See parent meeting attendance sheet.
Reports
Principal Report
See below, at end of the meeting Harlod arrived and gave an update on music and drama possibilities.
Staff Report
Jen and Natalie – students will register for Fall 2011 Intensives on Activity Day planned for the last day of school. Next year the Steller school year will start with intensives rather than before the December break, that is, they will be held during the first two weeks of school next year, not end of semester.  Students with questions should see their advisor. New students will go to orientation on the first day of intensives to learn how intensives work and their schedules.
Permission slips for the Activity Day off school grounds are still needed and if students do not bring them in they will have to remain at school.
Principal selection: A recommendation went to the District and we will know on Monday. Superintendant Comeau was very impressed with our process and may use it district-wide. Joe addresses principal selection in greater detail later in the meeting.
A rough draft of the Fall schedule is out, and students are being asked to look at it. Parents can get it from students or from their student’s advisor.
The music program has been cut. There is the option of a peer taught orchestra class next year.
The advisor note book is being worked on to make it more useful for staff. In process of making it electronic, and including some of forms from the new-to-steller information on the website.
Credit for student government is still in process and not back to staff yet from Eliza. She has been very busy lately, involved in TOB and the principal selection.
John – Temple of the Bean (TOB) is doing really well. We have no overhead, and are making money.
Op Group Report
No report, but Op group will have a wrap-up pizza party next week. It is also Spirit week next week.
Lounge Actions – Bo is building new furniture for the lounge at KCC. Students will not be able to write on the table any more. There may be high coffee bar type tables. And something else in the center of the lounge area, but the couch may not be there. This is being done with funding from op group and donated materials. Bo has been in carpentry now for at least 2 years, and this is his passion, and he’s had on the job training. Staff thinks he’ll be done before intensives a week and ½ from now.
Treasurer’s Report
Rebecca provided the current balance sheet. As of April 21, 2011 parent group has $14,891 dollars. $8,272 was made at the auction. Setting aside $500 for next year’s auction kitty for expenses, parent group has about $7,300 to give to ad board. Ad board can decide where the money goes. Previously about 45% went to a travel fund, 45% to technology and 10% to year book fund. Please email Rebecca after ad board to let her know how money is to be allocated. This year parent group gave some funds to the gardening club, the math counts, and the pizza for the principal selection meeting. $600 is being held back for the beginning of the year BBQ. There will be approximately $3,000 to begin next year with. There is another $450 for TOB for the purchase of ice makers and a blackboard for the drink menu. There is also $2,000 for teacher reimbursements. Details of these items are on the Profit & Loss Budget distributed at the parent group meeting.
Old Business
Helen/Facility and other needs advocacy – Helen has not yet received the information from the all community meeting and staff. The short and long term wish lists have not been discussed in advisory groups yet. Danielle and Eliza collected input at the last all community meeting and all student meeting. Helen will get this information from Danielle and can pull together lists and summarize Steller’s priorities as expressed by the community. Joe and Helen will work on getting a question on the flash to parents about wish list. Helen will bring list to May meeting and send to the new principal.
Auction – Lessons learned – there will be a meeting next week on what went well/what could be improved upon next Tuesday at 6 p.m. at La Mex on Spenard. The group thanked Rebecca, Wendy, Rochelle and others involved in organization and running the auction for their tremendous efforts. The community pulled together and the donations came in. We need one computer dedicated to the auction.  It would also be good to have an auction program.
New principal process – Joe: most here participated in some or all of the meetings. The meet and greet meeting was the culmination of our input for a new principal for the whole Steller community. Ken’s room was full and it was a relaxed process with a round robin approach, and the opportunity for feedback.
A consensus developed that most were interested in Dale Evern and Dave Morris. The students seemed to like Morris, he was a Steller student for several years. The staff appeared to like Dale Evern. Mike Henry from ASD was very impressed with Eliza and entrusted to her the task of tallying the preferences.
The Steller advisory committee for this process – 3 students, 6 staff and 2 parents met with ASD this Monday. Eliza had gone through the paperwork and summarized the voting. The emerging two candidates were Evern and Morris. The committee came to consensus to recommend Evern unanimously and put in Morris as a second candidate. The committee wrote this up and sent this to Mike Henry. He asked if there was a candidate that we did not want considered and the committee recommended that Mariah not be forwarded as a candidate.  Mike met with ASD administrators and went through our recommendation, and that has gone to Carol Comeau. The School Board meets Monday night so we should know then who new principal will be. Joe felt this was much better process than last time when the committee at Steller just gave the documented preferences of the community to the district and that was it. This time we got to process this information ourselves and spend time thinking and talking about it, with a weekend to think about it and meet again as an advisory committee.
Rebecca commented that Joe and others involved did an incredible job, and in less than two weeks of learning Harlod would retire.
Recruitment and retention – we have our slots entirely filled with seventh graders. 54 seventh graders, and other new to Steller students in other grades.
New Business
There will be a memorial service for our founder Caroline Wohlforth on Friday at 3 p.m at St. Mary’s. A suggestion was made to find out if we can run the flag at half mast in her honor and pay for flowers for the service with parent group funds.
Rebecca made 2 motions:
- To have flag at ½ mast in her honor tomorrow
- To send flowers and pay for them from parent group funds
Rebecca seconds
Both motions carry. Staff will pass the flag request on to Harlod to ask the district if this is OK.
Other Business:
Rochelle passed out a school calendar with handwritten dates marking Steller quarters which are different because of intensives. First quarter will be seven weeks. There will be semester long classes, not quarters next year. There will be grades each quarter grades but most classes will be semester long. PE will stay as a quarter class. If students only need one more quarter, this will be flexible.
We held the Ad Board and Parent Group meetings the same night this year to see if more would attend.  Rochelle thinks we should go back to second Thursday for ad board and third Wednesday for parent meeting. Six p.m. for parent group. The group agreed to this plan.
Should the back to school BBQ be held on the 12 or 15 of August? Staff thought that families might still be out of town on the 12th so 15th seems a bit better – it’s the day before school starts. A suggestion was made to have it after the intensives since they will be at the beginning of the year? Some more thought will go into this before finalizing the date.
The next year’s auction date is Feb 17, 2011. The auction committee will discuss if this is a good date because perhaps it’s a bit early.
Funding requests
Jen requested $25 for Steller’s contribution for pizza at the Bartlett Math competition.
Helen make motion, which was seconded, for 25 dollars to be spent from parent group funds for the pizza for the Bartlett Math Competition.
Motion carried.
Jen requested $200 for rechargeable batteries and chargers for graphing calculators.
Rebecca makes motion to approve $200 for the chargers and batteries
Wendy seconds
Motion carried
Announcements
The Music Program at Steller has been cut. Joe’s family has written to district music dept about this. Jimmie has emailed all band and orchestra parents and sent a copy to Frank Hauser and Carol Comeau. He has not had a response. We are losing drama, orchestra and band.
Harlod arrived and said that he was in conversation regarding the possibility of ASD providing transportation to West/Romig for band and orchestra students.
Harlod is meeting with the Dean of Theater Arts for an internship opportunity which if possible would only be for about 6 weeks.
Joe –  there is also the community schools option to explore
Next Parent Meeting: Â May 11, 2011.