City Garden Montessori School
Minutes
Governance Committee Meeting
Date and Time
Monday August 25, 2025 at 9:00 AM
Location
EAEC Conference Room
Committee Members Present
J. Dixon, L. Schwartze, L. Vowell, N. Johnson, S. Haigler
Committee Members Absent
D. Smith
Guests Present
C. Huck, C. Schell, S. Miner
I. Opening Items
A.
Welcome & Check-Ins
B.
Record Attendance
C.
Call the Meeting to Order
J. Dixon called a meeting of the Governance Committee of City Garden Montessori School to order on Monday Aug 25, 2025 at 9:12 AM.
II. Action Items
A.
Approve May Minutes
L. Vowell made a motion to approve the minutes from Governance Committee Meeting on 05-23-25.
S. Haigler seconded the motion.
The committee VOTED unanimously to approve the motion.
B.
Discuss SY26 Committee Priorities
- Jesse revisited committee scope & SY25 priorities, as well as SY26 board goals
- Consider tiering of responsibilities -
- R1, R4, R5 (eval, development, policies) - business-as-usual and continuous improvement
- Policies - opportunity to do a more strategic review (in context of strategic plan & current environment) and bring simplicity/transparency to current policy manual
- R2 (board recruitment) - top priority for this group, opportunity to build additional infrastructure
- R3, R6 (community engagement & strategic planning) - alignment with board goal, clearly define governance role vs board role
- R1, R4, R5 (eval, development, policies) - business-as-usual and continuous improvement
- Next steps - Claire to create draft priorities & potential timeline for September meeting review
C.
Board composition
- Need for prioritizing additional members this year, ensuring well-rounded expertise
- Next steps
- Move forward with temporary amendment of by-laws in September
- Move forward with parent member interviews for 1-2 more members in fall
- Spend time outlining multi-year board recruitment plan
D.
Policies
- Christie shared updates around short-term policy needs - Cell phone, PTO
- MCPSA will be sharing more complete list of changes/model policies over next few weeks
- Next month -
- committee to discuss phases of policy review - e.g., simplification, strategic plan review
E.
Community engagement/strategic planning
- Claire shared update about strategic planning process, and plans for community engagement
- Alignment that board members should serve as "hosts" for focus groups
- Student engagement in October board meeting
III. Updates
A.
Other priority updates
- Jesse shared update on CEO evaluation process, committee members to share interest in participating with Jesse.
B.
Updates from committee members
IV. Closing Items
A.
Next committee meeting
- In general, committee meetings to be held last Monday of each month at 9am, except November 21 & December 15
B.
Adjourn Meeting
There being no further business to be transacted, and upon motion duly made, seconded and approved, the meeting was adjourned at 10:57 AM.
Respectfully Submitted,
J. Dixon