Bellevue PTSA Council 2

Bellevue PTSA Council 2.3

General Membership Meeting

Monday, March 3, 2008, 7:00 p.m. / Bellevue School Dis= trict office (ESC)

Announcement of this meeting was given in email and is listed in Council Directory and on the website.

In attendance: see sign in sheet -- A quorum is presen= t.

The meeting was called to order by President Connie Ge= rlitz at 7:03 p.m.

February meeting minutes were presented. John Stokes m= ade a motion to approve as written. The motion was seconded and approved.

No Treasurer’s Report is available. The account balance on 1/29 was $21,080.67.

Announcements:

Dana Stoneman= from Sherwood Forest thanked Cherry Crest for assisting SF in writing a BSF grant, helping acquire library books and for being a supportive “sist= er school.”

Region Direct= or Election has been held and Audrey Bennett is our new Region Director. Congratulations to Audrey!

State PTA Con= vention is being held May 2 – 4 at a SeaTac hotel. Connie encouraged all units to attend and take advantage of the training, classes, networking and information fair.

Awards: D= ennis Gerlitz is our Council Awards chair and asked for 2 volunteers to help. Kari Lucas and Eric Matson volunteered to help. Dennis handed out descriptions of the awards. Nomination forms will be distributed at the next meeting and= via email.

Spring Confer= ence will be held on March 15 in the morning at Mt. Si High School. This regional training conference offers many basic classes and parenting classes for PTA members and leaders at local units.

Membership – several units earned the Gold level award (10% increase in membersh= ip over last year). Connie congratulated those schools and handed out the certificate of award. Units not in attendance can pick them up at the next Council meeting.

Committee Reports:

Leadership – Audrey Bennett. Audrey handed out the March training schedule. She reiterated that all local units should attend the Spring Conference. One fee per unit allows limitless number of participants to attend. She suggests th= at units review their standing rules prior to Nominating Committee’s work and make any necessary changes.

Legislative <= /b>– Eric Matson. Eric encouraged all to support, inform membership and vote in = the construction bond special election on Tuesday, March 11. This bond is criti= cal funding for school building projects. He encouraged all to help recruit pho= ne callers for the phone bank to remind voters to get out and vote. Eric also reported on Focus Day that was 2/13/08. Two buses drove 83 riders to Olympia. Many of = the riders this year were students. There were suggestions that the bus leave earlier and return later next year. Eric posed the question on whether to l= imit the number of students attending. He cited liability, expense and limited a= dult “face time” with elected officials as possible barriers to this= day of advocacy. We will continue to discuss this for the future Focus Day even= ts. Eric made a motion to allocate an additional $450 to reimburse the bus expenses. The motion was seconded and approved. Eric requested that Lake Washington PTSA Council be billed for their po= rtion of 19 riders at $14.00 each.

Bellevue Scho= ols Foundation – Christena Coutsoubos. Christena announced the Spring= for Schools luncheon will be held at Meydenbauer Center on Thursday,= June 5 this year. The goal is to raise $1.5 million to support science and langu= age arts curriculum in BSD. She indicated that school grants were low this year= and posed the question “why?” Comments were made that the process is too time consuming for teachers. It was suggested that PTA’s provide support (committee) to teachers to write grants.

Spring Celebr= ation – Cindy Hastings. The luncheon event will be held on Monday, April 28= at 12:30 p.m. at the Community Center at Mercer View on = Mercer Island. Price is TBD but approxi= mately $12.00 per person. All local units, Principals, BSD staff, Council members = and scholarship recipients and families should attend. Scholarship and Council Awards will be given out. The event is fun, upbeat and acknowledges our collective good work for the year. Invitations will be coming soon.<= /p>

Scheduled Speaker(s):

Bellevue= Education Association – President Stephen Miller. Stephen reported that the teacher’s union is dissatisfied with the Curriculum Web and would like to make some changes. He proposes a teacher and parent forum to discuss the Curriculum Web. The date= is scheduled for March 25 at 6:30 p.m. at International Schoo= l. Stephen requested that the Bellevue PTSA Council support this effort.

John Stokes made a motion that Council endorse and enc= ourage the Curriculum Conversation. The motion was seconded and approved. Further discussion revealed that Council does not take a position on the issues but endorses the event as an opportunity for parents and teachers to openly discuss BSD's curriculum and the Curriculum Web. Stephen will forward a flier to Connie to be distributed to local units as a promotional piece.

Family Resource= Center – = Paula Matthysse and Cultural Navigator speakers. This non-profit agency is suppor= ted by King County and City of Redmond and Bellevue. It serves to provide connecti= ons in multiple language and culture friendly forms to human services such as medi= cal, government, school and other human services agencies. It was suggested t= hat there be a link on the Bellevu= e PTSA website to this agency. Handout distributed.

PAAC/Latino P= arent Advisory – Ann Oxreider and speakers. Presentations were made abo= ut the outreach efforts of these two organizations. They exist to help minority and English challenged parents engage in the community and school. Multiple language phone systems, fliers in several languages and personal communicat= ions are all sited as efforts to support these families. Handouts distributed.

Hope Link= – Juan Hernandez. As time was short, Juan asked to be rescheduled to the n= ext meeting. Connie said that he could.

Connie asked that our next General Membership Meeting be changed from April 7 (Spring Break for BSD) to Monday, March 31 at 9:= 00 a.m. at the ESC. The membership agreed.

Action Items: see items underlined. Meeting was adjour= ned at 9:00 p.m.

Cindy Hastings

Bellevue<= /st1:City> PTSA Council Secretary