PA Committee Meeting - Wednesday 1st December 2010

Cindy welcomed everyone to the first meeting with the new committee members. The election of the executive committee (president, vice-president and treasure) was carried out first. The results were:

Mrs Cindy van Velzen - president - unanimous vote
Mrs Nathalie Beroard Barth - vice president - unanimous vote
Mrs Ute Schmidt-Rohr - treasurer - unanimous vote

Other tasks were allocated and accepted:

Cindy van Velzen - SWALS rep
Nathalie Beroard Barth - French section rep Oberschule, ESK french rep
Sarah Winthrop - Secretary (communications), English section rep for Oberschule, Interparents
Ana Gorey - Interparents, Canteen Committee, English section rep for Oberschuler
Anja Buhner - After-school activities, German section rep for Oberschuler
Michel Messmer - French section rep for Grundschule, transport committee
Flemming Merrild - Transport committee
Thorsten Reineke - communications, transport committee
Jacqueline Ribeiro - German section rep, canteen committee
Veronique Needham - French section rep, After-school activities
Debjani Basu - English section rep Grundschuler
Hamid Betani - Canteen committee
Fotini Morakis - Events coordinator
Valerie Dujardin - French section rep Oberschule, SEN issues
Letizia Dalle Donne - German section rep Grundschule, EuroBoutique

It was proposed and agreed that from now on the task of “communications” should be under the Secretary of the PA committee. This position has not been filled for the past 2 - 3 years.

Membership list
Ute Schmidt-Rohr and Thorsten Reineke agreed to investigate and propose a suitable administration software to manage the PA membership list in a more efficient way. This will link directly to the fee payment and a general data bank for members’ details.

Wind Instrument project with class 1 OS
This project has been very successful so far. The financing of the instruments is supervised by a “Forderverein” run by parents just for this purpose. There are concerts planned for later this year and Herr Klagges the music teacher has requested funding from the PA towards t-shirts. ITU are already given their support in this project (250 Euros) . The PA committee agreed to sponsor t-shirts, subject to cost estimates from EuroBoutique.

Grundschule Projects - funding requests
Kunst mit Naturelement project €300 - The committee would like further information about this project before agreeing to sponsor it. (Ute Schmidt-Rohr to follow up)
ESKADO - This will be supported, but further details are needed, and the support is subject to actual costs submitted for consideration. (Ute  Schmidt-Rohrto follow up)
Project Kunst-Stuck - This project is already getting €15,000 from another sponsor, so the PA declined to become a sponsor of this event. The PA would rather just help with preparation of a Abschlussvorführung. (Ute Schmidt-Rohr to follow up)
Mrs Haberland
We discussed whether the concept for cheaper 2L English class books proposed by Mrs Haberland is really useful.
Decision: It is probably easier when the parents organize the book exchange on their own – no funding.
Remark: A credit would not have been possible anyway due to the statutes of the European schools.
Känguru-Wettbewerb
In 2010 the PA paid the costs for the GS-pupils and awarded a grant for the OS-pupils (in total about 350,- Euro).
Decision: The Känguru-Wettbewerb will again be supported in 2011.

Ute Schmidt-Rohr suggested that a grant application form be available on the PA website, for future project funding. This is already partly done for the Project week events. Ute will draft out a more comprehensive form that will be available in French, German and English for all teachers and students.

MEET
Topic was postponed (Cindy will send some material)

Christmas concerts primary (organisation)
On Tuesday (7 Dec): Cindy, Véronique, Debjani, Fotini and Nathalie (not from the start) will be present, on Wednesday (8 Dec) there will be Anja, Nathalie, Fotini, Michel and Thorsten.

Canteen
Jacqueline gave an introduction about the Kantinenausschuß (KA).
Due to the different situation with the new catering service (MediRest) the actual question is whether the KA should be closed and an alternative concept be followed. First consultations with a lawyer have taken place.
Decision: A special meeting on this topic will be arranged, Jacqueline will forward material before the meeting.

SAC meeting
Short summary of PA proposals was presented by Sarah. (annex 1)

Interparents
A short report of the last meeting held in Karlsruhe has been sent to all committee members. (annex 2)

Dinner party (PA, class reps, school staff)
There will be a dinner in 2011, school management has been asked to make suggestions for suitable dates.

Next date class reps / PA meeting
A date in January is still to be found.

Any other business
Nathalie is going to meet Mrs Brun, who was asked by the director to develop a concept to increase the number of French Cat-2 pupils; further details will be provided by Nathalie after the meeting.
Thorsten addressed the problem of lacking supervision in some trams and buses causing/allowing conflicts, where mostly the younger pupils are affected.
Decision: Thorsten will contact Mrs Meyer (on a personal basis) and the information will be passed to Flemming.
Ute addressed the problem of lost hours due to regular absence of teachers.
Decision: Jacqueline and Ute will arrange a meeting with director OS to discuss the topic.
Jacqueline reported on plans for summer camps for the first three weeks of the summer holidays, she already received a cost proposal from „Familienservice“ and will also try to get an alternative proposal from „AWO“. Next step will be to invite Familienservice and/or AWO to discuss the details. In parallel parents (via class reps) should be informed and asked for feedback as soon as possible.

Date of next meeting
Wednesday, 12 Jan 2011, 19.00 hrs

Present: Cindy van Velzen, Nathalie Beroard Barth, Fotini Morakis, Valerie Dujardin, Veronique Needham, Michel Messmer, Anja Buhner, Ute Schmidt Rohr, Thorsten Reineke, Sarah Winthrop, Jacqueline Ribeiro, Debjani Basu.

Sarah Winthrop
Thorsten Reineke
3.12.10

Annex 1

SAC proposals from the PA 3rd December 2010

Establish the school as a modern 21st C. teaching establishment

• Increase the use of computers as an interactive teaching and learning tool in the classroom.
• Improve the Permanence so it offers an environment conducive to studying
• Re design the libraries so that they are modern “resource centres” for all pupils
• Set up and maintain an accurate data-base of all past pupils

Let the current parents of the school be the best marketing tool for promoting the school by addressing their concerns with concrete solutions.

• Ensure that a pool of qualified replacement teachers is adequate to cover all planned absences.
• Insist on adequate teacher training to give teachers the skills to provide effective differentiation teaching in classes with a wide range of abilities.
• Insist that the school guarantees that all the main subjects will be taught in French, German and English for pupils throughout the school
• Introduce a proper “cafe” area for students and visitors alike, offering drinks and healthy snacks throughout the day. This can also be available for students who have missed the proper lunch hour due to lessons but who still want to eat something for lunch.
• Facilitate more exchange student opportunities throughout the school year (with other ES as well as national schools) to underpin L2, L3 and L4 teaching, and introduce “language partners” between L1 students and L2 students to help promote language learning.

Build the school as a centre of citizenship excellence by ensuring the school addresses seriously a wider aspect of teaching through the valid educational goals found for example, in music, art, sport and theatre.

• Insist that there be at least one OS play a year and one OS choir/musical performance a year that involves all the students in secondary in some way.
• Support and encourage membership of an active school orchestra
• Introduce more competitive sporting activities especially against outside clubs and schools.
• Support and encourage a school newspaper, edited and produced by pupils
• Use the links created through the work-experience weeks in a pro-active way.

Build a stronger identity and community spirit

• Establish inter-language section project work so that teachers and pupils work together
• Introduce at least one party for the OS students per year apart from the AbiBall
• Insist on whole school participation in events such as EuroSport and project week.
• Ensure that national events, or holidays are marked in some way by as many different EU nations as possible.

Annex 2

Interparents Draft Report for ESK PA

Interparents (IP) met in Karlsruhe and there was a Roundtable session on SAC on the afternoon of Monday 29th Nov and the full meeting on Tuesday 30th November 2010. All 14 schools were represented at the meeting.
SAC Roundtable
Tom Hoyem was invited to address the meeting and to give his opinion on the SAC.
He said that all the European Schools have individual profiles and the schools should not remain a privilege for just a few EU families. In his opinion, problems are mounting for directors and the sensible way forward is to take autonomy seriously - ESK takes this seriously. If SAC is done properly it gives headmasters more power and becomes central to school’s success. Workshops have been arranged for directors and common templates have been developed.
In the IP workshop, participants emphasised that the SAC should not replace the educational councils as these deal with actual pedagogical issues. In the SAC, the school has the opportunity to reach a common position internally and with external stakeholders without interference from the commission and Central Bureau.
The SAC priorities do not influence the total budget allocation, however the Admin Board determines where the money should be channeled. Everyone who participates in the SAC, can make proposals, and set priorities, but in the end it is the Director who has final decision on the priority. Many decisions should now be taken at the Admin Board of each school and these should reflect the needs of that school. It is important for the PA to ask for a vote for every decision so that it is quite clear what has been decided and it is formally minuted.

The SAC is very important because the school can come to a conclusion, set priorities and make decisions. Because of consensus of all the stakeholders, the school has more power to defend the position at the Board of Governors. Autonomy goes together with accountability - this is the idea behind the MASP and ASP.
To date - this does not seem to be the case, for example the creating of classes still is strictly controlled by the central bureau. Many Schools are experiencing similar problems with SAC procedures so far - last minute, ad hoc meetings, lack of information, lack of clear structure, inconsistent participation by stakeholders, poor understanding of the meaning of strategic proposals relevant for the SAC forum.

Recommendations from the participants of the Roundtable include:

• Reflect carefully on the differing roles of the Educational Councils and the SAC
• The Director needs to have a clear focus on STRATEGY and to look after the big issues to keep SAC objectives at the forefront of discussions.
• The PA must be well prepared because even though this 1st year is a learning process, schools can quickly side-line parents.
• Make sure that the minutes are formal documents and there is effective feedback and follow up so that stakeholders remain engaged in the discussions.

Main meeting

Ana Gorey, president of Interparents welcomed everyone and started the meeting with an up-date on the IP’s perceived corrosion of the Board of Governors’ authority in the central bureau. A parent from Brussels with legal experience, has helped draft a letter to Mr Barosso in the European parliament outlining IP’s concerns in procedural matters and corresponding interpretation by various parties of the rules and regulations. Ana Gorey reported that she was very disappointed in the official response to the IP letter, and now she was seeking agreement from IP to get legal advice on how to proceed. In IP’s opinion, the governance of the European School System (ES) system is under threat and this may impact directly the spirit of the reform of the European Schools with the aim of giving schools more autonomy.
The Board of Governors’ meeting is being held on Wed, 1st Dec and Thursday 2nd Dec. and IP has two representatives in this meeting with specific voting rights. The draft agenda for the enlarged meeting of the Board of Governors of the European Schools as attached for your information. Also attached are some of the documents that were discussed. IP spent most of the first half of the meeting scrutinising the agenda and related documents, to come to a consensus over the interventions that need to be made on behalf of IP. The interventions are usually in the form of objections to policy, objections in wording, highlighting omissions and errors and objections to procedure. It is very important that IP goes through the preparation process thoroughly as the IP representatives represent the 14 ES Parent Associations, who in turn are the voice of the parents of the ES and it is important that the IP representatives in the Board of Governors have the mandate to give opinions and challenge proposals in the meeting.
IP discussed the ever-present demand of cost cutting activities. It was recognised that due to missing seconded teachers, there are even more chargé de cours (locally recruited) teachers whose wages take up the main bulk of the budget. One area that savings can be made is in cutting seconded teachers’ salaries, and understandably this is a most sensitive area. A new salary scale is being proposed for all new teachers, with lower starting salaries, and new criteria for grading experience. This will bring the salary scale in line with EU commission employees. IP are aware that these changes are very significant to parents as it may result in younger, less experienced teachers being selected, and this will affect the high teaching standards demanded of the ES. IP also expressed concerns over who is deciding on issues such as the level of experience. IP fears that the eventual outcome of such cost cutting measures will weaken the pool of teachers applying for seconded teaching posts, and that the involvement of EU member states will diminish. Up to now this has been the strength of ES. European school system is opening up to Type II and Type III schools and these schools do not have seconded teachers from the member states. ES already are facing the problem that chargé de cours teachers are not inspected as member states do not recognise this as their responsibility. Lack of inspectors for chargé de cours teachers is of major concern to IP.
An area that also has been impacted by cost cutting demands from the central bureau is the creation of classes and class size. Ana Gorey asked all IP reps to review the situation with classes and class size in their school and to report back so that there is an overview of the situation in all 14 ES. Chapter 19 (where it lays down the rules for creating and splitting classes) is being revised and IP feel that the revisions are far too restrictive. As schools are being encouraged to be autonomous, this is an area where the director should have the discretion to create or split classes according to the school’s needs. There are huge consequences for schools if main subject classes in a language section are forced to close as this threatens continuity of education for pupils and sends out negative messages to future parents. Interparents insist that pedagogical consideration should be paramount in taking budgetary decisions and the value of the European spirit should not be undermined.

Working Groups

Reform of the Baccalaureat
The Baccalaureat is currently being reformed for introduction in 2012 or 2013. The Bac report for 2010 was highly commended for the in depth statistical information and review. IP agreed that this document should be analysed by all teachers in every school. There needs to be complete transparency of grading levels. IP agreed that the current deliberation process for students with a pass mark that is no more than up to 0.3 below 6.00 should be maintained despite arguments against as there is a risk of an increase in the number of post Bac appeals. IP accepted that the fee for the Bac exam will be increasing in line with inflation, however there seems to be some confusion as to the amount, as in one document version it states 50 Euros, and in another 80.32 Euros. Other main issues involving the reform of the Bac includes the change from 5 written exams and 4 orals or 6 written exam and 3 orals to 6 written exam and 3 orals only. IP have insisted that pupils should have the right to choose and that if there is to be no choice, the savings of the change must be proven to be significant. There is still much discussion needed to resolve many issues related to the Bac reform.
SEN
The Commission have stated that the costs of SEN need to be brought “under control”. This seems to be expressing itself as a requirement for schools to cut costs in their SEN programme. Although this has been denied by the Board of Governors, IP representatives have reported actual evidence of cost cutting activity in their schools. Ana Gorey has requested that each IP rep send in their comments so that an ES comparison table can be drawn up and used to write an IP position paper on this topic. The Secretary General has been requested to advise on the procedures for ES to create a post for SEN assistants in their school. The new procedures for SEN pupil integration still need to be examined. The IP rep on the SEN Working group has made the following points:

• When a potential SEN student is being tested, the educational psychologist doing the test must have the same mother-tongue.
• All teachers must receive in-service training to recognise pupils who may have SEN issues.
• Gifted children are often over-looked as possible SEN candidates if they present specific problems, for example in behaviour.

Careers Guidance
All teachers involved with career guidance (this includes preparation and application for Universities throughout Europe) are highly commended for all the hard work they do for the students. It is recognised that this work takes up many hours and the current discharge for teachers involved is insufficient for the amount of work they are actually doing. To cover the cost of the service, three alternative proposals have been put forward in the Working Group:

• All class 7 parents pay extra for the careers guidance service
• Only parents of pupils who need the guidance pay for the service
• Free for the parents and the extra cost is born by the school and/or Board of Governors.

IP supports the final proposal pointing out that nationals get this service free in their home countries (eg UK and France), and the European Baccalaureat certificate still needs explanation to outside institutions and this should be of concern to Board of Governors.

Length of School Year (180 school days)

IP have always held a very strong position on this topic. Schools are sending secondary pupils home early (in Brussels up to 2 weeks and in Karlsruhe 4 days) so that the Bac oral exams can take place during the last week of term. This is done to ensure quiet in the secondary building, and because many teachers are involved in the oral exams and are not free to teach a normal timetable. IP have challenged the legal right for ES to allow this and the conclusion of the Board of Governors is simply to “change the rules” and to condone directors’ decisions to send all secondary pupils home early.
IP will consult a lawyer about the right for ES to provide fewer than the 180 day stipulated and also to confirm in IP’s justification to demand that appropriate alternative activities, free of charge to the parents, are provided by the school at the end of the Summer term. Brussels II has already sent a legal, formal letter of complaint to the Board of Governors on this matter.

New Calculator for Maths in classes 4 and 6 OS

ES have introduced a new maths syllabus that is interdependent on a TI maths calculator that parents are obliged to purchase at great cost. Despite formal objections from Interparents, individual PAs and some Maths teachers on the way the calculator and syllabus have been rushed through to start in Sept 2010, the Board of Governors have gone ahead with the project. Various problems have since arisen in some of the ES and the IP reps have been requested to do a review of the situation in their school so that IP can produce a position paper on this topic. Luxembourg has written a formal letter about this issue, and requests that IP support their position to the Board of Governors. IP have requested that the Board of Governors make a detailed evaluation of the Maths performance/grades/calculators in class 4 and 6 after the first year of use.

Early Education

A web-based curriculum is being introduced in September 2011 for Kindergarten pupils. There will be workshops held in Summer 2011 for various representatives, including IP reps. Further information will be forwarded soon as there was no time to discuss this development thoroughly at the meeting.

The full official minutes of the Karlsruhe meeting and all documents relating to Interparents are available on the Interparents website.

Sarah Winthrop
1.12.10