The Pledge of Allegiance was led by Jon Wasser.

There was no teacher/student presentation.

ELAC parents Darlene Vasquez, Yolva Vela and Karen Cortez, attended the Board meeting.   They shared that this group of Spanish speaking parents has been at ECRCHS for the past four years but have become more involved the last two years and now have approximately 50 members.  They meet once a month and feel very comfortable and connected with the school.  Ms. Cortez, the VP, shared that she has an 11th grade daughter at ECRCHS and thanked Lisa Ring and Angel Lerma for their assistance and for all the support they receive from ECRCHS. The Spanish speaking parents feel they have a voice and are not afraid to speak up.  This group has assisted Spanish speaking parents with workshops and information in Spanish to incoming 9th grade parents, on Back-to-School Night, college fairs, financial aid, colleges visits, the ACT/SAT and sponsor a Teacher Appreciation Day.

Cameron Maury, ECRCHS English teacher and Debate coach, thanked the Board for their time and congratulated and thanked the stakeholders for participating in the democratic process that makes the school work.  He announced that, for the first time in ECR history, ECR students won the State Championship in debate.  Students Shawn Haq won First Place in Congressional Debate and his brother, Sarem Haq took 10th in the State, setting records for ECRCHS.   Mr. Maury urged the Board to consider raising the cap on individual student awards to $300.00 per student and lift the team cap.  He thanked the administration for working with him to find a way to give cash equivalent awards to the students in a way that serves them best, with financial need as a consideration.

Jackie Keene stated that Committee Updates will be covered later in the meeting under Governance.

Vote to combine approval of Items A, B and C included in Motion in Section II A.

Vote to combine approval of Items A, B and C included in Motion in Section II A.

Jackie Keene reported that the guidelines to apply for the two upcoming Board positions were posted in March on the website and on the Marquee in front of the school.  Two applications have been submitted, one for the Teacher Rep position and one for the Community Rep position.  The deadline to submit an application was extended from April 15th to April 30th.  Once all the applications are in, the Committee will convene and invite the applicants to attend the May Board meeting. She is working with Fernando Delgado to set up an electronic voting system for the teachers when they vote. There are two Community Rep positions available, one currently filled by Larry Rubin and he is eligible to reapply.
 

Melanie Horton reported that the website is being redesigned and highlighted some of the improvements.  The target date to launch is this summer. The new website will be a cleaner design and easier to navigate and will include a Twitter feed and a link to the ECReality show.  The Board Tab will be separate and moved to the top of the page where it will be more visible.  The website is being designed to be usable by any device.  There will be a direct link to the Student Store instead of having to access it through the Student portal and the front page will include more information that parents want to know such as school results, graduation rates, college admission numbers, etc.  It will also include ECRCHS's increased graduation rates pre-charter vs after conversion as well graduation rates comparisons, District and State comparisons, ECRCHS's average daily student attendance, merit scholars and information can be changed from month to month.  Board members' and teachers' suggestions are welcome.

Tony Lumino, from Opterra Energy Services, presented the financial component of the Energy Efficiency projects that will be partially funded by Prop. 39.

Eric Wilson updated the Board on the progress of the LCAP committee, comprised of teachers representing the five core academic subjects (English, World Languages, Science, Math and Social Studies) plus a college counselor, Special Ed. and administrator who met for two full days on March 8th and April 4th.  Two more meetings are scheduled for April 4th and April 25th to finish the Goals, Actions and Services, which is the bulk of the LCAP.  They have been working with a consultant who has experience developing LCAP's with other school districts and brought much needed direction.  It should be ready for Marshall by the end of month for budgetary line items and is scheduled to be up for review by the Board in May and adoption in June. 

Eric reported that ECRCHS established a Professional Development/Educator Effectiveness Committee to review the allocation of funds, for Board approval, to provide two full days of Professional Development in the 2016-17 school year, scheduled for Oct. 24th and March 6th (pupil free days).  There are 15 teachers on the committee, 10-12 of whom are very active, representing all subjects with the exception of World Languages, and meets every 2 - 3 weeks after school.  The committee is focused on current research, pedagogy, and varied committee members include a doctoral candidate, National Board Certified teachers and teachers who have recently earned their credentials and are versed in best practices. The specifics are to be determined. Of the $228,000.00 funds, $140,000.00 will pay for next year's PD days and the remaining $88,000.00 will pay for the additional two days in the 2017-18 school year. 

Melanie reported that the first campaign letters were sent out to ECRCHS parents three weeks ago.  The total response as of the date of the meeting was 40 donations totaling $10,600.00, with the single largest donation of $2,500.00

Marshall reported that when the lease is up on the large copier "Big Bertha" in June, it will be replaced by two smaller more efficient copiers that will be faster, more efficient, cost less and double the copying capacity.

Jon Wasser stated that if either of two laws currently proposed in Tennessee are passed (one would deny K-12 students from using restrooms according to their gender identity and the other would allow therapists to deny services to LGBT patients due to their religious beliefs), he will not attend the National Charter School Conference on June 28, 2016 in Tennessee.  He stated that he will not attend, nor will he travel to or conduct business with, any state that passes laws similar to Tennessee's proposed new laws and urged the Board members to do the same.  Mr. Fehte stated for the records that he supports Jon's views and he also asked the Board not to support or spend money in any state that passes similar laws. 

David Hussey reported to the Board that starting next year, an EL coach will be added with one period out of the classroom to work with Dept. Chairs and EL students.  Dept. Chairs will be point people for Writing Across the Curriculum.  Elections for Deans for the 2016-17 school year will be held next week.  The staff voted not to have a full time Spec. Services Coordinator, so ECR will be hiring a Special Ed teacher which should help reduce class sizes and hopefully will add five Special Day classes and reduce the load of our Special Day teachers.  The Professional Development Committee is doing well, there's energy in the group, good ideas and it's teacher-driven so hopefully the teachers will buy in.  Since the coordinator position was voted out, an administrative designee will be appointed because this is not an out-of-classroom position, and names of those who are interested are being collected now.

Chang Patel gave the financial update prepared by Ed Tec to the Board.

Marshall informed the Board that Signature Estate Investment Advisors will manage the funds in the ECRA retirement Trust.

Marshall addressed the recent article in the LA Times by Howard Bloom that was very one-sided regarding eight ECRCHS teachers who have requested to return to LAUSD to retire with lifetime benefits paid for by LAUSD.  He explained that these teachers qualified for lifetime benefits with LAUSD prior to ECR going Charter and are within the 5 year window to return to the District to retire, as seven previous teachers did after ECR went charter.  Melanie stated that in her interview with Mr Bloom, that if he was referring to any teachers who did not qualify for benefits at the time ECR went Charter, that ECR had agreed to pay for their lifetime benefits when they qualify and retire,  but those who qualified with LAUSD prior to going Charter could return to the District to retire with LAUSD lifetime benefits, according to ECR's understanding of the agreement with LAUSD and UTLA.  Marshall stated that the Material Revision has now been delayed one month because of the damage created by his article and has a huge financial impact on ECRCHS. 
Marshall reported that implementation of the ERP system is behind schedule because of staffing issues and changes being made to the system to capture more information because of additional demands by LAUSD.  He reported that since Yvonne Halski is retiring, David Hussey, Dean Bennett and Lisa Ring will be picking up her responsibilities.  We lost our Controller in January and an analyst, who will be replaced in May, and the HR Manager is retiring in June and we will need to plan who will assume her responsibilities handling employee benefits, workers comp, FMLA and more.  Fernando and Susan are working to add fields to the ERP system to formalize our purchasing process.
 

Revisit the issue of the fallout caused by the LA Times article by Howard Bloom.
Mr. Vastenhold commended the staff for general upkeep and cleanliness of the campus and for providing mediation to help with the current issues between staff members.  Review staff morale w/Stefanie Bero and discuss how morale may be improved.