September 2019 School Council Minutes
Westminster Woods P.S. School Council
Meeting Minutes
Meeting Date: September 16, 2019
Present: Cherise Johnson, Allison Stoffman, Melanie Taylor, Lulu Zwingli, Dawn Nicholson, Angela Popofski, Holly Thompson, Lisa Matchett, Natalie Thomas, Kylee Booth, Vanessa Luxen, Andrew Cloutier
Welcome: Cherise called the meeting to order at 6:30 pm
Review and Acceptance of Past Minutes: Motion to accept the minutes from June’s meeting by Natalie and seconded by Lisa
Election of School Council Executives for 2019-2020:
Discussion of positions and nominations were made for each position.
Our newly elected members of parent council for the 2019-2020 school year are:
Council Chair: Cherise Johnson
Treasurer: Angela Popofski
Secretary: Vanessa Luxen & Kylee Booth
Fundraising and Allocation Committee Co-Chair: Melanie Taylor & Holly Thompson
Milk Chair: Angela Popofski
Playground/Greening Chair: Dawn Nicholson, Lulu Zwingli & Lisa Matchett
Community Building and Events Chair: Kylee Booth & Holly Thompson
Principal’s Report:
Staffing:
● Hiring a new grade 4 teacher, and a new 0.2 planning time teacher
● M. Brooks (maternity leave covered by L. Jansen) will be moving to kindergarten planning time coverage role
● C. Reimer moved to new kindergarten class (KE)
● new ECE being hired for KE
Start up: smooth start to the year. All reorganization of classes has been done. We had a few moves in grade one, increased to 5 kindergarten classes and had to move some of our class’ locations throughout the school. Our population has increased to 687 students!
Information:
● Many clubs and teams are already up and running:
-Lead the Change Club ,“We Day” is on September 19th in Toronto
– Junior Cross country has started, meet is in October
-Intermediate cross country and football have started, tournaments will be coming up
● Bus patrol training for all South Guelph schools will be taking place at Westminster on October 8th
● PD day on September 27th has a Math focus in the morning, Health and Safety training in the afternoon
● Open House September 26th from 5:30-7:00 pm
● Terry Fox Run September 26th, Mr. Hummel and Mr. Hamilton will be shaving their heads for $5000 and $7000 raised
● Orange Shirt Day September 30, Recognition of Indigenous People, Elders visit for Grade 7 (TBD), we will send out more information about this soon
● Stay connected with UGDSB app and calendar. Teachers are beginning to use the School Messenger App. School-wide information will continue to be shared through the website and UG Connect. We will do callouts as needed, as well.
Treasurer’s Report:
● School Council needs to purchase insurance with funds ($120-$150) to come out of the Community Building funds. Holly motioned to accept and seconded by Dawn. Allison will see to the payment.
● Motion to move $5000 from Milk funds to Playground Maintenance Motioned by Angela, seconded by Natalie
● Motion to move $6218 from Milk funds to Future School Yard improvements which will zero out the Milk funds
Motioned by Dawn, seconded by Natalie
● Motion to move $1000 from Booster Juice fund to Funds for Friends Motioned by Natalie, seconded by Lisa
● Motion to move $1855 from Booster Juice fund to Special Projects Motioned by Dawn, seconded by Melanie
Fundraising Reports:
● QSP has changed their name to “Cherish Tree”.
○ Melanie proposed a new EcoFriendly Produce bag fundraiser.
○ Two week turnaround time for product delivery
○ Set of 4 bags is $10 and profit is $3 a set
● Spirit Wear
○ Order and sales all on line, adult and child sizes available
○ Will not be a fundraiser in order to keep cost down
○ Hoodies $37, charcoal and black
○ T-shirts $17, discussed having a pink option for anti-bullying day as well
as black and charcoal
○ Cherise will look into a zipper hoodie with logo on the back
○ Cherise will look into bringing in sample sizes to the open house and there will be a table set up to place orders
● Planet Bean Coffee
○ Discussed that it be run again this school year
● Bag2School
○ Environmentally friendly activity, clothing would be donated/recycled.
○ Choose how long to run event for and would like the Green team to assist with pick up
○ Certificate of achievement and eco points can be awarded
○ Discussed storage of donated items as a drawback
○ Discussed spring time frame, possibly around April 23 movie night, and having pick up the following Monday
Community Building:
● Fall Open House on Sept 26
○ No food trucks this year
○ Grade 8 may sell popcorn/snacks
○ Open House sign up sheet for School Council was passed around by Cherise
● Multicultural Night on Nov 21st 6-7:30
○ Sign up sheets will be sent home with students before the event
● Movie Nights
○ Jan 30 and April 23
○ Andrew said he will look into movie options and bring to Jan 6 meeting
● Skate Night
○ In Puslinch on Feb 20, discussion about moving to Feb 18 instead? Also discussed if the event could start earlier. Lisa and Melanie are looking into this.
● Family Fun Night
○ June 4
○ Cleo is booked for face painting
○ Discussed coming up with ideas for other activities/entertainment, such as
Andrew’s Toon’s, superheros, Storm mascot, science show
○ Food trucks coming as well
Playground and Greening:
● Maintenance and Edging
○ Dawn discussed the need for a big cleanup of the gardens but discussed hiring a professional landscaper would be expensive.
○ It was decided to do a family volunteer clean up on Sunday, Sept 22. Dawn will write a note and will send it to Andrew to be sent home with students and the app will be updated with the event. A push notification will be sent as well and the website will be updated.
○ Gardens will need mulch at a later date
○ Lisa will be getting bags for the event
○ Holly will get a quote from her family after the clean up
● Natural Playground
○ Dawn will call Earthscapes for a quote for updates and repairs
○ Issues to be address:
-Logs around sand area are splitting
-Sand is not contained
-Request for more loose logs
-Snow fence around butterfly garden
Milk Program:
Angela will continue to run the milk program and it will start soon
Booster Juice Program:
Angela will continue to assist with the Booster Juice Program and it was discussed that it was very successful last year
New Business:
● Melanie Taylor volunteered her husband to make new wood cabin signs for all of
the cabins.
● Open House and Multicultural Night
○ Open House volunteers signed up
● Parking lot
○ Discussed safety concerns in parking lot
○ Discussed option of closing the lot and having pickup and drop off on Goodwin
○ Members volunteered to help during drop off and pick up
○ Cherise will write a blurb to be posted in the app
○ Discussed members contacting the city about their concerns as well as a Guelph police safety blitz
○ Natalie offered to help with solutions for the parking lot safety issues
● Cell Phone Policy
○ Cell phone policy is not changing
○ Remains that if teachers see a phone they can take it away
● Alternative Fundraiser Form
○ Discussed and decided not to proceed for now but possibly adding an option on the School Cash Online for donations
Next Meeting: November 4, 2019
Adjournment: Meeting adjourned at 8:30pm
Categories: School Council