ESK PA committee meeting minutes December 4 2009

Thursday, 4 December 2008

The ESK Parents Association's General Assembly took place on the 6 November 2008 where they approved the previous year’s Annual and Financial Report and elected the Committee for this year. The new Parents’ Association Committee held their first meeting on Thursday 4 December 2008, when they elected Cindy van Velzen as President, Ana Gorey as Vice President and Kevin Barber as Treasurer. They form the Parents’ Association’s Bureau. The Committee members are as follows (in alphabetical order): Blandine Aslanides; Anja Bühner; Markus Gammelin (since resigned), Beth Klawun; Madeleine Koch; Merrild Flemming; Michel Messmer; Ramil Nasyrow; Sylvia Röder; Daniela Rudel and Sarah Winthrop. Cindy van Velzen underlined the fact that this needed to be a real team effort.

There was a general discussion about the numerous tasks ahead and which would be priority for this year. The Committee particularly emphasised urgent action on the Canteen and Communication. More specifically responsible on behalf of the Committee are:

Canteen – Ramil Nasyrow / Daniela Rudle
Transport – Merrild Flemming
Communication – Sarah Winthrop, Blandine Aslanides, Beth Klawun
Interparents – Ana Gorey

Section Reps for Primary and Secondary school are:
German Section – Sylvia Röder and Daniela Rudle
French Section – Michel Messmer and Blandine Aslanides
English Section – Beth Klawun and Ana Gorey
Dutch/Italian Sections + SWALS – Cindy van Velzen

There was a still a number of other important on-going tasks on behalf of the Committee which include: security, after school activities, events (particularly the Summer Fete), school cards and photos, management of membership, EuroBoutique and the Website. The opening hours of the Parents Association's office remains on Wednesday mornings with Cindy van Velzen and Sarah Winthrop present. Sarah Winthrop will also be available in the Lower school Library on Friday mornings.

At the beginning of the meeting, two guest parents gave their impressions of the canteen trial week with the Grbrüder Kunzmann GmbH company. They generally held it to be catastrophic but we need to await the results of the questionnaire. This was only the first trial canteen week and the Committee looked forward to the next one in January with Scholarest. General discussion on the canteen highlighted three main issues: quality of food, quality of service and organisation. More information was requested.

Cindy van Velzen informed the Committee of the state of preparations for their Christmas Carol gluewine event on the 15 and 16 December and noted down volunteers to help. Markus Gammelin presented a funding request with regard to EuroSport (Appendix 1) and the possibility of hosting an evening on education for parents (Appendix 2). Ana Gorey informed them of Mr. Hoyem’s plans for opening a boarding school in 2010, which is outlined in a letter to parents (Appendix 3). These would be discussed at a later stage, once we had a framework for deciding such matters, in order to avoid making ad-hoc decisions.

The next meeting will be Wednesday 14 January 2009 and starts at 7:30pm.

ESK PARENTS ASSOCIATION
NEXT STEPS

In order for the Committee to be able to discuss the issues on the basis of more concrete information, have a better understanding of what we were dealing with and not make decisions on an ad-hoc basis, a series of background papers would be extremely helpful for the next meeting. Those responsible are asked to draft something and other members are encouraged to send in ideas and suggestions.

- CANTEEN
o what is the current situation of the Canteen (who does what on the Canteen Committee)
o how does it function regarding food (menus, choice, quality control)
o how does it function regarding parents (organisation of tickets, payments)
o how it functions regarding kids (queuing, second helpings)
o how it functions regarding the canteen staff (service, cleaning, cooking)
o financial report for last year (this is now urgent)

o on-going testing of new canteen companies
o biological and environmental aspects
o what happens in other European schools? European Institutions?

- TRANSPORT
o what is the current situation of the Transport Committee (who does what on the Committee)
o how does it function regarding busses (routes, times, quality control)
o how does it function regarding parents (organisation of payments)
o how it functions regarding kids (monitoring, bullying)
o how it functions regarding the monitors (are they paid, what is their role)
o financial report for last year (this is now urgent)
o what happens in other European schools? European Institutions?

- COMMUNICATION
o how to improve communication, avoid repetition and overload
o targets: class reps, students reps, parents, school management, teachers and staff
o what we are communicating (school v. Parents Association information)
o how we are communicating (paper v. e-mail v. Website)
o events
o membership drive

- FINANCING
o past practice and traditional projects
o income and kitty (do we need to increase the membership fees)
o current projects and commitments (need for priorities)
o framework for fundraising (who are the targets, beware of overlap)
o framework for sponsoring (what should the school pay for and what should we pay for)
o framework for Social Fund (income v. requests)
o what can we finance, or financially contribute to, so as to achieve our goals or encourage a particular direction? (e.g. Fund school band if that’s what we want)

- EDUCATIONAL/SCHOOL ISSUES
o Preparation of the Administration Board- 29 January 2009
o Preparation of Education Councils
o Interparents
o Security
o Welbeing of students
o Class trips
o Language issues

- EVENTS 2009
o Back to school – 5 January 2009 (three Kings Feast?)
o PA dinner buffet evening – How about Friday 6 February?
o Valentine’s Day – 14 February 2009 –
o Open Day –
o EuroSport – 18-21 March 2009
o Summer Fete – June 2009

ESK PARENTS ASSOCIATION
DINNER BUFFET

The idea of the PA Committee hosting a buffet dinner in the new Canteen at the beginning of 2009 would achieve a number of important goals:

- introduce the new PA Committee
- make sure that Class reps know who their Section representatives are on the PA Committee
- make sure that teachers know who their Class and Section representatives are
- vision of what the schools goals / challenges are
- informal occasion to disucuss what we want to achieve together
- occasion to see what are the best working methods
- occasion to see how best to reach all parents
- better define the roles of all those involved with the school

- give an opportunity to a new canteen company to present itself

- have a good time and get to know each other

Target group should include: class reps, student representative, teachers, educational counselors, management and admin staff. Approximatly 250 people including the PA Committee.

It would be best to do this as soon as possible and the first realistic date could be Friday 6 or Friday 13 February 2009.

NEXT STEPS
Please do this before our next meeting

CANTEEN - look into options (buffet dinner, drinks, snacks etc.) and costs

COMMUNICATION - see what is our message should be on the night, Speech for Cindy

FINANCING –look at budgets and costs for event and any possible follow-up

EDUCATIONAL / SCHOOL ISSUES – prepare guidelines on how to be a class rep etc.