PTO Meeting Minutes - 8/8/24

9/7/2024 11:22 am

PTO Meeting Agenda Minutes – 8/8/24

1. Principal Update: had a great first week!
   1. Enrollment is looking really good – 81 kindergarteners. 43 are Mandarin! 1st time more in Mandarin than in English class. Able to return all of our teachers this year as well.
   2. Curriculum night on August 20th, primary from 4-45, 3-5th from 515 to 6pm. Children are
      welcome but may not be the best forum for them; cannot use the playground unsupervised.
   3. DCES STEM/Robotics teams – hoping to capitalize on a grant from ASU. Open to grades 3 through 5. Mrs
      Mendelson is applying for the grant along with Mrs Wilson. Will be labelled as a school club. Site
      council likely to pay for teacher stipend time. Open question on paying for additional robot cost
      (approx. 400 dollars); could come before PTO for vote.
   4. Communication sent to parents about the ball court and using it for high heat days. Gates are on the court due to the fire code; involves safety training for students and staff as kids could push the door and walk out. Cameras also supposed to be installed along with an alarm on the gates; Mrs Mills is following up with the district on these
      points.
2. Celebrations
3. Calendar of Events for Q1 of the school year (10 mins)
   1. PTO Happy Hour
   2. Open PTO meetings
   3. Need to close out on school events (make sure calendars align).
4. Fundraiser with the Phoenix Suns/Phoenix Mercury - will require a vote from the board (10 mins). Vote passed unanimously to try as a family fun night.
5. Budget votes (AR/STAR reading)
   1. AR/STAR reading: 35 dollar increase (passed unanimously). Keep in mind that the 1k discount for this year will not be applicable next year; hoping to use district Fastbridge or other assessment tools for next year to reduce costs.
   2. Be Kind program. Need to increase the budget by 450 dollars to cover the differential in the invoice. Passed unanimously.
6. Secretary role vote. Vote passed for Paige Miller Blum to serve as PTO secretary.
7. Committee & VP Budgets (5 mins).
   1. Treasurer has a volunteer (Lee Lander) to help with teacher reimbursements/stipends.
   2. Treasurer to share budget guidance with committee leads associated with specific budget line items (i.e. 5th grade party, Chinese New Year).
   3. Events: parking auction update. Made 5100 dollars on the auction, PTO will earn 4600 dollars after fees.
   4. Communications. Parent Survey feedback: people love our comms channels. Email preferred form of communication. Back to School Bash (dance) got a lot of positive feedback as well.
      1. Remember to send bio and photo to Stephanie. Deadline is Monday evening for going out in the Wednesday newsletter.
   5. Hospitality. Teacher Treat sign up will get up and running shortly. Decorating of teacher workroom for snack delivery. Will get feedback from Mrs Caramucci on preferences. Need list of featured restaurants who have donated to us before; team will follow up with Casey and Melanie.
   6. IT Support. Working on emails and updating the web home page.
   7. Teachers: ink toner needed for the color printer. We have blue and magenta and yellow in stock; black will be ordered by VP of campus improvements and yellow has been delivered. Does not come out of CI budget.
   8. Sponsorship. Raised 7053 dollars in in paid sponsorship YTD. Going to advertise through FB and newsletter which drove new sponsors also. All sponsorship suggestions are welcome! Will do new banner and update.
8. Updates from all VPs (15 mins) – include Comms Survey update.
9. Mandarin Update. T-shirt designs as CNY falls in late January. Moon Festival coming up in class; Sister Cities opportunity to travel to China with students.
10. Teacher Updates. Playground equipment. Mrs Caramucci to follow up with Treasurer and VP of Campus Improvements to order.

PTO Meeting Minutes - 6/4/24

6/5/2024 11:22 am

DCES PTO

BOARD MEETING MINUTES

Call to Order 

• The open board meeting was called to order at 3:01 p.m. by President April Beauboeuf.

Principal Updates

• Working on parent incentive with a tax credit. Plan to add date for fundraiser
• Enrollment is currently going through the district office. A digital flyer will be shared
• Currently transitioning to a new website platform
• New kinder teacher, Melissa Caramucci, announced
• All teachers fully staffed

President Updates

• Setting plans to auction parking spaces
• Focus on the paw partnership for the coming year
• Discussion about increasing the teacher treats for the upcoming year
• Memorial bench has been ordered and will be installed in August.

Treasurer Updates

• Roughly $80k in the bank to start 2024-2025 schoolyear with only a few pending reimbursements and expenses to process.
• 2023-2024 schoolyear brought in $107k while spending $137k
• Budget draft for 2024-2025 was reviewed line by line with highlights. Some numbers can still be adjusted to offset eachother including lowering the book fair expense and increasing the movie night expense.
• April made a motion to accept the 2024-2025 budget pending those changes. Adam seconded the motion. All were in favor and the motion passed.
  

Next Meeting/Adjournment 

• With no further business to discuss the meeting was adjourned. The next meeting date will be August 8, 2024.

Respectfully submitted,

Adam Cusimano – Board Secretary