Citizens Advisory Council (CAC) Draft Minutes

Kia Chandler, the Annapolis Secondary School Cluster representative to the Citizens Advisory Council (CAC), passed these minutes onto Bates Middle School, Annapolis Middle School and Annapolis High School PTAs for dissemination.  Her contact information is kchandler06@gmail.com.

DRAFT CAC – Meeting Minutes 

February 10, 2014

Note: The meeting was schedule originally for February 3, 2014, but due to weather closure was re-scheduled.

Attendees:

Annapolis Cluster	Karma O'Neill	P	Kia Chandler	P
Arundel Cluster	Kevin McCoy	P	Loretta Khangura	P
Broadneck Cluster	Lisa Nolan	P	Constanza Hanford	P
Chesapeake Cluster	Tanisha Jagoe	P	Brian Weber	P
Meade Cluster			Rachelle Large	P
Northeast Cluster	Katie Wukitch	P
Severna Park Cluster	Thurman Reynolds	P	Brad Myers	P
South River Cluster	Debbie Oakes	P
Southern Cluster			Lynette Entzian	P
At-Large	Edmund Barrett	P

Call to Order 7:09 pm by Karma O’Neill

Quorum established by Karma O’Neill

Old Business:

a. Superintendent Search Report provided by K. O’Neill and Ed Barrett.

The Sub Committee: Ed Barrett, Katie Wukitch, Rachelle Large, Lynette Entzian, and Carla DeWitt. Ed Barrett received a call from the school district to be part of the screening process as application process proceeds. 

                     

b. Cell Phone Towers: Report provided by K. McCoy

Discussion which was extracted from the board’s agenda for the February 5, 2014 meeting:

This is the second reading for this policy.  There were three (3) comments during the 30-day posting on the website.  The public comments regarded communication concerns, specifically that parents and homeowner’s associations and/or community associations shall be notified as soon as the Board is aware that a school is being considered for a telecommunication transmission facility.  Additionally, one comment also aimed to ensure that Anne Arundel County Public Schools had the authority to preclude a project from proceeding if the need arose.  These concerns are properly addressed in FB-RA as communication is provided to the stakeholders upon determination by AACPS that it is appropriate to proceed with the approval process for such equipment and communication regarding the status of the project is required throughout the Regulation.  Additionally, if the Board has concerns regarding a project proceeding they may take action as they deem appropriate as stated in C(4)f of the Regulation.

K. McCoy comments to the BOE were to have no towers closer than 300 feet to an elementary school due to signal transmission concerns discussed during the Piney Orchard Cell Tower testimony.  It was not incorporated into the current draft, but the regulation does allow the BOE to reject any proposals based on input from all stakeholders as outlined above. K. McCoy also made a recommendation there be revenue sharing with the school where the tower is placed, but that input was rejected and the revenue was going to be centrally controlled.

There are also 2 proposals for new towers in the process.  One at Annapolis Middle School and Center for Applied Technology - North (CAT-N).  Both proposals were discussed in the January 8, 2014 board meeting and the technical documents were also include with that agenda. K. Chandler related the principal had an information meeting on the placement of the tower.

As previously reported the Tower at Piney Orchard was withdrawn by the vendor who is looking at an alternate site.

c. High School Start Times:

K. O’Neill reported that K. Chandler is the CAC representative to the Task Force (TF) to make recommendations on this issue.  K. Chandler related the TF will meet monthly between now and August with a goal of a recommendations in September 2014.  The first meeting is set for February 19, 2014.

Many of the CAC were concerned regarding the complete shift of all start times, particularly with elementary students getting off the bus at the end of the day when it was dark.  Members wanted to document that the CAC recommendation only focused on later High School Start Times and not a complete shift of all start times and that need to be the focus and direction of the TF.

            d. Common Core:

L. Nolan provided a recap of meetings in the Broadneck Cluster.  A general discussion of the concerns identified that the implementation was not handled well, as teachers seem to be getting material late, not have time to teach the new curriculum and students are not being prepared to be evaluated successfully.  This is a concern that county students are being used as “guinea pigs” with the new PARCC assessments being developed and the school system should have developed a “bell curve” during the transition of the material so student’s academic careers are not harmed with the fragmented implementation.  http://www.marylandpublicschools.org/msde/programs/ccss/ccssrffaq.html for common core.

Motion by L. Khangura:   Submit the following question to the BOE to provide the CAC more information to share with clusters, many of which are frustrated with the way common core is being implemented:  What was/is the past/ongoing schedule to provide material to teachers for instruction and the schedule of testing students on that material?

Second by T. Reynolds.

Vote: Unanimous to support the motion.

            e.  Class Ranking: BOE is aware of this situation and asked CAC to provide input

on this issue as it appears most of the concern is about Valedictorian/Salutatorian status. Sub Committee: Loretta Khangura, Lindy Marks, Tanisha Jagoe.

New Business:

            a.  Review and approval of the December 2013 meetings was deferred at the beginning of the meeting as a quorum was being established.  Once a quorum was established there was an oversight in voting on the December 2013 minutes. Approval of the December 2, 2013 minutes was obtained in an e-mail vote.

            b.  C. Hanford related there is a small group of concerned citizens that is pushing for additional Foreign Language Facilitators within the schools for the FY 2015 school budget.  There are currently only 12 (10 Spanish speaking) facilitators for an approximate 8,000 students who need assistance.  It was generally agreed the CAC did not have enough information on this program and will ask the BOE to have a staff member brief the CAC.

            c.  Brad Myer was interested in what the inclement weather decision making policy process.  K. McCoy related it is posted on the AACPS home page and is quite detailed.

            d.  K. O’Neill sought input from the CAC on their experience with Parent Connect.  The discussion related it is a great tool for parents to use to help monitor their children’s efforts and grades.  There was agreement about improvement on how the assignments are “weighted” and a suggesting that weighting be show by the assignments.  The major problem seemed to be in the timeliness of posting of grades by teachers.  Some post by the due date of assignments and some wait for weeks to post, even close to the end of the marking period.  This makes it difficult for parents to assess the performance of their child unless they directly reach out to the teacher. There was a concern that not all of the assignments for a semester are posted so the parent can see the work load required and that some teachers seem to post as they grade.  The question arose is there a board or school policy on the timeliness of posting of grades, how should assignments be shown in advance and other administrative issued with the “missing” that post if there is not grade by the time the assignment is due. K. McCoy related the Parent Handbook has information on how some of the assignments are weighted such as testing counting for more toward a grade than homework.  In addition the class syllabus issued by teachers at the beginning of the year should also provide that specific information.  It was agreed that a question would be provide to the board to seek clarity on just what is the policy for not only timeliness of posting of grades by teachers, but showing all the assignments for a particular semester. K. O’Neill took that for action.

           

Public Participation:

          There was one member of the public who also commented on the Parent Connect that if there was specific timeliness policy, they should make a link to it in the Parent Connect area to include clarification on the weighting of assignments.

Announcements:

            a. County Executive Laura Neuman is hosting three town hall meetings this month to provide more information on the county budget process and to hear the opinions of residents about the budget.  

·         February 13, 2014, 6-7pm at Lake Shore Elementary School, located at 4531 Mountain Road in Pasadena.

·         February 19, 2014,7-8pm at Old Mill High School, located at 600 Patriot Lane in Millersville.

·         February 26, 2014, 6-7pm at the Deale Community Library, located at 5940 Deale-Churchton Road in Deale.

County Executive Neuman will present her budget proposal to the County Council on May 1, 2014.

            b. The County Council will hold public hearings on County Executive Laura Neuman’s proposed FY2015 budget at 7 p.m. on:

• Thursday, May 8, 2014, at North County High School, located at 10 E. First Avenue in Glen Burnie
• Monday, May 12, 2014, at the Arundel Center, located at 44 Calvert St. in Annapolis

Next CAC meeting is Monday April 7, 2014 at the School Board. 

Motion by T. Reynolds to adjourn

Second by L. Nolan

Vote: Unanimous to support the motion.

Adjourned 8:40 pm

Respectfully submitted, Kevin A. McCoy

Vice Chair