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HomeMy WebLinkAbout1997-03-18 School Committee Minutes - joint School Council and PTO!ley z~~~~. Noted ® March 18 Combined Meeting coo ommittee, School Council, P.T.O. Ms. Fidele's class made a presentation including a shortened version of the video they prepared for the Rosewood School in Great Britain. They explained that the program began with penpals set up between RM.H.S. students and Rosewood students. Letters included information about RM.H.S. activities, the students, their families, and jobs they hold. After letters were exchanged, the class produced a 45 minute video tape for which they wrote the script and did the filming. So far the students have discovered the following similarities about themselves: they are the same ages, they will soon get their driver's licenses, and they enjoy the same sports. They have discovered the following differences: the students at Rosewood live in dormitories, Rosewood is an all boys school, students in Great Britain attend school until they are 16 and then choose to go on to a prep. school to prepare for college, or go into a job working during the day and attend school at night. The two groups also exchanged Christmas cards. Currently they are waiting for a response to their video tape from the Rosewood students. Ms. Fidele and the Rosewood representative are discussing the possibility of a student exchange in the future. This project allowed the students to use technology, presentation skill, and research schools. In addition to this project, Ms. Fidele's class also performed a community service by making cookies and buying toys with money they collected for an AIDS orphanage where children live who have lost their parents to AIDS. They delivered the cookies and toys to the children for Christmas. They would like to do something else for these children before the school year ends. Mr. Orlando passed out two items for discussion: bulleted items from his entry plan and also a categorized list of the bulleted items. The categories of the items were: programmatic, student-centered issues, teacher training, facility, restructuring, equity, and parent issues. Mr. Orlando summarized the categorized list before discussion began. The following feedback was garnered from the group. Mr. Spadafora brought up community service as being important. He also pointed out that health education should receive a priority. He mentioned the Yellow Dress play and how the roots of violence need to be explored and understood by students-He asked about computer equipment and the number of computers the labs have (how was the technology money spent in the high school). He felt that it was important to teach students parenting. Mr. Twomey had two issues: beef up the average level programs so that there is not such a disparity between these and the level 1 classes, and that the home environment has an enormous effect on the progress. He wanted to know whether there were things that we should be doing in the home environment to get results in the schools. When parents are involved with the students and the students know that performance is a value, they progress further. Ms. DaSilva supported Mr. Twomey's comments that there is a giant gulf between the level l and level 2 classes. She and Ms. Commito brought up the request for support for an intramural activity which would allow all students to participate in sports without requiring try-outs. Dr. Harutunian asked what the school could do to get the tremendous parental participation we see at the elementary school level. He suggested a consistent program of informing parents and workshops for parents to help parents understand how to participate and work with their students. Ms. DaSilva asked about providing a "go with your student" to school day. She felt that this would encourage more parental involvement and help them see what the student issues are in the current classroom structure and scheduling. Ms. Commito asked Mr. Harutunian to consider providing conference periods at the middle schools as are help at the elementary and high school levels. Mr. Orlando suggested parent education programs which could be put on cable TV such as: using graphing calculators, Cornell note-taking, and setting up an appropriate study environment. The idea was brought up of exchanging e-mail with teachers for things like assignments, syllabus information, and other information about specific classes. Ms. Macaulay mentioned that lots of parents feel insecure and don't feel that they can help their students with academics. She suggested that we open up the schools at night and have people available to help students and parents with homework and projects. Also during this period, parents could help other parents as well as community members help parents and students. Mr. Meharg said that he felt that it was important to get students involved in outside activities to help them organize themselves. Clubs, perhaps run by retirees, would help bring in the community. A suggestion was made that adults be able to attend high school classes along with students classes they missed while they were in high school or classes they are now interested in. A discussion ensued about students providing community service. Mr. Orlando talked about a program where high school students practiced job schools at the home of seniors in the community such as construction skills, yard work elementary plumbing, wallpapering, and painting. Mr. Orlando thought that we are about 3 years behind where we should be, and that it would take about 3 years to make community service a graduation requirement. Mr. Meharg suggested a gold seal, tassel, or some other recognition device be presented to seniors at graduation for a certain number of hours of community service. He felt that this should be an award, a certificate, or some mark on the student's transcript. Ms. Macaulay feels strongly that all students need to learn how to organize their time. - Ms. Cavicchi suggested that instead of community service, an issues hotly debated within the School Committee, high school students need more course like civics, sociology, and the application of skills in their community. Mr. Orlando said that if you had a course which included community service, the department of education would accept the course. However, if you try to just support community service as an activity during the school day, without tying it to a course, the department of education will not accept it. The last discussion of the evening centered around the requirement that all students have course in the 4 major subject areas each of their four years. Mr. Orlando also added that in order to get into the college of choice, students should make sure that they take 3 years of a foreign language. In order to introduce this at KM.R S., we must learn how to handle those students who are less motivated to take courses in subject areas which are not their strong areas but they must take the course and also provide less rigorous courses in each area. RE 0 LUR YK ov U1k, ING, Toe Dr. Harutunian From: Mr. Orland Re: School Committee Highlights Meeting Date: 3/4/97 On Tuesday evening, March 18, Ms. Swenbeck-Fidele (special education teacher) and her students will present the video tape that they created for students in a high school residential program in England. This assignment allowed Ms. Swebeck-Fidele's students an opportunity to test their script writing skills, plan a comprehensive presentation, and research differences between our educational system and the English schools. Following this presentation, I will lead a discussion on the development of our school improvement plan. My recently completed entry plan will help focus this discussion as we cooperatively explore avenues of improvement for our school. I fully expect members of our PTO, School Council, and School Committee to offer their thoughts during this discussion. There were many positive comments made regarding the school, the faculty, our program, and RMHS students. There were also several notations on areas of needed change. I have organized these comments into six broad topics and will use these topics to generate commentary from all three groups. The topics are: PROGRAMMATIC CONCERNS STUDENT CENTERED TOPICS TEACHER TRAINING FACILITY RE-STRUCTURING EQUITY This discussion was initiated at the February school council meeting. The PTO did not review the entry plan in-depth at its last meeting. I sincerely hope that all parties present on the 18th will take an active role in the discussion. There are many positive attributes that the high school can use as a foundation for further growth. Let's have a lively, positive, and thoughtful discussion. Our students can only benefit from this type of collaborative effort. t READING MEMORIAL HIGH SCHOOL SCHOOL COUNCIL MINUTES FEBRUARY 10, 1997 Members Present: F. Orlando, C. Perletz, H. Shannon, G. Hines, A. Fedele, A. McCoy, T. Capasso, D. Porter, D. Laabs, A. DaSilva (Recorder). BUDGET Carol Perletz reported on the public meeting regarding the "draft school budget". Issues ♦ Outside services contracting - Winchester Hospital/school medical personnel (K-12 contract nurses); Special Education teacher's contract [Frank adds that 60% of Reading families deal with Winchester Hospital. Examples of the benefits of a contract through the schools: allow computerized medical records system to coordinate school and family care, and health education programs.] ♦ Physical state of the high school building -Capitol improvement working plan (not final); Questions about $2 million repairs vs. replace high school; High interest in potential areas of parent involvement and action. ♦ Parent concerns - Phone lines and technology; Equalizing school facilities and offerings throughout the town. ♦ Mary Williams, School Committee Rep - appeared to listen with interest, acknowledged input as invaluable, reminded public that the budget was still changing, assured parents of communication throughout the budget development process. Frank notes that there was small parent representation at the meeting. More school personnel were present than parents, and more town organizations were represented than the "general public". ENTRY PLAN - A needs assessment for the high school Formal report will be available to the public after school staff views and comments. At this time Frank has 7 pages of commendations and recommendations, and questionnaire results. So far there have been no concerns expressed regarding Frank's issue priorities. Questionnaire- 1. What are we proud of? 2. What are the issues? 3. How would you address the issues? 4. What are the expectations of the principal? Anticipated Results- 1.Prioritize from the Entry Plan 2. Create a School Improvement Plan 3. Ongoing discussions to set 4-5 goals for the high school Questionnaire positive feedback on students, faculty, humanities program, English writing, peer leaders, soc. research process, level of involvement (clubs, committees, sports), climate for learning is improving. Discussion of the chart (attached), to begin to identify issues and set priorities. Frank's point: all issues concern students, staff, programs, parents and community. Most also involve building and budget. Discussion highlights: --Dreary building has a negative impact on education and morale; short custodial staff. --Diversity - harassment concerns; confidentiality issues impact handling of harassment cases. School Committee has a policy in place which Frank has relied on with satisfactory results. Faculty and student training is planned on diversity issues. Frank will assemble a - Principal's Diversity Committee to specifically work on this issue. --Absenteeism and Tardiness - this issue earned heated debate as to relative importance vs. building and curriculum concerns, and school vs family responsibility. Determined that tardiness is excessive and impacts teacher's ability to conduct successful classroom activities. Frank indicated this is a broad problem, yet results are apparent once a program is in place. He explained there are a variety of tardiness programs implemented in surrounding towns which are effective,with low output and quick results. This suggests tardiness/absenteeism is worth prioritizing initially. Student Advisory Council is also addressing tardiness programs. Frank explained that one possible program would provide school-wide student photo ID cards, perhaps bar coded to match the system used by the town library. "All members are asked to develop suggested priorities for the next meeting: GOAL ACTIVITY FOR STUDENTS AND PARENTS PLAN OF ATTACK Include on your list: BUILDING FACILITY STUDENT ISSUE STAFF ISSUE PROGRAMMATIC ISSUE PARENT/COMMUNITY ISSUE NEXT MEETING - NEW DATE JOINT MEETING WITH THE SCHOOL COMMITTEE TUESDAY, MARCH 18 7:30 PM High School Media Center Recorder- Chip Hines Snack- Allison DaSilva (MARCH 10 MEETING IS CANCELED) READING. MA 01867 POSITIVE 1. Students and Faculty 2. Upper Level Programs 3. Level of Involvement 4. Support staff 5. Particular Programs: a. Humanities b. Peer Leaders C. Social Studies - research d. English - writing b. School spirit 7. "Climate for learning is improving." Concerned parents. ISSUE STUDENT STAFF FROG. BLDG. BUDGET PARENT COMM. Dreary Bldg. (A) x x x x x x x Diversity x x x x x x Abseentism (A) x x x x Tardiness x x x x Smoking x x x x x x Drinking / x x x x x Avg. Level Prog.• x x x x x x Parent Ed. Prbg. x x x x x x - Update Curr. x x x x x x Study skills x x x x x x More Resources x x x x x x Communication x x x x Inclusion x x x x x .Community Service x x x x x x Re-structuring (A) x x x x x x x Parent Involvement x x x x x x x Test Results x x x x x x REVIEW PROGRAMS: Guidance _ Health Alternative D. x x x X. x x Partnerships AP EQUITY: Students Class size x x x x x x Teacher Assign. Scheduling RAISE REQ, Honor Roll Graduation x x x x x x Course Load > '.7. '.:ate-.~•N - Y ~ '.Jyi c- t y i t -El CH - i i% Sod ISSUE STUDENT k - STAFF PRQQ. BLDG. aUDO. PARENT COMM. -STAFF-(TRAINING Tech. « ' . er Longe r: x x x x x x -Strategies -~?lanagement UNITY/SPIRIT x ':~..wiil'E3eL~;d:'L.u)E'.:.:YS+.lel:..' x x x x x x x - W _ r .7~ y TT ai 'y r : r :fv+cs • a _ e