• Staff back to school:  Very positive
  • 20 new staff attended full week of onboarding in alignment with the STEM mission, including classroom management development.
  • Most additional staff to accommodate needs of additional students
  • Former STEM student is one of the new staff!  
  • Full staff learning STEM Core Values tomorrow for the first time.   
• Introduction of new platforms:
  • Support SES: Platform to support teachers in sharing student progress more easily with students, families, and each other. 
  • Team Optics Platform for giving teacher peer feedback:  Training initiated to support teachers with this. 
  • Win At Social:  Celebrating great student behavior and sharing with grades 5-8
• Current Staffing Needs:
  • One business teacher resigned impacting 150 students
  • Gifted and Talented teacher 
  • ES Instructional Assistants
  • Secondary Ed Aides
• Many start of school events to ease students back into school routines and opportunities for enrichment.
• Extremely high retention rate of staff
  • Much higher than national average
  • Allows for STEM to grow instructional leaders 
• Enrollment
  • Discrepancy between District and School
  • Exec. Director predicts between 1515 and 1530 (budget is 1530)
  • Waitlists in 3 grades
• Facility upgrades
  • Painted walls throughout the whole building
  • Bathrooms renovated
  • Mobiles in certain spaces
  • Playground is still in the works. Red tape is blocking progress.   

• Graduation this year is 5/18/2025, 10 am at Echo Park
• Board reviewing the proposed 26-27 Calendar (will vote next month)

• Mission & Core Values:  Matt proposed extended timeline for mission development that meets high bar.  Board agreed. Matt to send invite to board to recruit 1-2 board members to join mission task force.Staff being introduced to Core Values Friday
• Leadership Retreat:  Matt reported it was very positive. Leadership team addressed several high priority leadership initiatives for 25-26. Highlight:  Student Showcase further refined to reflect the strategy goals. 
• Fundraising:  Launching Accelerator Fund in August.  Currently still planning details while also collecting fundraising plans and budgets from club and sport leads.  Events planned for fall.  Will present at Governance and Finance Committee this month.
  • Adelita asked about process of citing needs/requesting funds.  Matt explained how there's a "strategy alignment" filter before going through other steps.
  • PTO ways of working shifting so there's no risk of conflict with the updated fundraising plan.

No public comment

• We discussed the timing of committee and task force meetings so that folks have enough time to report to Carla any updates to planned agenda items.  Broad agreement that 2nd and 3rd week of the month are good times to hold monthly committee and task force meetings.
• Gina asked about "listen only" option for participants who choose to attend open meetings (when there are 3+ Board members at the meeting).  This is acceptable.  We don't need to collect public comment.  
• Only need to post 24 hours in advance if there's a quorum.
• SAC functions like a mini-board.  They need to give 24 hours notice AND post the agenda.

• Carla reminded the board members to complete action items in Board on Track.
• Next Month:  
  • If we have SPF results, Exec. Director will share outcomes in Sept.  Likely don't need a new UIP for 2025.
  • CIO Goals for 2025-2026 presented
  • All committee one-pagers should be uploaded to board book before Sept. meeting.   
  • Carla to bring board report to next meeting.