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Heritage Elementary School
School Community Council
Minutes
Wednesday, January 10, 2023
In attendance: Lance Robins, Maria Jones, Kendal Welker, Julie Clark, Melisa Richardson, Andrea Linton
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Welcome to Heritage Community Council
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Review minutes from last month
III. Approve Last Meetings Minutes
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Motion to approve Melisa Richardson 2nd Julie Clark
IV. School LAND Trust funds spent to date
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Budget: $68,192.42
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Amount Used: $79,737.59
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Amount Left: $42,685.58
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Percent Remaining: 38.5%. We have to be under 10%, and we can carry funds under 10% to the following year.
V. Estimated distribution for 2024-2025 = $105,000
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Trust Land Funds have not been allocated yet for the 2024-2025 school year, but we will base our discussion on $105,000 (estimate only).
VI. Ideas for how money should be spent
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Reading paraprofessionals for our reading program (TIER II)
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These paraprofessionals support the reading program.
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Cost - $80,000.00
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We spent $55,000 last year for reading paraprofessionals and aide support. We would be able to spend more in this category if we funded the areas below with TSSA money. Extra funding in this area would be used to increase salaries and add training. Training for hourly employees adds up. These aides support the whole school.
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AMITY aides
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AMITY aides provide classroom support to teachers and students.
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The majority of the amity aides’ time is spent in the dual language immersion (DLI) classrooms. School Land Trust money should affect the whole school.
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We would like to continue the AMITY aide program, but we must secure housing for next year in advance. We thought we had housing lined up for this year, but things changed. We did find housing for the AMITY aides for the rest of the year, though. The new hosting family is excited to have the AMITY aide and says that the situation will be great for them.
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The AMITY aides were concerned with the housing issues and said they might have made a different decision to come if they had known that there were going to be problems. Shauna Winegar asked us if we need to take a year off to line up housing for the future, but we think we can handle it for next year. The paperwork is due at the end of this month, so we need to line it up soon. We need to send the notice out to the parents by Friday. Mr. Robins can’t house them because he’s their direct supervisor. We need backups. Families that house AMITY aides don’t have to have a student here. AMITY aides need a private room, transportation to the school, and food. The transportation can be a school bus. Families can choose to host for a half year or a full year.
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Other schools say that housing is the biggest problem for the AMITY aide program. Providence might apply for an AMITY aide, but the other schools may not.
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We might need to revamp the letter and make it more appealing. Parents might not be paying attention to the current notices. The following were suggested as ideas on how to revamp the notices:
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Put the notice in the body of emails instead of attaching them to the emails.
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Use bullet points to list what is required.
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Add a timeline of how housing is handled.
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Add a link to a Google form where parents can sign up for more information.
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The interns have been very valuable and helpful to the teachers. For some students, they are another reason to come to school. We’ve enjoyed having them. They are a second teacher in the classroom. They keep things running even if the teachers step out. Ms. Clark said the AMITY aide continued teaching in her child’s classroom, and there was no disruption when the teacher left. Mr. Robins would like to continue this program. The greatest need is in the 1st and 2nd grades, so AMITY aides spend a lot of time in these grades. Some years, there are other needs in other grades. We had three AMITY aides last year. Ms. Jones might see them once a week, but not that often. She’s happy that they’re helping where they are needed. The AMITY aides are in 1st and 2nd right now, but one might help more in the upper grades. One AMITY aide subbed for Ms. Jones, and she was nervous because it was her first time with the 6th grade, but she did great and wanted to return.
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We hope to put this on our TSSA Plan instead of using School Land Trust funds.
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Aide support
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Cost - $21,900.
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Aides can provide support in certain classes, such as large classes, classes with behavioral problems, or classes in lower grades with many students on individualized educational plans. We spent $55,000 last year on paraprofessionals and aide support.
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Classroom computers
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Our computers are on a 4-year rotation, and then we need to replace them. We are in good shape in this area and may not need to do much this year. Teachers have only asked for 2 Chromebooks and 2 iPads. Ms. Clark mentioned that Millville has more expensive touchscreen computers. Mr. Robins said that we could have done that, but it does save us about $75 per Chromebook, which adds up. They were looking at touchscreens for the younger grades at Heritage.
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We hope to put this on our TSSA Plan instead of using School Land Trust funds.
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Chromebooks for School
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Buy for school
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If we pay for AMITY aides with TSSA money, less TSSA funds would be used for technology. We plateaued in our technology needs for now, and we can take a year off before we need to do major replacements. We’re talking about technology like computers, not school safety technology like locking our front doors.
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Every grade at Heritage has Chromebook carts. If we have budget cuts in Utah, replacing all those carts will be difficult. We have a lot of technology at our school. Some schools share Chromebook carts between teachers, which saves money in the long run because they have fewer Chromebooks to replace, but this makes it difficult for the teachers. Ms. Jones said that teachers had to share carts at Heritage in the past, and scheduling was complicated. Ms. Jones funded some of the Chromebooks by asking for money from the community, and she said it has made things easier. Teachers can be spontaneous. In the 6th grade, they use the Chromebooks for RISE testing, which frees up the computer lab for other teachers. Homework and assessments can be done immediately on the Chromebooks. The teachers enjoy them. We need to decide if we can maintain this amount of technology in 5 to 10 years.
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We currently use Dell Chromebooks. Ms. Richardson said that Asus and Lenovo Chromebooks are rotated on a 5-year schedule, so that might be something we could do to gain an extra year.
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We hope to put this on our TSSA Plan instead of using School Land Trust funds.
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Software for Reading Inventory/Reading Counts
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Cost - $2,900.00
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We don’t know if we will continue to use Reading Counts, but this plan allocates funding for it just in case. We can always take this off and replace it with another reading program. The 4th grade does not encourage Reading Counts participation now, but they might in the future. The 1st grade has more participation than the 4th grade right now, but the 4th grade has a reading competition in the spring. A lot of the teachers assign a monthly book that can be used in Reading Counts, so it’s incorporated into classwork. Teachers in 3rd, 6th, and 5th grades have their own Reading Counts parties. The parties are successful, and the students want to participate. The 6th grade is the last year to push reading before middle school. Heritage still awards an ice cream party for 250 points and a t-shirt for 500 points. Students earn the hot dog award at 1000 points and the lone wolf award at 2000 points. Some students have earned the lone wolf award in the past. The student with the highest points so far this year has 816 points. Reading and comprehension are very important to learning. Every year we consider moving to a different program. If we decide to use a different program, we could substitute funding for that program unless it costs more.
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Matching grant for library (JMW)
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Cost - $1200.00
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If we show that we are funding the library, this grant will double our funding. This funding will affect the whole school.
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Mr. Robins proposed this plan to the council to get their thoughts. It’s a lot of money for aides, but we want to remember why we’re doing it. The $80,000 would be supporting literacy. It mostly affects kindergarten through 3rd grade, but also some students in the higher grades. We’re hoping to find a good plan moving forward so we don’t have to worry about finances in the future. We want to see if we can keep our reading scores where they are. Our 3rd graders have been reading at a higher level than the state average for the past 6 years, and we would like this to continue. We’ve had TSSA funding for about 4-5 years, and it’s been a huge benefit to our school. We also used to be a Title 1 school, which brought in a lot of money, but we’re not anymore. Ms. Clark asked how we became a Title 1 school. A school needs a certain number of students who get free and reduced lunches. About 20% of our students are economically disadvantaged. If the council is okay with this plan, Mr. Robins will present the new TSSA and School Land Trust funding details to the council next month so that they can see how it would work out.
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Ms. Welker asked what would happen if we lost the TSSA money. We don’t know when it will go away. If we lost the TSSA money, it would be hard for our school.
VII. Other items of business
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School Safety - We currently use the DIR-S app for emergency communication. The name of the app might change in the future, but we’ll use the same system. They’re updating to a new app with a new company. This app is used to send out alerts like lockdowns, and it’s connected to the Cache County Sheriff’s Office. The teachers all have access to this app.
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There was an accident at the roundabout today that damaged some crosswalk signals, and a bus was delayed. We sent the alert out to parents about the cancellation of After School Club about 5 minutes after we found out about the bussing problems. We just had a few minutes to react, and we kept the students in the office, knowing that the parents would be late.
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The next meeting will be on Valentine's Day, so Ms. Clark motioned that we change it to February 21st. Ms. Welker seconded the motion, and the council voted and unanimously agreed.
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We have grant money to improve our safety system, such as our PA system. We are adding additional cameras and looking into bullet-resistant or bulletproof protection for our front doors. We want to ensure that our school is safe but still looks welcoming. Ms. Richardson is involved in these decisions for Logan City School District, and she said that there’s also riot-proof glass and glass with wire embedded in it. Bulletproof glass won’t stop a rifle shot. Riot-proof glass won’t shatter. We have finished the work on our doors, but we still need to ensure that our new fobs work with the new fob readers. The district is working on that. The district is working with the grant money to increase safety in all the schools in the district.
VIII. Thanks for attending
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Motion to Close Kendal Welker 2nd Maria Jones
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