February School Council Minutes-2024

Posted February 15, 2024

Date: February 13th, 2024 

Start Time: 6:30pm

Location – Salem Public School, Learning Commons

Welcome

Attendees: Kyla Lightfoot, Amanda Marson, Adam Lyle, Jessie Price, Thomas Sampson , Kortney Derikx, Lauren Harris Selby, Andrea Catteau, Lisa Wyatt, Katie Giddy, Bruce Woods, Courtney Ecclestone and Vanessa Cordes

Approve: Jessie Price

Seconds: Kortney Derikx

  • Teachers Report (Amanda Marson)
  • February: Black Brilliance Focus
  • Several classes have walked to the Elora Centre for the Arts to experience the Metaverse 3D music and visual presentation.
  • Junior classes have (or will be), visited the River Run Centre for a mime presentation.
  • Some classes have participated in a digital Photography workshop 
  • Tomorrow is Valentine’s Day and the gr 5/6 classes will be having a dance and karaoke. Thank you for the loan of lights. 
  • Speeches update – Cole and Eli are going to Belwood to compete against area schools on February 24th and Kaiya is presenting her speech to the Guelph Legion area competition.
  • Some primary classes celebrated the 100th day of school, will celebrate Valentine’s Day and talk about families ahead of Family Day weekend
  • Principals Report (Kyla Lightfoot)
      • Kindergarten Safety Focus : Recess Slides to teach how to work with K students
      • Possibility of shrinking the Kindergarten space to give them a smaller, more protected area to play in?
      • Supporting School Culture:
        • -Empathy lessons
        • -Cooperative game activities
  • Met with division teams (eg. Kindergarten, Primary and Junior) to determine what their literacy and tech needs are:
        1. -New chromebooks and headphones arrived
        2. -organizing class libraries and individualized book bins so students have books at their exact reading level to grow from.

Upcoming Events:

  • February 14th-Chicken Orders due
  • March 4th-Chicken order pick up
  • February 15th-Term 1 Report Cards Available online
  • One mark Language (focus will mainly be on reading/writing)
  • February 19th-Family Day
  • March Break -March 11th-15th
  1. February Meeting Business:
  • Additionally to the auction at the Holiday craft night, $1500.00 was raised for Salem Public School from the sale of Katie Giddy’s books!
  • Thank you cards have been made to give out to our wonderful donors of the Silent Auction.
  • The 2025 Krispy Kreme fundraiser has been BOOKED for June 3rd, 2025 
  • This year’s Raise the Dough fundraiser has been booked for April 10th (Families can order Pizza from Dominoes and a portion of the profits go directly to Salem School). More on this to come.
  • A motion was made by Vanessa to have a hot dog day fundraising lunch. This was second by Katie Giddy. The Hot Dog lunch will be held on Friday February 23rd at first break. The option will be available for parents to purchase on School cash online for $2.00. Regular and veggie dogs will be available.
  • A Motion for School Council to cover the cost of sporting carts (metal carts on wheels filled with balls/skipping ropes etc. for each class) was made by Kyla. This was second by Adam Lyle. The approximate cost of these carts is $100 – 150 per class, for 12 classes.
    • Council discussed the future playground updates with a focus on fundraising and larger donations/grants available.
  • A Formal Motion was made to have the School Council focus on raising money for a naturally inspired playground space that would allow students to have an inclusive, sustainable and equitable place to play and inspire outdoor play and movement. A three year plan, with a goal of making 25, 000/year, for a total of $90,000 to create a sustainable playground for the school. Katie Giddy and Lauren Selby will look into applying for any grants available to support this goal. The motion was second by Courtney Ecclestone. Next meeting we will discuss playground updates and consider ideas for next year!
  • Next council meeting we will be planning the June picnic as well as discussing a spring “clean out” event.
  • An important reminder for parents that the April 19th PA day has been moved to Monday April 8th due to potential safety concerns of the solar eclipse happening that day.
  1. Treasurer Report (Courtney Ecclestone)
  • Charitable lunches: $0
  • Fundraising: $12, 837
  • General Fund: $312.37
  • Nutrition Program: $4387
  • Parent Engagement: $-58.75 
  • Playground: $4364.12 
  • Playground maintenance: $668.77
  • Student Activities & Teacher Allocations: $0
  • Ending Balance: $ 22,512.02
  • $350.18 will come out of Fundraising account to go into student activities 
  • $200 will come out of Fundraising to go to parent engagement
  • A motion was made and approved to move funds from the fundraising account to the Playground account, to bring it up to $10,000 in anticipation of a new playground in the future.

Next council meeting Tuesday April 9th 2024 @ 6:30pm

End Time: 8:10 pm




 

 

Categories: School Council News