Lowcountry Montessori School
Minutes
Special Board Meeting
Date and Time
Thursday April 10, 2025 at 5:00 PM
Location
Lowcountry Montessori School
The mission of Lowcountry Montessori School is to provide an authentic Montessori education building a foundation for lifelong learning.
Directors Present
A. Wright, G. Alexander, J. Poole, K. Scott
Directors Absent
D. Slazyk
Guests Present
A. Horn, B. Shaffer (remote)
I. Opening Items
A.
Record Attendance
B.
Call the Meeting to Order
II. Finance
A.
First reading of the budget
A. Wright made a motion to Approve the first reading of the budget with a 3% raise.
J. Poole seconded the motion.
The board VOTED to approve the motion.
B.
Executive Session if needed
A. Wright made a motion to Go into Exec Session.
J. Poole seconded the motion.
The board VOTED to approve the motion.
A. Wright made a motion to leave exec session.
J. Poole seconded the motion.
The board VOTED to approve the motion.
III. Closing Items
A.
Adjourn Meeting
There being no further business to be transacted, and upon motion duly made, seconded and approved, the meeting was adjourned at 7:38 PM.
Respectfully Submitted,
K. Scott
WIll add 35 students to upper el this is a 3% increase in staff pay
how the projections of the revenue were made.
That based on the number of students by grade level and or those with learning differences being weighted. Special needs are weighted differently EFA funding sheet shows numbers
how the enrollment projections match up with this year's current enrollment for each of those categories. We still have waitlist and projections are pretty on par
I'd like to understand the wage scale and why and how that works.
For example,
is there starting wage based on their years of instruction?
Yes
is there an extra bonus if they have Montessori certification for the grade they're teaching?
Yes Montessori Cert and state cert extra 2k and 1k respectively
after 3 years 500 increase 7 years 1k increase
Do they document that the teacher has been certified by Montessori?
Yes documentation
There's often teachers who take the training and never complete the handing in of materials or practicum and don't get their certification
Yes someone left and someone that didn't complete the training.
We have one paying back the school now because she didn't complete the contract. 2 year commitment after training.(1-1.5 years to complete) 10-14k Expenses for training. Training and contracts still profit more than losing. Most people follow through.
Angela addressed the Lunch amount increase. Amy stated they anticipated the Cafe will be up and running.
Jen asked a question about (separating line items) out different fundraisers possibly.
Angela asked why there were two lunch lines. One is for the cafe
Greg asked what is the difference from the bills this year from next year. Electric bills projected because of new building
Operation and maintenance shows a ~70k jump for that.
Greg asked what the 3% raise does to put our salaries and how does that have us comparing.
He asked what percent of the budget were we. We were at 80 percent and was hoping it was coming down. What is the percentage?
Amy stated we were always going to be over the 30-40% for salaries. The percentage she tallied 72%
Becky stated Beaufort County says after 28 years there isn't a pay increase for years of teaching service.
Greg asked if we have heard anything about funds that may be cut this year. Amy said nothing as of yet, USDA funds are not something we get. She said possibly IDEA Funds but Becky doesn't see that happening.(70k IDEA funds)
Greg asked if Martha found anything that may need replacing. Amy stated there's always going to be things but we do need to put together a schedule of things that need to be replaced.
Have any teachers indicated they are not coming back next year. Assistant moving, Michael Bell not coming back, Emily Fowler not coming back.
Greg asked what is Part time position(50k)
Put it in as a place holder for Admin/ another VP part time just a placeholder but possibly under if need be with the increase in students.
Greg asked for more details for the part time position. Would the person work another job?
Amy said this would not be an ISR position. ISR would be a hourly person.
Greg asked if Amy has someone to teach Health yet. She said she's working on it with training.