South Eugene High School
Parent Council Meeting Minutes
November 30, 2010
1.0 The Meeting was called to order by Helen Beardsworth at 6:30pm. Meeting attendees introduced themselves. Helen presented some correspondence received by Parent Council: a letter about a study being conducted at South about body image and a note from Debbie Boures who was one of last year’s co-chairs for Senior Party held in the Recreation Center at U of O after graduation. Kathy Ruggles will ask Debbie if she will be the contact person for parents interested in chairing this committee. Kathy with put something in enews.
2.0 Secretary’s Report: The minutes of the November 3, 2010 meeting were approved as they appear on the blog.
3.0 Reports
Financial Report: Kathy Barnes presented the budget report. We are on target for our budget. Fewer directories were sold this year, resulting in a lower than expected revenue in that area. Direct Donations have been up this year. According to Kathy’s preliminary report the Gala netted $6, 355. See attached Financial Report.
Program Committee: Lauren Kessler, Professor at U of O, and author of My Teenage Werewolf, has offered to present a public education series at South in February or March free of charge. Her book is about her daughter and the experience of being the mother of a teenager.
Site Council: As part of a discussion in Site Council about the School Improvement Plan and the larger class sizes expected next year, parent representatives expressed a desire for teachers to increase communication with parents about their kids’ progress. Cary Hancock proposed writing a letter from PC to the administration expressing appreciation to teachers for posting blogs, using Basmati and responding to e-mails. There was a consensus that we would like to extend a hardy “thank you” to all teachers who do that. Cary will present a proposed letter at the next PC meeting.
4.0 Old Business
West Side Story Gala was a huge success. Five hundred and five tickets were sold. Also, ticket sales doubled for subsequent performances of West Side Story. See attached Gala Report.
Fresh Planet: Parent Council voted to take charge of the money flow from donations from freshplanet.net generated by purchases made by South Eugene families who place orders for food on-line. Persons ordering food from Fresh Planet must type in “SEHS” into the voucher field when placing an order. Fresh Planet will contribute the $5 delivery charge to SEHS. PC members agreed that Fresh Planet contributions fall under the scrip umbrella and that we will feature each scrip provider in the e-news on a rotating basis.
Stand for Children:
Joy Marshall represented SFC, saying that since we are not going to be getting more money from the state, we should begin to act locally.
SFC is exploring the possibility of supporting a proposed fair, small, temporary, affordable tax to minimize cuts and maintain good policy.
She encourages parents to visit the SFC website:
www.stand.org/or, join the mayor at a City Forum on schools on Tues., Dec 14 at 7-9pm at Eugene City Hall to learn more about this and express support to the Mayor.
SFC also encourages parents to contact elected officials, visit the blog, attend the rally.
Visit the website for more information.
Principal’s Report: Randy Bernstein reported that the Sustainable Budget Survey results are on the 4j web site. He discussed various ways the budget will impact South and some options for how to mange these cuts: we can change the class size, have fewer classroom minutes, change the schedule, eliminate foreign languages, put limits on enrollment. Randy gave this example of how our teachers are trying to think of creative solutions for next year: One teacher suggested teaching a hybrid on-line class in which she would meet with students once a week. Some people are afraid of this method, but if it is done well, many kids can succeed.
The meeting adjourned at 8 pm.
