Parents Association Committee (PAC) Meeting, 9th February 2011 minutes

Present:    
Cindy van Velzen , Nathalie Beroard-Barth , Ute Schmidt-Rohr , Michel Messmer,  Hamid Bateni, Fotini Morakis, Valerie Dujardin, Veronique Needham, Barbara Bellosa, Debjani Basu, Thorsten Reineke                                                [11/17, i.e. committee was quorate (?)]

Presentation Frau Brun (1.5 hrs)
Mrs. Brun is voluntarily working for the ESK, her task is to analyse the current situation of the French section and to develop possible solutions. The slides of her presentation are available.
Acceptation of agenda
A few topics were added under AOB.
Report/feedback from Cindy and Nathalie
Cindy gave an overview about the management meeting on January 19th – topics discussed were the next Admin Board meeting (27th January), budget, canteen, summer camp, SAC, PA-Party (11th February), project week/open day, Eurosport, acquisition policy, school fee, French section and others, the protocol will be available. Also a short report of the Admin Board meeting was given – main topic was the school budget.
Feedback from Ute
Ute informed the PAC that the PA lost its charitable status („Gemeinnützigkeit“) already in 2008, since necessary documents had not been forwarded to the tax office. As a consequence of a law from 2009 the statutes of the PA will have to be adapted in order to regain the charitable status. Ute is working on this topic.
Ute presented the financial status of the After-school Activities; Veronique has already checked students and payments – there are still some payments outstanding. Veronique and Anja will follow up on these. Ute and Veronique proposed that the teachers should maintain attendance sheets for all courses. Haftpflicht- und Unfallversicherung are out of date, in particular  in regards to student and teacher numbers. Ute will negotiate new contracts with the insurance company.
Ute also summarized the status of the overall budget of the PA – in order to reduce the administrative burden more parents should be convinced to pay their contribution by debit notes.
Several applications for funding were discussed:
MEC project (European Politics, 10 students) – 250,-€ granted (11 votes in favour, no abstention, no dissenting votes)
Rome trip of the Latin classes (50 students) – 500,-€ granted (9 votes in favour, 2 abstentions, no dissenting votes)
Trip to the Choir Festival in Varese (50 students) – 500,-€ granted (5 votes in favour, 2 abstentions, 4 dissenting votes)
Two applications to the social fund:
100,-€ granted for Rome trip (11 votes in favour, no abstention, no dissenting votes); 75,-€ granted for trip of primary school (11 votes in favour, no abstention, no dissenting votes)
Nature Project during the project week in primary (84 French students) – decision postponed

Report/feedback from section reps
English
- Smartboard in 4th class primary school did not work until the Christmas holidays – Michel proposed to initiate service contracts for technical devices.
-  English Kindergarden has only very few picture books – advice: check official budget of the library.
French
- A meeting of all French class reps took place on 26.01.2011
German
- Hamid received the actual programme of the children’s office (Kinderbüro) for the project week in primary
General
- There have been some communication issues with class reps and teachers. The PA will send out a letter to all class reps with guidelines. These have been discussed with the management as well (the letter is attached to this protocol).

Feedback on Euroboutique
to be discussed (tbd) next time
Feedback on Afterschool activities
tbd next time
Report /feedback from Transport
Thorsten gave a short summary of his meeting with Flemming and Mrs Meyer, which was meant to give Thorsten a first overview of the work of the transport committee. An official meeting of the whole transport committee is in preparation. A candidate as a successor for Flemming from next year on has been found.
Report/feedback from Canteen
On behalf of Jacqueline Thorsten reported about the constitutional meeting of the newly elected canteen committee. Main topic was the contract with MediRest and the future of the committee as such. Main result was that the school is willing to sign a bilateral contract with MediRest. Details are still to be discussed. A meeting with MediRest is scheduled for March.
Status Dinner party
Everything has been organised.
ESK Summer camp 2011
A letter to the parents with a request for feedback has been sent by Jacqueline – so far there are 37 interested families.
Open day/Project week
tbd next time
Summer fete
Scheduled date:    19th June
Any other business
Thorsten very briefly introduced Dropbox, ther new application for sharing information within the PAC.
Date of Next meeting
Scheduled date:      9th of March, 19.00 hrs

Thorsten Reineke