Julie Vanderschot

Seconded by: Joel Berger

General Show of Hands - Majority

Carried

Book Fair Report

Seanna Kreager said that Book Fair had started a lending library for teachers. She noted that while the books were in our possession we may as well use them prior to the sale. She said it would take the place of the teacher’s bucks that had previously been given out by Book Fair to teachers.

Seanna said that Book Fair has an additional $15,000 in funds to give to the school. The total amount of available money is approximately $19,000 but the remaining amount ($4,000) would be kept by Book Fair for unforeseen expenses (like replacing the mouldy bookcases that had to have cleaned the previous year). She noted that the extra funds were partially due to revenue from the gala and silent auction.

It was noted that in the Fall it was budgeted for $25,000 from Book Fair to go to the school and that amount has been turned over to the school. Seanna announced that in light of recent events the extra cheque should be given directly to the school instead of sending it via the School Council accounts.

Motion proposed to give the extra funds cheque from Book Fair directly to the school.

Moved by: Seanna Kreager

Seconded by: Gillian Campbell

General Show of Hands - Majority

Carried

Seanna said that her authors workshop team was busily pricing out various options. She also mentioned that Book Fair received a very large donation of books from the Kanata United Church.

Grade 6 Graduation

Lori Lovett said she was eager to put together a parent committee to facilitate the grade 6 trip and graduation. Marianne said that the grade 6 trip had been planned for June 17. She noted that the students would be taking a bus to Montreal, visiting Montreal and the biodome and also a sugar bush at the end on their way home. She noted that the ceremony and party were slated for June 25 (because the hall was available that day). Lori said she was surprised to find out that the parent committee would be responsible for paying or raising funds for the hall rental, DJ, and refreshments. Lori said that in previous years she thought that those costs had been covered by the pizza funds. She was encouraged to put together a proposal for Council.

Volunteers / Milk

Lisa Levia said that Helene was pleading fo help in the library. She said that Helene was concerned that certain sections of the library needed a lot of organization/help. Lisa said she would be sending out an e-mail on Helene’s behalf.

Lisa said that RPPS was receiving two deliveries of milk a week and that Elise was in the process of setting up a credit with the milk company in order to avoid their strict COD policy. Lisa noted that the compressor in the chocolate milk fridge was not acting properly. Lori Lovett informed her that the compressor was recently replaced and may still be under warranty.

Treasurer – Not in Attendance

At this point in the meeting it was obvious that the Council treasurer was going to be a “no-show” at the meeting.

Motion proposed to have the School Council books audited.

Proposed by: Elise Zarkadas

Moved by: Michele Hayman

Seconded by: Gillian Campbell

General Show of Hands - Majority

Carried

After School Programming

Lucie Bohac presented a brief version of the report [attached below,  Review of the RPPS Afterschool Pilot Project.doc].

Motion proposed to adopt the recommendations as noted in the report above.

Proposed by: Elise Zarkadas

Moved by: Gillian Campbell

Seconded by: Julie Nightingale

General Show of Hands - Majority

Carried

RPPS Council Electronic Communications

Joel Berger submitted the [linked] report which most Council members received via e-mail prior to the meeting. Hard copies were also available at the meeting. In light of the late hour this business will be moved to the next meeting.

Motion to Adjourn

Moved by: Elise Zarkadas

Seconded by: Gillian Campbell

Carried

Next Meeting: Tuesday April 10, 7pm