We were unable to invite a scholar to present to the board due to our meeting being held off-site.

What Is Going Well:

• PARCC and MCAS testing are complete (except a few makeups). Our scholars were focused during the testing and the overall testing experience went smoothly.

 

• Liz Leiwant is leading the effort to update our literacy curriculum and has made great progress. We now have an updated “scope and sequence” for every grade that aligns what we teach in reading/writing/social studies and science so that topics and texts build on one another and are complementary. Click here to take a peek at the scope and sequence.

 

• We recently hired two new academic deans, one who will be joining us from Excel Academy Charter School in Boston and one who will be joining us from KIPP New Orleans.

 

• % of returning staff for next school year on track to be highest to date

 

• Our new building construction continues to be on track

Challenges:

• Reduced tuition amounts for next year means an additional $65K cut to our annual budget.

 

• We are continuing to work through the long term challenge of aligning our projections beyond 3 years with an enrollment capped at 360 scholars.

 

• Larger political landscape: this coming year is going to bring heightened statewide political noise about charters which may directly or indirectly affect Alma.

J. Baptist said that there is a misconception about high turnover of teachers at Alma that needs to be addressed. B. Unger suggested that Board Chair C. Arnold craft an op-ed piece speaking to the main misconceptions about charter schools like Alma. 

The Board decided to create a short-term sub-committee to address Alma's PR strategy in response to charter discussions leading up to the ballot question in November. The committee will include Bob, Jan and Chris. 

Big fundraising update that wasn't included in the packet: We received a $25,000 grant from the Kaplan Foundation to support our fine arts programming! In the past they have supported the purchase of string instruments for scholars. This brings our annual fund total to $192K. 

We have created a sub-committee to handle the planning of the Ribbon Cutting Ceremony, which is tentatively set to be held at 10:30 am on Thursday, Sept. 22. The plan is to hold a brief ceremony outside of the school with remarks from Chris, Will and perhaps the mayor. The celebration will move inside then to the community room for light refreshments and mini tours to those who want one. We will be inviting all capital donors and looking at ways to recognize our major supporters. 

There was further discussion about sending out the annual appeal letter earlier in the fall. Pros of this move include: less holiday noise, more supporters still in the region (before winter travels) and this would allow us to have a better hold of our annual fund status much earlier in the year. J. Eagle and B. Kurie will work to finalize our development calendar before the next meeting.

 

The governance committee will invite P. Ditchfield and J. Dildine to the next board meeting to discuss E.D. evaluation and compensation. 

The governance committee will take staff survey results into consideration and will also administer a survey to the Alma Leadership Team and B. Kurie.

The board did not go into executive session as they deemed it unnecessary. 

This item was not discussed due to time limitations. W. Gardner will send out more information at a later date.