Anvil City Science
Parent Advisory Board
REGULAR MEETING

January 23, 2003

M I N U T E S

CALL TO ORDER

Cheri Kruschek, called a scheduled Regular Meeting of the Parent Advisory Board to order at 7:09 p.m., Thursday, January 23, 2003 in the Council Chambers at City Hall, in Nome, Alaska.

PRESENT
Cheri Kruschek Randy Romenesko
Annette West Leslie Swenson
Sharon Keeney-Olson Lew Tobin

STAFF PRESENT
None

1. Kathy Horner not present. The Board is interested in hearing Ms. Horner about the testing program and where it falls under NPS District policies. Need to get input from Mr. Hindman and Mrs. Leeper on program.

2. It appears that ACSA may have funds available for reprogramming within the school. Ms. Swenson will speak with Business Manager Amy Lujan and Personnel Administrative Assistant Irene Merchant on the ASCA budget; to reprogram the available funds. Possible uses for the funds would be the hiring of someone to write our Charter School application for the State and the purchase of microphone systems for class use. Possibly contact Georgianna Takak, Director of Special Education to ask about the systems currently in use by the Elementary School and if we have any students with a hearing deficiency.

3. Lap top computers arrived early January but have not been able to connect to the internet. Ms. Kruschek will contact Pat Malloy, Technology Coordinator, and request assistance from his Tech Master students. ACSA may need to purchase additional equipment to get the system up and running.

4. Ms. Keeney-Olson will meet with Janeen Sullivan on scheduling gym time. She will also talk with Pat Malone. Discussed ordering Presidential Fitness awards for ACSA qualifying participants. There is a softball program scheduled for spring and possibly cross-country skiing.

5. Discussion for 2003/04 staffing resulted in the decision to hold an Executive Session. The board is looking at changing staffing to allow more time for administrative duties as well as teaching duties. The following options were presented and will be further discussed at the Executive Session:
a. 2 full-time teachers & 1 aide
b. 2 full-time teachers & one ½-time teacher
c. 1 full-time teacher & two ½-time teachers and 1 aide
d. 1 full-time lead teacher & two ¾-time teachers

Some questions that need to be answered are what benefits are available for ¾-time teachers and how would that affect their retirement.

The Board will also be discussing how they can redo the "model" to best fit ACSA student needs and parent desires.

6. Ms. Swenson discussed the current ACSA application with NPS District.
a. Draft agreement is nearly complete
b. Louie Yanetti and his tech review committee will look at the agreement before final approval
c. Ms. Swenson met with Superintendent Lujan and Business Manager Lujan and have reviewed the November 2002 draft
d. Article 9: only teachers need NPS Board approval on their contracts, not aides and other staff.
e. Complete and accept agreement by end of 2002/03 school year.

7. State Charter School Application Renewal was discussed with Ms. Swenson handing out the template that will be used for "grading" our application with Mr. Louie Yanetti being the charter school contact. Current ACSA application is approximately 50 to 75 percent complete towards new application. Ms. Swenson is to request "contractors" to help write the new application, which is due October, 2003. A Charter School can ask for the application to be good for a time period of three to ten years. ACSA will ask for a period of six years so that in the future the application with the state and the contract with NPS district will not fall in the same year.

8. At 8:45pm Kathy Horner arrived and discussed testing for Math leveling with the Board. The Board feels that ACSA does a good job with standards based testing and is not sure if our students need to be tested. Ms. Horner stated that she is not aware of any problems with ACSA students moving into High School and having any problems in the Math area. The question was asked as to what kind of math testing does ACSA perform and then the Board felt that we needed to talk with Mr. Hindman and Mrs. Leeper as to whether or not they would feel that this testing is necessary and also what the time issue will be regarding the testing.

9. Teacher contract information was then discussed with the following information presented to the board by Ms. Kruschek.

I spoke with Irene Merchant on Tuesday and again yesterday. It was stated that the tentative date for distribution of teacher contracts is set for Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2003. The teachers will have 30 days from receipt of contract in order to sign and return to district office. NPS states that when a contract is signed it is considered a firm commitment and does not allow a teacher to get out of their contract unless there is an unforeseen emergency. In some cases, if a replacement can be found and that it is made known within a reasonable timeframe that the teacher is wishing to get out of their contract that the district may honor that request.

Inter-District transfer requests of certified staff will be received up until the end of February. If a teacher wishes to transfer within the district, they must fill out the appropriate form, which needs to be signed by their building principal, and the building principal that they wish to transfer to, if that is the case. The superintendent has final approval or denial of these requests.

There is a tentative meeting scheduled for Monday, January 27. NPS Administration and the Executive Board for the Teachers Union will discuss the above information and get it all in writing. It will then be distributed to all certified staff of NPS.

The ACSA Parent Board is responsible for finding a replacement for any staff (certified or classified) that chooses not to return the following school year or is let go for any reason. Classified staff will not receive their contracts until after the 03-04 budget is approved (sometime during the months of May-July). In the past, classified staff has had 30 days to return their contracts to NPS. If ACSA should fold then NPS will absorb any staff with signed contracts.

10. Board discussed concern regarding the correspondence between Mr. Hindman, Mrs. Leeper and a concerned parent. The e-mails were reviewed previously by most of the board members and Mr. Romenesko and the board agreed that Mr. Hindman handled the correspondence very professionally and felt that there was nothing further to discuss.

OTHER BUSINESS

Louie Yanetti and DEED will be in Nome the week of March 17 for District and Charter School inspection. Mr. Yanetti will send a checklist in preparation of his visit so that ACSA staff and board can have the information ready and available for him. The board would also like to meet with Mr. Yanetti while he is in Nome.

BOARD COMMENTS

There were no comments.

ADJOURNMENT

There being no further business to discuss, the meeting adjourned at 10:04 p.m.