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ST. PIUS X SCHOOL ADVISORY COUNCIL MINUTES FOR JANUARY 22, 2007 In Attendance: Will Ward, Rosemary Benedetto, Darlene Tobin, Carol Newman, Alicia Mendoza (PTO Rep), Brian Ruby, Amber Martinez, Rachel Lopez, Michelle Rochester; Absent: Msgr. Larry, Dwight Delfeld, Frank Perez, Frank Valez Brian opened with a prayer. Minutes: November minutes were approved Pastor’s Update: None. Principal’s Update: Thank you to all Council members for your help and support for our accreditation visit. We are anticipating a very pleasant, positive experience. Thank you also to Rachel Lopez for speaking at the Spanish Masses January 14 to promote our school. Charles Thomas will represent our school at the Diocesan Spelling Bee this Wednesday, January 24. Registration packets for the 2007-2008 school year will be sent home this Thursday. Current school families will have until February 9 to register. Registration for new families will begin February 12. Catholic Schools Week, which is Jan. 27 – Feb. 2, is planned and posted to Renweb. Some of our St. Pius Alumni will be participating in the Mass Jan. 27. The Men’s Club is providing the hamburger/hot dog cookout. All the students and teachers have been working really hard to prepare the school for all our open houses. Everything looks great! We have eight families who are delinquent in their tuition, so their access to Renweb has been blocked, and their child’s report card will be held. I have called all the families, and they are in the process of taking care of the late tuition. We thank Mary Donahue for putting together the slide show that was shown at the accreditation dinner and will be shown continuously at the new family open house Jan. 29. The music on the cd was our honors choir from last year. Tony’s Wine Warehouse (now owned by Rosemary’s son) offered us a free wine-tasting evening for our faculty/staff. We are looking forward to relaxing and enjoying ourselves on Friday, Feb. 2 – accreditation and Catholic Schools Week will be over! We appreciate the generosity. Darlene Tobin and I will again be attending a two day “Enhancing Catholic Identity” workshop at the American Airlines Training Center on February 22 and 23. Our 8th grade Confirmation retreat is Sunday, February 4, at Samuel Farm. Confirmation is Saturday, February 24, at 7:00 p.m.
President’s Update: Finance – John Farrell made changes to the budget and finalized. Budget indicates an increase in revenue due to tuition increases (20 new students). 2006 Church collections exceeded pledges by 10%. Father Arturo has been encouraging increased offerings during the Hispanic masses. In addition, CCD now requires a minimum for $250 to participate vs. the previous $0. Open House – Carol met with the Day Care Director about setting two tables by the concession area. Other groups to attend Open House are: chess club, scouts, and a band parent (Cathy Conway). Ginger Farrell to also attend as representative for Athletics and Safe Environment. Rachel is coordinating cookies and punch, Alicia is bringing cups and Michelle is bringing napkins. Will to discuss making the Open House announcement during all masses with Father Larry and also checking on additional brochures and fact sheets. School Advisory Council members are to be available during the following masses in the foyer promoting Open House: Sun 8:00 – Michelle Sun 10:00 – Michelle Sun 11:30 – Rosemary Sun 5:30 – Brian School Advisory Council members should arrive at Communion Hall by 6:00 to help set up for Open House. Banner will be displayed. Need to position students at entrances and have the students assist with the tours. Will to send layout to Amber and she will distribute to the students conducting tours. Currently, two School Advisory Council positions need to be filled (Frank Perez, Dwight Delfeld). The council members will actively begin looking for replacements immediately. PTO Update - Alicia presented sample promotional items and price lists. The School Advisory Council agreed to purchase sports bottles, baseball caps, cinch sacks and personal umbrellas. Although there is currently no budget for these items, everyone agreed the investment is necessary to begin the SPX promotional item fundraising project. The initial investment will be approximately $1,300. Upon determining the success of this fundraiser, additional items will be added. Alicia is also looking into pencils, erasers and key chains as give-aways. Future Dates: SPX Open House: 7:00 pm – 8:30 pm in Communion Hall Next SAC meeting 2/26 @ 7:00 pm in Media Center PTO Meetings 3/6 @ 7:00 pm Gym reception room
Meeting adjourned.
ST. PIUS X SCHOOL ADVISORY COUNCIL MINUTES FOR March 5, 2007 (reschedule of postponed 2/26/07 meeting)
In Attendance: Will Ward, Rosemary Benedetto, Darlene Tobin, Carol Newman, Alicia Mendoza (PTO Rep), Brian Ruby, Rachel Lopez, Michelle Rochester, Msgr. Larry; Absent: Frank Valez, Amber Martinez Rosemary opened with a prayer. Minutes: January minutes were approved
Pastor’s Update: No update, however, Principle assessment completed as noted below.
Principal’s Update: Recent test scores from incoming students were higher than previous years. There is concern of the low registration of the kindergarten class. Other schools have full kindergarten classes. Discussed obtaining a list of pre-k students that are in day care and calling those families that have not yet registered for the ’07-’08 school year. Alicia feels communication my be lagging in the day care, as 28 kids have not re-enrolled. Some feedback received eludes to the financial burden. Rachel received some feedback from a few parents upset about increased tuition. Carol is looking into kindergarten parents visiting day care to talk to pre-k parents. Carol has not received much feedback about the proposed voucher system and very little from the Austin rally. Should the bill pass, the private schools would have to begin a standardized test (similar to the TAKS test). Four of our 8th grade students tested in the top 10 of the Bishop Lynch entrance exam. SPX will possibly put together a study packet to prepare students for the exam in the future. Our accreditation visit went very well. We received a positive preliminary report from the team leader and from TCCED in Austin. We will not get our formal “Accredited” status certificate until May 2007. Again, thank you to everyone who helped us with this important task. St. Pius truly shined during the visit, and the team could see and feel the great spirit that is St. Pius. Thank you to all Advisory Council members, PTO members, scout leaders, teachers, students, and everyone else who helped with the open house for new families on January 29. We were disappointed at the light turn-out (26 families) but proud of the improved conditions of the open house. We currently have 350 students registered for next year (includes new students). Only 23 of those are kindergartners. Eighteen new students took the entrance test this past Saturday, and we are in the process of determining whether they will be accepted (due to academics). I will begin calling current school families this week who have not yet registered to determine why they have not re-enrolled. We will also get a list of the preK children from the daycare and call those families who have not registered. The Admissions Committee will meet this Thursday, March 8, to review all applications. Acceptance letters will be mailed after spring break. We are losing 12 spots in the 8th grade for the 2007-2008 school year, as the current 7th grade class is smaller. We have decided to offer an incentive to our current school families to bring in new families to our school. We will give a $100 tuition discount to current families for every family they refer to St. Pius that is accepted to attend school here. This announcement will go out in the newsletter and parish bulletin this week, as well as be posted on Renweb. Only one teacher does not plan to return next year. Mrs. Jennifer White (4th grade) and her husband are moving back to their home state, Tennessee. We had a request from some school parents to use our field for soccer practice in the evenings. I took the topic to our parish staff for discussion, and the decision was made that only St. Pius School and/or Parish- sponsored groups/organizations may use the facilities – buildings, field, grounds. The rationale for the decision was based on safe environment and liability issues.
President’s Update: Finance – January, 2007 was a good month with a favorable variance of $22,000 due primarily to inheritance received (located in acct. #371570 Gifts and Grants). A positive expense variance is due primarily to lower utilities than budgeted. Brian inquired as to whether landscaping expenses were split between the church and school. Carol responded that certain expenses are allocated between church and school accordingly, and yes, landscaping is one of them. Carol reported that discussions have occurred to place the pre-k under the SPX school system. There are pros and cons to this concept. During last finance council meeting, Will expressed that Carolyn, Day Care Director, would like to partner with school events. Will to invite Carolyn to speak at the next School Advisory Council meeting., working towards developing a relationship between day care and school. We need to be prepared if enrollment doesn’t increase, despite increased marketing campaign. Maybe our focus should be channeled to Sunnyvale and Rowlett. Will inquired whether the Diocese would provide a mailing list of Catholic families in order to develop a mailing list. We will put together a mailing proposal to include electronic mailing lists and sending postcards. Bishop Lynch sent a bulk mailing to Rockwall and Rowlett and also delayed assessing registration fees until acceptance notification has been received by new families. Brian suggested distributing pamphlets at soccer fields and other events. Also, we should obtain parish directories from St. Martin, Our Lady of the Lake and St. Peter, to name a few to be utilized for a mass mailing. The suggestion was made to mail a post card including text in English and Spanish, reference the SPX website, give a response deadline and utilize a catchy phrase such as, “Just a few spots left”. Need to contact Bishop Lynch an inquire as to their process and experience with obtaining specific mailing lists and their marketing plan.
PTO Update - Promotional items were received and we viewed: umbrella, cinch sack, ball cap and water bottle. The pens and pencils were returned, as they were the wrong shade of blue. Alicia reported that a storage area has been secured and PTO members will be taking a complete inventory this weekend. Will set up a table with promotional items at the next sporting event. Possibly give a few items away at the next PTO meeting and maybe at the next pep rally. There were no volunteers for the upcoming PTO board elections.
Principle Assessment Carol and Darlene left the meeting so the board may complete the Principle assessment. Msgr. Larry read the guidelines in completing the assessment. Each board member present completed the written assessment and returned to Msgr. Larry. Future Dates: Next SAC meeting 3/26 @ 7:00 pm in Media Center PTO Meeting 3/6 @ 7:00 pm Gym reception room PTO Meeting 5/8 @ 7:00 pm Gym reception room Msgr. Larry closed w/ a prayer. Meeting adjourned.
ST. PIUS X SCHOOL ADVISORY COUNCIL MINUTES FOR April 30, 2007
In Attendance: Rosemary Benedetto, Darlene Tobin, Carol Newman, Alicia Mendoza (PTO Rep), Brian Ruby, Rachel Lopez, Michelle Rochester; Absent: Will Ward, Amber Martinez, Frank Velez, Msgr. Larry Carol opened with a prayer. Minutes: February minutes were approved Pastor’s Update: None.
Principal’s Update: We currently have 360 students registered for next year - still only 24 kindergartners. We cannot afford to keep two kinder teachers and have only 12 children per class. The kinder teachers have been informed. Acceptance letters were emailed to parents March 23. Conditional acceptance letters were mailed that same day. We had 50 families that have not completed their volunteer hours nor paid the $120 fee; eight for excessive tardies; and 12 for not giving the required $500 to the church. These families are steadily coming in and taking care of the missing requirements. We sent 21 packets with school information and registration forms to the daycare. They were to be sent home with the pre-K children who have not registered for kindergarten next year. We have had one family take our offer of a $100 tuition discount to current families for every family they refer to St. Pius that is accepted to attend school here. That’s a start – we hope to have many more! We are very proud of our 8th grade students. Information about the high schools they will be attending and scholarship offers was in the March 29 principal newsletter. They are a great group of kids, and we will really miss them next year. As a little parish outreach, Kathleen Huggins will open the spring book fair after Masses on Sunday, April 15. The CCD director is helping find Spanish-speaking people to work the book fair on Sunday. The book fair will run during school hours April 16-20. The teachers are very appreciative of all the good food that has been provided by Debbie Merkel and Diane Paradowski through the Advisory Council Mission Effectiveness committee. We have had something different and delicious at each of our faith formation classes once a month. Our school calendar for 2007-2008 was approved by the diocesan office. A copy will be provided to each council member Monday night. School will start August 27, 2007 and end June 4, 2008. Spring break will be combined with Easter (March 17-24). Graduation will be May 30, 2008. The Bishop Lynch principal and I worked on the calendar together, so, if she submitted the one we agreed upon, their calendar should be very similar to ours (except that they are starting school August 22). Our 8th grade students did very well on the math placement test at BL. Out of the top 10 scores, five were St. Pius students. Twelve of the 20 students who took the test will place out of Algebra I. We look forward to participating in the new marketing plan for St. Pius Parish/School. The first meeting will be May 10 at 6:30 p.m. Will Ward should have more information about this plan. Carol informed the council the school is planning on working towards a partnership with Day Care and possibly taking in pre-k within the school. Focus is to market to the entire Parish through-out the year and not just during Catholic School’s Week. Carol asked that council members email any suggestions related to this issue to her, that she can take to her meeting with the new marketing plan group. Four parent volunteers and I attended a luncheon that is held as a thank you for all the schools who participate with QSP’s magazine drive. Plans are underway for next fall’s drive. General Discussion: Brian inquired as to whether we have historically had kindergarten students register after the general enrollment period. Carol responded no. Rachel suggested the low enrollment could possibly be attributable to the negative media coverage of the SPX Day Care. Rachel also mentioned we need to focus on going forward, as our recent initiatives are obviously not working to increase enrollment. Need to hit the marketing plan aggressively. The new elementary school does not appear to be contributing to the low enrollment at this time. Carol is uneasy of the possibility of a single kindergarten class and the perception by the community. If pre-k was taken under SPX School, Carol will handle hiring of pre-k teachers. Brian inquired whether there was a bullying policy at SPX. Carol has discussed this issue with the students and parents as great length. We possibly need to have Byron Fassett return with this presentation and include the lower grades in addition to 7th/8th grades, as it is a widespread problem. Carol mentioned that bullying was the topic at a recent Elementary Principals Association meeting. Rachel suggested contacting the Rainbow Days, Inc. which is 12-week program where a third party visits weekly and conducts specific exercises that are topic specific with classes. Carol will inquire. Brian mentioned he received feedback that the school’s curriculum is challenging and the 8th grader’s test scores reflect the advance level of our students. Brian spoke with Ed Leyden about Bishop Lynch’s marketing program. Ed said the most challenging aspect was determining what will work in a marketing plan. Bishop Lynch spent $7,000 on a mass mailing. The key is to keep a consistent marketing plan in place; even if you reap immediate rewards from a mailing, keep going. Rockwall and Rowlett should be our focus and maybe begin with alumni and registered parishioners. Darlene suggested putting a little flyer in the mailed tithe envelopes and include a comment about the day care as well. Brian inquired whether a survey has been completed. The council generated a survey two years ago. We are looking into a survey that can be distributed/completed through Renweb. Rachel inquired if flyers that are sent home through the students had to be directly related to SPX. Carol responded that flyers had in fact gone home with student in the past related to other extra curricular activities no related to SPX.
President’s Update: None.
PTO Update - Attendance is very important at the next PTO meeting (5/8) as class representatives will be selected. Last JAVA of the school year will be 5/25. Future Dates: Next SAC meeting 5/21 @ 7:00 pm in Media Center PTO Meeting 5/8 @ 7:00 pm Gym reception room JAVA 5/25 @ 7:30 am Brian closed w/ a prayer. Meeting adjourned.
ST. PIUS X SCHOOL ADVISORY COUNCIL MINUTES FOR MAY 21, 2007
In Attendance: Will Ward, Rosemary Benedetto, Darlene Tobin, Carol Newman, Rachel Lopez, Michelle Rochester; Amber Martinez, Frank Velez, Msgr. Larry; Absent: Alicia Mendoza (PTO Rep), Brian Ruby Msgr. Larry opened with a prayer. Minutes: April minutes were approved Committee Updates: Three members will reach the end of their 3-year term effective the end of June and two of these members hold officer positions (Dwight Delfeld, Rosemary Benedetto and Michelle Rochester). The members may extend their terms if they wish. Rosemary Benedetto and Michelle Rochester offered to extend for one year if necessary. Will is to approach a few school parents that have expressed an interest in serving on the council. Upon their response, Will may contact Carol to generate a mass email to all school parents, informing them that council positions are available and to complete an application. The Vice President and Secretary officer positions will become open effective July, 2007. Vice President responsibilities include stepping in for the President in his/her absence, handle membership renewal process, coordinate election and other specials tasks as needed. Secretary responsibilities include recording minutes for each meeting and ensuring they are distributed to John Farrell for website posting, coordinate/organize annual teacher/faculty dinner at the beginning of the school year, and other special tasks as needed. Will has the draft constitution and will bring to the June, 2007 meeting for review. We will possibly add a non-voting council position for the next term to accommodate day care representation. Pastor’s Update: Msgr. Larry is very pleased with the direction the marketing efforts are leading and is surprised and disappointed of the low kindergarten enrollment. Principal’s Update: We now have 25 kindergartners registered for next year. We still cannot afford to keep two kinder teachers, and the teachers have been informed of this situation. Our total registration is 369. Carol thought we were only two teachers would need to be replaced – Jennifer White and Robbie Gavos – but there are three others that may be leaving. Carol is not ready to talk about those yet. Also, Deb Jaska will be leaving to take a job at Bishop Lynch. Carol has hired Margaret White as Deb’s replacement, and Margaret has already been coming in and working with Deb to learn the job. Will and Carol have started working with the parish committee to formulate a marketing plan for St. Pius Parish/School. We welcome your input and ideas. A copy of the school calendar for 2007-2008 will be provided to each council member who was not present at the April meeting. School will start August 27, 2007 and end June 4, 2008. Spring break will be combined with Easter (March 17-24). Graduation will be May 30, 2008. Will inquired as to when the accreditation feedback would be received. Carol received the letter this week, stating that St. Pius X School has been officially accredited. The school was only given one questionable comment, specifically, one of the visiting teachers noted that two children went to the restroom together without adequate supervision. Carol will address this comment.
President’s Update: Marketing: A marketing committee has been formed to focus on marketing of St. Pius X as a whole. The committee, consisting of Carol Newman, Mary Donahue, Caroline Blasigame, John Farrell, Jill Cale and Will Ward will gather regularly to unify the marketing efforts for St. Pius. Discussed adding CCD representation. The committee is considering an annual theme striving for a consistent common factor between all organizations under the St. Pius umbrella. The theme currently being considered is “Olympic” based encompassing the mind set of uniting the many cultures together as one. The goal of the committee will be to develop a comprehensive marketing plan with input from all organizations. Will invited Brian to attend the next committee meeting on June 5, 2007 @ 6:30 pm in the Rectory conference room. Will extended the invitation to all council members. Will is to email the last survey results to all council members for review. Discussed conducting the next survey in 2008 (every other year) through Renweb. This issue will be discussed further in the upcoming 2007-2008 school year. Msgr. Larry suggested we increase marketing efforts at Divine Mercy, due to the growth and the fact they do not have a school. Rachel agreed. Father Ernie will be approached about placing SPX brochures in the Church on a permanent basis. Discussed at great length the potential reasoning behind such a low enrollment at the kindergarten level. Possible causes suggested were: Surrounding demographic has changed, financial issues in general, generation issue as a result of 9-11 tragedy and the day care abuse perception. All are possibilities, but not one single reason could be determined. Our parents are the biggest marketing tool we have and we need to find a way to encourage school parents to market the school by word of mouth through individual events.
PTO Update - None. Future Dates: JAVA 5/25 @ 7:30 am Next SAC meeting: 6/25 @ 7:00 pm in Media Center Long Range planning meeting: Saturday, 7/28 @ 8:00 am – 12:00 noon
Msgr. Larry closed w/ a prayer.
Meeting adjourned.
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