PTA Meeting, 10/25/2007
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Carlow Campus School PTA Meeting
October 25, 2007
Minutes
I. Welcome- Dana Casale, PTA President, welcomed everyone to the meeting at 8:30AM. A very warm welcome was extended to Karen Kelley, Parent, Chair, Campus School Financial Advisory Board.
II. Financial Advisory Board (FAB) – Karen began with a brief explanation of her background which includes President, Fund Management Company; Chair, Campus School Financial Advisory Board; a member of the University Board of Trustees, and #1 Cheerleader of the Campus School.
Karen explained that the Campus School is a program of the Department of Education of Carlow University. The Campus School has a separate budget that is approved by the University. Karen gave a brief history of the FAB. The FAB was created by Sister Mary Paul on March 3, 2004. The goal of the FAB is the understand all of the finances associated with the Campus School which includes three items: 1). Enrollment, salaries and financial aidee; 2). Balance the budget (especially the 2005-2006 school year); 3). Three year agenda to address financial issues and endowment. When Middle States surveyed the school in 2005 they were very impressed with the FAB of the Campus School.
The mission statement of the FAB: Develop long term and short term goals to address the budget requirements within Carlow, the Dioceses and the Independent Schools Committees. The mandate of the FAB: Address the current finances of the school, guide the budget and working capital and establish the long term placement. Membership of the FAB includes 2 parent representatives, 2 Campus School representatives, 2 University representatives, and a representative from the Sister’s of Mercy.
Karen talked about the endowment. The three items of the endowment are scholarship, teacher excellence and the Sister Mary Paul endowment chair. The Sister Mary Paul endowment chair is done. The Legacy Event raised 2.7 million dollars in donation. The majority of this money was donated toward scholarship. The teacher’s excellence donation was less than $20,000, thus it was placed in a segregated account to earn interest and revenue. Once it is at $25,000 the endowment will pay out toward teacher excellence. All of the donations must be maintained in an account to earn income for one year. By fiscal year ’08, the funds will have been matured. Today the payout is at 5% but this will change as investment changes. $300,000 was collected for scholarship, of this, $15, 000 will be available for scholarship June 30, 2008. This $15, 000 was added to the already available scholarship dollars bringing the total to $90,000 dollars of scholarship and financial aidee. The Financial Aidee Department of the University helps with our financial aidee. The FAB makes sure it is earmarked and taken care of. $5, 000 was donated by the PTA for scholarship. The Annual Enhancement is money raised annually to help with the workings of the school. This is a nonrestricted fund. The Endowment is more long term and is donated for one specific goal. Karen answered questions from the members and in closing offered to come back to discuss the finances of the school at a future meeting.
Dana added that the PTA website will have information related to the PTA dollars spent.
III. Dr. Balzano and Dana thanked Karen for the very valuable and enlightening information presented. Dr. Balzano discussed the PCR website that will soon be up and running. She thanked Theresa Hassett for the hard work she put into the website. Day and evening parent training will be offered soon. Dr. Balzano thanked the PTA for the $5, 000 donation and for the recess equipment. She thanked Ms. Wojekowski for arranging Red Ribbon week to help keep our children and school safe and drug free. PCR will be used to alert parents to these special events.
Dr. Balzano explained the school began a safety patrol. Grades 5 though 8 volunteered to be safety patrollers to help the younger children cross the street. A thank you was extended to Sarah Posti for arranging the safety patrol group. Dr. Balzano encouraged parent to enroll on E2 Campus which will alert you via email or text message of school closing or other emergencies which happen on campus. Parking is always an issue. Please do not park in the nun’s parking spots. 71 spots were added in Lot C.
IV. Dana ended the meeting stating the PTA newsletters will now be via email. This is a saving of $800 a quarter. The book fair was a great success again this year, netting over 200 books for the teacher’s classrooms, $11,494 in total sales, $1747.18 in total books for the library and PTA profit was $2000. PTA is looking for volunteers for the Christmas Basket raffle, chaired by Irene Hils. PTA is also looking for volunteers for Santa’s workshop. A special thank you went out to Ros McCorkle for doing all of the shopping for the workshop. It will be very special this year. Dana reminded everyone to continue to collect box tops for education. Each room has a decorated box to collect the box tops.
The PTA website will be up and running soon. The site is www.carlowpta.com. A very special thank you to Mary and Bob Kiernan for development of the website.
V. The meeting was adjourned at 10:15am. The next meeting will be November 27, 2007.
