ISAAC FOX PTO BOARD MEETING MINUTES

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1 ISAAC FOX PTO BOARD MEETING MINUTES Wednesday, September 16, 2015 This meeting was held in the Isaac Fox Library, call to order 7:00 pm Board members present: Cara Marquis, Prajina Aryal, Katherine Gill, Natashia Dannegger, Jenny Lindberg, Erin Brown, Kara Dohman, Lisa Gregoire, Karen Kopilash, Kimber Lawrence, Andrea Hall, Kim Radoy, Jill Thurmond, Elizabeth Hosfield, Heather Lang, Michele Weir, Lainie Epstein, Kim Gallo, Stephanie Wahlund, Diane Koester Motion to approve the August Meeting Minutes: Erin Brown approved; Jenny Lindberg seconded that approval. Officer Reports President Kim Gallo: Back to School Picnic Thank you to all who helped out. The weather was fabulous, we sold out of hot dogs, everyone enjoyed the firetruck and the tie dye went well. We made around $200 which was better than last year when we lost money. Unfortunately, we had to cancel the dunk tank due to the crisp autumn air although Ms. Dohman said she was still willing. You go girl! Congratulations to Barb Randazzo for winning the parking spot raffle! Her name was drawn during the Back to School picnic. We are waiting for Julie to mark the area so we can put up the sign. This was by far the best raffle we have held to date, bringing in $270. Most raffles usually bring in around $50. It helped that we started this early at residency and all the good communication about it and definitely the flyer with the picture of snow had to help. Meet the Staff Day We had a great turnout but the school supplies handout did not go well. We are discussing ways to improve that, including pre delivering the boxes to the classroom or having pickup on different day prior to Meet the Staff day. It was also difficult for parents who had children at the middle school as well to be able to get to both as they were held at the same time. Culver's Night Culver s was very packed and the drive thru lines full. We do not have totals yet. This is a great social event in addition to fundraising to have dinner with other classmates and the Culver's staff was great to work with. Scoopie was here at the school during the day handing out stickers to promote the fundraiser. Safety Patrol We have 28 students wanting to be on Safety Patrol. This is being managed by Lisa Hintermeister with training from Officer Frost. This is mainly for 5th graders but now includes 4th as well. These students will help with crossing streets. In the morning we will have a student with an adult per crossing and for the afternoon it will be 2 students.

2 Book Fair. 9/29 is now family night 6 8pm. This is a CHANGE from the date previously communicated, so please update your calendars. The Signup Genius for volunteers will be coming out soon if needed. Tim Parks is running and he first starts filling spots with committee people, then those who signed up at residency. We are planning on having the popular Donuts and Apple Cider again this year. We will also have a PTO table set up. Spirit Wear we will have Taft pillowcases; flannel pants, and sweatshirts available for purchase to help raise money for Taft. Be on the lookout for order forms coming home soon! Taft Fundraising in addition to the Spirit Wear, we will also have the following to help raise funds for Taft: School Store 10/2 is the planned Grand Opening for our School Store! All of the funds raised until April will go towards the 5th grade class and after that will go towards the 4th grade class for next year. We will start with trying this once a month on Friday and then possibly changing the frequency depending on its popularity. Everything will be $2 and under. Gum is still up for debate as we are still trying to gauge parent opinion. The option of a pre paid punch card that students could use instead of cash was discussed. One issue that was brought up may be that since Chorus is held on Fridays this could be a conflict. We have over 100 or so kids involved in Chorus. There may be other conflicts throughout the year as well with Band, Orchestra, and Student Council. Restaurant Night at Chipotle possibly they will donate a whopping 50%! Holiday Store has been tabled for this year. This would require a lot of volunteers and we would need a locked room for several days and to do accounting every night. We are working this year to build up our PTO and it is hard to fill open spots as it is so maybe in the future. Volunteer PTO T shirts. Kim G. and Stephanie modeled the new volunteer shirts. Thank you Erin B. for the logo. These are available for purchase for $7. Please consider purchasing it is not required, but highly recommended. These would be great for events such as book fair, bingo night, walkathon, etc. to help identify the volunteers. Order forms are available and will be sent out. Craft Club We are happy to announce that we are starting a new Craft Club! Lindsey Davanzo will be heading this up and we hope to have a kick off near Valentine s Day. More info to come! Walk a thon 10/5 10/9 In the spirit of the no stress fundraising, we will not be having the kids raising funds for this like we used to even though Walk a thon generated a lot of money for us in the past. We need to get the word out that if any families were planning on contributing this year to the Walk a thon, please still contribute that money through no stress. Also, some companies will match donations and have matched in the past to the Walk a thon. If that is the case, they will also match on no stress, so please seek out that match as well. The Walk a thon fundraising in the past involved prizes, so we will no longer have

3 those, but we will still hand out bracelets. We also still NEED A CHAIR to coordinate this event. Wednesday is Walk to School day Lisa Hintermeister is in charge of this day and event but we still need a chair for the rest of the week. Kim Gallo attended the district PTO President s meeting. They also met with the Superintendent. Some notes from that meeting: 9/10 was the ribbon cutting for the new High School Football field. 10/4 is the D95 5k/1mile walk/run. The district now has 2 way radio for emergencies. This past emergency in Fox Lake was radioed in. All Principals and Assistant Principals must wear an earpiece at all times and are also equipped with an emergency radio button. Transportation updates are now available through Twitter. Tweets include bus route changes and delays. Vice President Stephanie Wahlund: No Stress fundraising has brought in $4,500 so far of our $12,000 goal. With the decision not to fundraise for Walk a thon, it is very crucial that we get more donations. It was suggested that we post the budget to the website or send it out so parents can see where the money is going. We will send it out and look into posting. Another point that was brought up is that we will no longer have the children s involvement as the Walk a thon incentivized the students with prizes based on level of fundraising they did. We might need some incentives to help drive donations. One of the prizes for Walk a thon was a private table at the fun fair, maybe we could offer that. Someone also suggested a raffle for families that donated. We need to continue to communicate what would be impacted due to lack of funds enrichment programs would be at risk, the PTO provides $5 per student for transportations for field trips that may have to come from parents in the future, the teacher start up fund could be impacted. To simplify how the fundraising has been impacted by the change to No Stress this year: last year we brought in $4200 from Walk a thon and $3500 in gift wrap sales. Both of these fundraisers have gone away and we need to make up this money. Target has been awesome with the donations to the school. The money this year has gone towards the Author Day, helped subsidize the new playground equipment, and provided for the pizza party for the summer reading program. Unfortunately, Target has hit their goal of providing $1 billion towards education and they are ending the program in April. We still want to continue urging parents to link their Target cards to our school as it is a lot of money and we still have a holiday season to go through.

4 Amazon has a program that donates a portion of their sales to schools. There is currently a link to the district but we would like a link to our school. Stephanie has obtained a majority of the information we need to get this set up but there is still some work to be done. Diane will work on this and put it with the Box Top committee s responsibilities. Principal Lisa Gregoire: The new playground equipment from the Can Do Crew fundraising will be installed on the 25th. There is no update yet when Can Do Crew will start up again this year but we may change the can collection day to Wednesday and the Can Do Crew will sort on Thursday. Please link your Target cards if you haven't already. Treasurer Kim Hahn (not present): We will need a new Treasurer for next year since Kim s term is expiring. There will be some training involved so if anyone is interested, please contact Kim. All committee members will need to use tax exempt form during their purchases so they are not charged a tax. They will not be reimbursed for the tax amount if it is submitted. All stores accept the tax exempt form except Costco but we have a Costco card for these purchases contact Kim Gallo if you wish to purchase from Costco. If purchasing from Walmart, you need to use the tax exempt form to get a card from the service desk first and then show that card to the cashier before they start ringing. Secretary Diane Koester: We will need a new Secretary for next year since Diane s term is expiring. If anyone is interested, please contact Diane. The Buzz Book cover contest is underway, a winner will be announced on Monday. We are waiting for the refresh of student information and then will start printing the Buzz Books. Teacher Representative Report (Ms. Murray): Thank you to everyone for the wonderful luncheon and the gifts. We appreciate all the effort from the PTO. Kindergarten is working on making applesauce. Grades 1 3 are working on their reading workshop routines. Grade 4 is working on the mock rock project. One class is learning about metamorphosis with a Monarch butterfly. Grade 5 has a field trip to The Grove to learn about colonial life. Thank you to the PTO for the book bins that you bought for our reading program.

5 Standing Committee Reports Box Tops (Diane Koester): We are moving up our Box Tops submission to 10/2 instead of 11/2 to get entered into their sweepstakes. Submission deadlines are twice a year for Box Tops to cut the school a check. We will have a Box Top Drive for the next two weeks, ending the end of the month 9/30 urging parents to get their Box Tops in. We need to get the word out. There will be a trophy and prizes for the classroom that collects the most Box Tops per student count. Someone asked about collecting Tyson points we will look into. Spiritwear (Roxy Czarnik not present): Spiritwear sales ends this Friday. Last year we had $3600 in sales but we are currently only at $2950 right now. Hopefully we will get a big push at the end. Joanie's Closet (Jill Thurmond): Our biggest initiative is the school supply boxes. These are given out discreetly to families in need. This year we gave away 305 boxes an increase over last year where we gave away 273. These are available for all students from elementary through high school. This was the first year that we've held a school supply drive at Isaac Fox and we're happy to report that 381 items were donated. Some of the other items that we supply to those in need are snow boots and pants and emergency grocery store gift cards. Our big event that we host is the Valentine's Dance held at May Whitney. All are welcome to attend. Volunteer (Room Parent) Coordinator (Heather Lang/Natashia Dannegger): We have assigned around room parents/assistants but have a couple openings left that we hope to get filled soon. We will be hosting a kickoff meeting Tuesday night and will try to meet throughout the year to network and share ideas. Red Ribbon Week (Kim Radoy): Kim attended a district meeting to prepare for Red Ribbon Week, which is a week to raise awareness about alcohol and drugs. They discussed how to give parents tips to talk to their kids. Some things she shared with us were: It is imperative to keep your child's brain healthy at least until their mid 20's as they brain is still developing until then. Parents should start talking about drugs and alcohol around the 3rd or 4th grade.

6 By age 13 or 14 teenagers will start drinking. Research has found that parents are the #1 reason kids stay alcohol and drug free. Teachers are the top 2 or 3 reason. Red Ribbon Week this year is October Bingo Night (Lainie Epstein/Elizabeth Hosfield): We are working on a new date for this as the gym is already booked for the originally planned date. Upcoming Dates 9/25 No school Institute Day 9/29 Book Fair Family Night (not 9/30) 9/30 Box Top submission deadline for the fall 9/30 Early Release Day 10/4 D95 Education Foundation 5K & 1 Mile Run 10/5 10/9 Walk a thon 10/7 Walk to School Day 10/12 No School (Columbus Day) 10/16 Vision and Hearing tests (this is a change from 10/19) 10/22 Early Release 10/30 Classroom Halloween parties Meeting adjourned 8:20 p.m. Next PTO meeting is Wednesday, October 21st at 7:00 p.m.