LSAT Meeting Minutes – September 2023

Posted on by payneelementary

Attendees:

  • Principal Byrd
  • Ms. Brown
  • Mr. Gordon
  • Mr. Creef
  • Josh Smith
  • Becky Cook-Shyovitz
  • Stacy Larracey
  • Rebecca Hunt
  • Aaron Schumacher

Agenda

  • As the first meeting, there was no official agenda beyond electing the chair who will be responsible for agendas going forward.

Notes

  • Selecting chair for 2023/2024
    • Josh selected by consensus
  • Selecting secretary
    • Aaron selected on acting basis
  • Discussed running election at next PTA for open parent spot currently held by Aaron
    • Also: Could add one additional community (non-parent, non-teacher) member to LSAT
    • Josh to email about open spot
    • Becky to run vote at next PTA meeting
  • Principal Byrd leads discussion on thriving school
    • Focus on equity
      • “a thriving school is one where the least of them is cared for so students, families who are in need of the greatest support know and feel confident that their children, that they as students are in the right place”
    • Retention (grade to grade) as a measure of success
    • Data from DIBELS, iREADY, PARCC
      • Improvement over the year (“school works”)
      • Distributional differences by race
    • Comprehensive School Plan
      • Goals on reducing chronic absenteeism
        • Overlaps between IEP, African American, chronic absentee, at-risk groups
        • Rebecca offers that chronic absenteeism can be related to asthma: recommends not using air fresheners, Clorox wipes, anything that can aggravate asthma
        • Principal Byrd notes transportation has also been an issue, especially for IEP students
    • How do we center the neediest among us?
    • How do we make all parents feel comfortable at school? How do we structure opportunities for parents to engage?
      • Mechanisms for families to meet each other?
        • Becky notes the Welcome Committee can play a part here
    • Request for grade or class-level data that will feel more applicable to specific classes/parents
      • Principal Byrd offers that more detail will be shared at upcoming APPT meetings
    • (Re)starting difficult conversations around race?

Actions

  • Josh to email about open LSAT spot (parent spot currently occupied by Aaron)
    • Rebecca offered: “Josh – maybe in that email re: vacancies you can also let people know that our meetings are open to the public if others aren’t quite ready to commit but want to join us to explore being an LSAT member in the future (as a way to pull in a more diverse representation of the students)?”
  • Becky to run election at next PTA election, possibly consider the community member spot
    • There was also a note about the Welcome Committee possibly helping make the school more welcoming and inclusive – is there any status update on this?