April 2024 DCES PTO Board Meeting Agenda and Minutes

4/3/2024 1:13 pm

DCES PTO BOARD MEETING MINUTES - New Board Old Board meeting - April 2, 2024

Present:

Tara McConnell, Old Board Co-President

April Beauboeuf, New Board Co-President

Sophie Badgett, New Board Co-President

Lisa Lee, Old Board Treasurer

Kristen Easton, New Board Treasurer

Nicole Carey, VP of Fundraising

Stephanie Sedlak, New Board VP Communications

Casey Magargle, New Board VP Communications

Melanie Frisone, Old Board VP of Hospitality

Blair Geczi, New Board VP of Hospitality

Kimberly Lyons, New Board VP of Hospitality

Craig Doss, VP Technology

Mary Olley, Old Board VP of Technology

Whitney Graving, VP of Events

Melissa Caramucci, Teacher representative

Jamie McCrensky, Teacher Representative

Erin Scagnelli, Vice Principal

Paige Miller-Blum, site council representative

Amie Hegeman, Mandarin representative

Absent:

Adam Cusimano, Secretary

Courtney Schramm, Old Board VP Communications

Kimberly Mills, Principal

Principal Update

Mrs. Mills & Mrs. Scagnelli

A + Recognition April 9th Governing Board Meeting RSVP.Share out to DCES Families as well.

Kindergarten enrollment - up to 60, 37 in Mandarin.

Testing going on this week. Last week was 5th grade science, today is writing, then oral reading fluency and next week is reading and math.

Still finalizing staffing for 2024 year. Some adjustments being made to teaching staff and classes.

President Update

Tara McConnell

April Beauboeuf - board to vote on updated library series titles purchase (2200 USD) + line item for each semester. Vote passes 90% of staff. Vote for the 2200 library series title purchase passed unanimously.

Sister Schools relaunch

Sophie Badgett

VP of Fundraising

Nicole Carey - vote to make changes passed unanimously.

Proposal for new Sponsorship packages and pricing for 2024/2025

	BRONZE	SILVER	GOLD	PLATINUM
Website	3 x 2" logo for full year	3 x 2" logo for full year	3 x 2" logo for full year	6x2" Banner on Homepage + 3x2" logo for full year
PawPrint Newsletter Communication	Weekly logo for full year	Weekly logo & 1 advertisement / coupon per year	Weekly logo & 2 advertisement / coupon per year	Weekly Logo & 3 advertisements / coupon per year
Signage at DCES	Your Logo on the DCES PTO "Thank You" Banner	Your Logo on the DCES PTO "Thank You" Banner	Your Logo on the DCES PTO "Thank You" Banner	Individualized "Thank You" Banner
Yearbook			Color Advertisement	Color Advertisement
Facebook Exposure during School Year	2 Facebook posts	3 Facebook posts	Facebook Cover Photo and 4 PTO Facebook posts	Facebook Cover Photo and 5 PTO Facebook posts
Invitation to attend campus events	Yes	Yes	Yes	Yes
Donation	$350	$550	$800	$1,500
15%	$403	$633	$920	$1,725
2024/2025 Pricing	$400.00	$625.00	$900.00	$1,725.00
	14.29%	13.64%	12.50%	15.00%

Early Bird Rate	$360.00	$562.50	$810.00	$1,552.50

Eliminate Diamond-level
Raise rates roughly 15% (have not been raised past two years), but provide an “Early Bird” discount of 10% off the new rates for returning sponsors
Craig/Mary, is there a way to do a discount code on Membership toolkit?
Craig/Mary, can we update the online form with the new rates May 1?

Site Council Update

April Beauboeuf

Mandarin Rep update

Amie Hegeman

District podcast to showcase Mandarin DLI rolling out in April as well as press article (City Sun Times). Middle school is excited for their upcoming trip to China in 2025. Could be open to 5th graders and above. Naming ceremony happening on April 19th at 9am for 2nd grade ceremony.. 300 dollars requested to support decorations and snacks. Amie will send details for an email vote.

Treasurer

Lisa Lee

Kristen Easton

Current Chase Checking Account Balance: $116,265.95

Amazing Race numbers:

Expenses - $3,746.92

Donations - $32,825.00

Net Total: $29,078.08

**There are some prizes and misc expenses not included as of 4/2/2024, so the net total will decrease slightly.

Teacher Reps

Melissa Caramucci/Jamie McCrensky

vending machine book titles will be presented
Information on Gillian Ragan bench will be shared
Noah Ayala bench, name added to Gillian’s or separate bench?
Kindergarten Buddy day May 3rd- Buddy bags and event details (8:45 Checkin event 9-10:30am) - Laura Weeshoff doing buddy bags. Order coffee and muffins for parents?

VP of Events

Whitney Graving

Student prizes distributed on Monday 4/1

Breakfast with Melvin for top tier Amazing Race donors- April 26th

Extra clear tote bags and blue cups (100 bags, 100 cups) - Use for Teacher Appreciation Week??

VP of Special Projects/ Campus Improvements

Sophie Badgett

VP of Hospitality

Melanie Frisone

Blair Geczi

Kimberly Lyons

Teacher Appreciation Week May 6 to 10. A+ celebration is May 9th.

VP of Communications

Courtney Schramm

Stephanie Sedlak

Casey Magargle

VP of Technology

Mary Olley

Craig Doss

———-

A note from Tara to the new board

It is my hope that the future boards will be good stewards of the money the community entrusted in you. This money was donated by aunts and uncles and grandmas and grandpas and even children. Every year as treasurer, during the Amazing Race, I would get at least one bag of coins from a student and it was always a reminder of how much people were willing to give us no matter how little they had. To me, that means two things. That means we have a responsibility to spend the money and we have a responsibility to spend the money wisely. Those things are not mutually exclusive. In the last few months, I’ve heard someone say at a board meeting “we have lots of money so why does it matter if we are doing it in a cost effective way?” And I’ve seen an email that asked us to distribute very purposely deceptive information about costs to teachers and parents. I’d really like to encourage all of you to point these things out when you see them and to use as much integrity as possible when making all your decisions. Familiarize yourself with the budget and ask Kristen questions. Budgetary concerns are not just treasurer concerns. Being good stewards of the funds entrusted to you is an important part of your role as a board member and I hope you’ll be a board that families can trust.

Give and accept feedback. Several years ago, Cheyenne PTO tried to move from a volunteer led donation drive to an outside company donation drive. But the families (who should be a huge stakeholder in this decision since it’s money you’re asking from them) were so upset that Cheyenne PTO has gone back to volunteer led ever since. Before the board meeting where we discussed doing the same, I was led to believe that the only reason outside companies were being contacted was for ideas such as a color run and we were still intending to do the Amazing Race as completely volunteer led. It’s important to note that if we had raised the same amount during Amazing Race using Moolah fundraising, they would have taken 35% of our family raised funds. Raising these concerns is not to be taken personally and nobody should walk away from that experience saying “nobody likes my ideas.” If at any point, you are no longer using them, Debbie Blaes would like to have the original Amazing Race materials (binder/format/unused materials etc) for use elsewhere.

Do not tolerate deceitfulness or a lack of transparency. Call it out. There should be at least 1-2 additional board members cc’ed/invited to all PTO business. Recently, I’ve been left out of a series of emails conducting PTO business that I should have been included on and then they were deleted from the sent email box. Unfortunately, this is something the new board is going to have to be on the lookout for. In this atmosphere, I strongly encourage you to make it a priority to publish all meeting minutes within several days of your board meetings, to have the two required open meetings, and to consider if any communications with families are misleading. This PTO is a 501c3 and nothing should be done in secrecy.

Change is good! But change should be made while understanding how things were done beforehand so that the same mistakes aren’t made over and over again. And integrity and transparency should never be sacrificed in the name of change. As a board member, no matter what job you’ve volunteered to do, it is your job inside the board meeting to speak up and ask questions and to promote clarity when communicating with donors.