PVPA meeting September 10, 2015: Notes
(6-6:30pm potluck, 6:30-8:30pm meeting; Co-Chairs: Kirsten Rayhawk and Gemma Metzger)
Documents: Handout of scheduled community events for the year. [KR notes: This was published on this blog immediately before this post.]
Board Update to PVPA:
Mary Li, President, Jamie Trummer, Board Rep to PVPA (also attending, Medessa Cheney)
Highlight: PVS is in its 9th year of operation. Like a child going through the Nine Year Change, PVS has been moving from focusing on internal affairs of growing the grades to now looking outside for a new home.
PVPA liaison to the Board this year is Jamie Trummer. Next board meeting is September 17, at 6:30pm. All are welcome to attend.
Overall picture for the year:
The school has matured and gained clarity in the roles we all take on to support the children. The Board has primarily taken on the Head, the PVPA is this year deliberately taking on the Heart role (focus on the community life) and the staff clearly is the Hands (direct delivery of education, what we call in Waldorf the application of The Will). The PVPA will focus on the heart needs of the community and social support building, supporting the community and the teachers so that we can all best support the students.
Looking at the overall calendar/plan document ...
The Harvest Festival and Craft Fair are both PVPA events.
Susan Harris is this year's PVPA's liaison to the staff's Events committee and will keep us informed about requests for support for school events like the Lantern Walk and the Spiral Walk.
This year we plan to sponsor regular Adult Education sessions. We are confirming topics with the PVS staff and will publish a schedule when we can.
Creating room for connection: volunteering
What are the gifts this community brings and how can we include them as part of PVS? People with special gifts that they want to contribute are welcome and should contact Kirsten or Gemma, who will try to find a good opportunity to hook you in.
Crossing Guard volunteers needed: to assist those who are already volunteering to help keep kids safe when passing between the upper and lower school buildings at the beginning of school. Contact Gemma (usually working as a crossing guard in the mornings!).
Paul Berg requests that people think beyond their classrooms: are there people who can drive for field trips or help during the school day (especially park walk monitors!) for classes which have trouble getting enough daytime volunteers?
Harvest Festival
Saturday, October 3, 10am-3pm at Kenton Park
Harvest Festival involves a lot of activities for the kids and an apple press for cider. It is a community event and not a fundraiser -- our big annual fundraiser happens in the springtime.
Kristen Saxton and Jamie Trummer will organize and coordinate Harvest Festival this year.
We will need apples donated for the apple cider press. Kirsten Rayhawk will be providing times (via a Google Calendar) for families to come to her home at Abby Creek Stables to pick apples and donate 50% of the picked harvest to the Harvest festival. [KR adds: info at http://pvsharvestfestapples.blogspot.com.]
The organizers will create the activities for the festival with help from the third grade classes. (In the past there have been kid craft tables, musical instruments for the kids to try, music to gather around, a parent lead spaghetti feast ... .)
Ongoing PVPA connections:
Each class should have a Class Room Parent and Class PVPA rep – The room parent helps the teacher with organizing the parents in the class and the PVPA representative comes to the PVPA meeting and reports back to the class what has been discussed and volunteer opportunities and social events discussed.
Coffee social – On the 1st Friday of every month. A time to come and meet other parents, build community. Carrie is organizing it and additional volunteers are needed. Come and brew coffee in the morning before school starts, set up a table in the breezeway. Get donations of baked goods to offer.
Fundraising: plans, ideas, how to hook in
The Fund Raising Committee meets the 1st Wednesday of the month; it is a committee of the Board of Directors. New board member Heather Ficht is the chair of the fundraising committee. They have a fundraising plan for the year. PVPA is an important part of fundraising. We need a PVPA rep to go to that meeting each month and inform the PVPA of what is going on with the board so we can coordinate with the board the fundraising.
Fundraising ideas
- Fundraising Committee plans restaurant nights where proceeds go to the school.
- Idea brought up during meeting: having a Run for the Arts at PVS. Where kids run laps and have family/friends donate per lap. Have other activities there for fun, ie. dunk tank. Consider using a website to advertise event to family/grandparents, where they can donate.
Fundraising committee is organizing a fund-raising event in Spring of 2016. People gave feedback that it could be a free event at which to encourage people to donate to PVS. This will create a setting for socializing and fund raising.
There were questions about the hows and whys of fundraising at PVS ... there will probably be a short presentation at PVPA next month about why fundraising is necessary, where PVS' money needs to go, what is happening with the finances of the school, what is the fundraising plan. Paul Berg recommends that to learn more, one can look at the Chalkboard report from 2015 (Paul Berg has this, or http://chalkboardproject.org). It describes how charters are run vs. how neighborhood schools are run. The PVS budget from the state ends up being about 59% of a PPS neighborhood school, per student.
Craft Fair: Saturday, November 21
(always the Saturday before Thanksgiving)
Chair: Jane Graybill
The PVPA Craft Fair (holiday pies, handmade crafts, kid activities, food) is a fundraiser for our staff at PVS. Upstairs in the upper building, there will be vendors -- people from our community as well as local vendors. Different PVS classes will be assigned making soup and cornbread, coffee, and cookies. The Pocket Fairy wears a costume with many pockets filled with small beautifully wrapped crafts for children for sale for a dollar. There is a story room that is for the children to come and listen. Crafts for kids. Students also sell their crafts – ie. dream catchers, jewelry. All crafters give a percentage of what they make to the fund for staff bonuses. All the profits will go to the teachers as an end of year bonus.
The craft fair needs many volunteers to make it happen -- volunteers for the Craft Fair day, for decorations, for making pocket fairy crafts. Adults donate their time and materials to make the pocket fairy crafts. Volunteers are meeting 7pm a couple Tuesdays per month at the North Star Ballroom to create crafts for the pocket fairies. Last year the pocket crafts made $1200! Contact Jane Graybill.
... more events/plans ...
Teacher Appreciation Week – February, around valentines day.
Social event possibilities – Having family dances? Can ask Ms. Heidi to bring back family folk dances with live band. Maybe something else. No widespread interest in planning anything big besides the Spring Fundraiser.
The Fundraising Committee's restaurant nights should provide good non-school-hour social opportunities for our families.
Update from Principal Paul Berg to PVPA
Talked about necessity of volunteers for helping out in their own class as well as in other classes. People who can help with other classes he called Utility Volunteers. Volunteer as drivers for field trips and park walks so that these outings do not need to be cancelled at the last minute due to the lack of volunteers.
PVS - Current enrollment is 427 students – very close to full capacity (approx. 433 at our current site, 444 at a larger site)
At the beginning of school, he and a few veteran staff members held a 3 day professional development dedicated to just the new teachers to help them integrate in quickly and efficiently and it has supported them and their students greatly. (Some of the new teachers moved clear across country and did not get the chance to attend summer training weeks. Teachers from Arizona, Washington State, and Pennsylvania.)
October 8th – Special Guest Speaker Stephen Keith Sagarin, PhD – please be sure to attend! (No childcare offered that evening, so plan ahead.)
October 17th, Saturday – Work party offered by bartenders from the hospitality industry (Bon Vivants), that come from all over the country. Last year they came and worked for a full day. Last year they painted the basement, cleaned all the awnings, made the benches by the kindergartens, had a great time! This year we need more PVS parents to come and volunteer with the hospitality industry volunteers. PVPA needs to organize transport, perhaps food for them – coffee and pasteries in the morning, lunch. (Gemma and Mary Li are heading the food effort.)
October 18th, Sunday – The Bon Vivant bartenders will have a party fundraiser with the proceeds that all going to PVS! Please attend as a fundraiser. Last year cool shirts were sold too, and the food and drinks were (of course) great!
Future presentations –
Paul Berg will present on middle school kids, for one of the PVPA adult education sessions later this year.
[Notes provided by Stephanie Farrell 9/11/2015, edited for publication by Kirsten Rayhawk 9/28/2015. My apologies for the delay. -- Kirsten]
