There was no public comment. 

Bill provided a brief report about school highlights from the past month.  Bill introduced two Building Excellent Schools Fellows, Christina Perry and Bianca Cabrera, who the school is hosting as "residents".  They have worked at the school throughout the month of March, taking on select projects and learning from school leaders.  Bill highlighted a professional development session on Collaborative Planning that took place today.  Wendy and a team of grade level chairs presented to a group of approximately 12 instructional leaders from Springfield Public Schools on the school's collaborative approach to curriculum planning.  Justin coordinated this through his role at ANet. Bill also shared photos of the school's Girls on the Run team, an after school running program for girls which is new this year.  Bob also announced to the board that Bill is a recipient of BusinessWest's 40 Under 40 Award. 

Jennie Williamson from the Massachusetts Charter Public School Association presented to the board. She gave an update of charter-school specific legislative efforts and talked about the board’s role related to advocacy.  She emphasized that elected officials make important decisions about public schools, including charter schools, and that board members can play an important role to inform legislators about issues that impact charter schools  Jennie talked about the Association's work to advocate on behalf of charter schools and this year's specific advocacy agenda, which is focused on an increase of facilities per pupil funding for charter schools and an increase in funding for all public schools.  It also includes an optional effort to allow for weighted lotteries for students with higher needs. The board asked questions and discussed ways to reach out to legislators.

The board discussed the amendment and lease renewal. The charter amendment request to DESE to allow continued occupancy at Heritage Academy for the 2019-20 school year was approved.  Bill has exercised the option to extend the lease at Heritage Academy for the 2019-20 school year. There has not been an update on transportation from SPS. 

Bill provided the board with a brief update on Capital Campaign work. Bill, Meghan, Andrea and Sally are currently in the early  planning stages of preparing materials for grant requests and setting up initial meetings. Bill has met with a number of foundations and the response has been positive, although foundations have indicated that having a specific site will be important to them if they are going to contribute to a capital campaign.

Doug presents the monthly financials to the board, noting the financials are projecting a healthy surplus at year end.  While the financials show an increase in special education evaluation costs, there are increased federal grant revenues which will be applied to these increased costs.  Meghan noted that the Davis Grant funds will be shown in the April 2019 monthly financial report.  Doug also reported that the finance committee reviewed the first draft of the school's FY20 budget and he will present a draft to the board during the April meeting. The FY20 budget will be finalized for the May board meeting. 

Kelvin presented the Academic Dashboard to the board and focused on these highlights:

• STEP performance shows 60% of students reading at or above grade level. While second grade data shows a significant percentage of the students performing below grade level, there is still growth occurring. Second grade teachers have shifted their instruction to small groups across the grade level (versus in their own classrooms alone).
• There was a high number of student applications for the 2019-20 school year, with 408 total new applications for approximately 54 seats.  Of note is that the number of applications decrease as the grade levels increase.
• On the MAP Assessment, Springfield Prep performed well, finishing 2nd out of 80 BES schools nationwide. 
• The suspension rate remains low with one in-school-suspension and no out-of-school suspensions. 
• Student attendance is strong. Chronic absenteeism has decreased from 10% in the month of February to 8% in the month of March. 

The board discussed revisions to the current school complaint policy.  The board agreed with the governance committee's recommendation to update the policy to bring the language in line with current law, to make the process clearer for potential complainants, and to simplify and correctly state the responsibility of the board in regards to formal complaints. 

The next board meeting will be Wednesday, April 24 at 5:45 pm at 594 Converse St. Longmeadow, MA.