In attendance:
- David Juralewicz
- Sara Smith
- Gwen Kordonowy
- Krista Magnuson
- Amy Gusefski
- Abbas Taha
- Leomene Jeanlouis
- Morgan Hayward
- Jen Mason Stott
- Vicky Pol
Ice breaker / Intros (Dave)
Citywide Parent Council report (Sara)
- This year the Council has mostly been focused on issues related to remote learning. Quarterly meetings with superintendent, this past week was the most recent one
- 28 schools reopening on Monday
- JFK is not one of those schools mostly due to its limited number of students with special needs
- 1000s of air purifiers being installed
- Working on additional testing
- Sara noted that they have been doing better at getting translation services at the meetings, it felt like to her that they were making a commitment to make it better
- They are committed to hiring a lot more diverse staff
Treasurer report (Krista)
- We hadn’t had a report for a while because all bank statements had been going to school, we now have them so can give a report!
- $1678.71 in the bank account
- Pre-March was around $3,600 we spent a couple thousand on stop and shop cards for our community members
- So, we will need to do some fundraising at some point if we want to do that again
- Will need to pay some outstanding balances – if you have paid for something on behalf of parent council and need to be reimbursed, please contact Krista
Breakout room discussion:
how does everyone feel about science instruction at the JFK?
Summary from breakout rooms
- There was a recent meeting with 5th grade parents and the science team about the large amounts of missing work.
- As a result, the parent council wanted to check in and see how other grades are doing with this special.
Some of the comments:
- Frustrating part of the day
- Many parents feel the science teachers are putting a lot of pressure on themselves to have kids produce a lot of work, that might be unnecessary.
- Parents wonder what kind of remote learning guidance the science team may or may not have gotten and it’s probably overall a hard situation they are in with remote learning/lack of training
Positives:
- Ms. Moody does take time to connect with the kids
- There is a new curriculum coming that they are getting training for – Mystery Science. So, there might be improvement in the spring
- Parents shared other examples of how Ms. Moody connected with students
Suggestion for parents who have concerns or questions:
- Going to the science teacher directly first is where you should start.
- It doesn’t appear that Dr. Copeland has been hearing concerns from parents about science, so parents are also encouraged to talk to Dr. Copeland, while also looping in their child’s grade-level teachers and their science teacher.
Other new business
Jen Mason Stott – first grade is potentially planning a book house project to have a little free library
Abbas – it would be great to have the teachers survey how the kids are feeling about their classes. The parents have some idea but the kids really know how they feel. The more we can hear from the students the better understanding we have of how things are.
Important Dates
Upcoming important dates:
Winter Break 12/23-1/4
SPC meeting 1/13 8 pm
SPC meeting 2/11 7 pm
February break 2/15-19
SPC meeting 3/10 8 pm – ELECTIONS
SPC meeting 4/15 7 pm
April break 4/19-23
SPC meeting 5/12 8 pm
SPC meeting 6/10 7 pm