Posts made in April, 2013

Meeting with Paul Randall

Posted by on Apr 10, 2013 in Blog

Last Friday night Dionne, Laurie, and I met with Paul Randall. He is the former administrator at Ridgeline and has served on the board of the Coburg Charter. Here is what we learned.

  • We don’t have to bus the kids.
  • We might be able to provide guaranteed admittance to children of employees.
  • Most schools don’t fill up in year 1, so we shouldn’t be worried about our children having to participate in a lottery.
  • Start a new charter school instead of converting an existing public school. Conversion was used when their was seed money to start a charter.
  • Ask for and review the proposal handbook from the district we want to sponsor us.
  • It is ok to say “we follow our sponsoring districts policy” in our proposal.
  • Directors of existing charter schools will be more than happy to talk to us about our proposal and give us advice.
  • The Kings Valley Charter is a similar size to what we are thinking of. We should contact them.
  • All that we need is a sound proposal. The district will have a tough time disapproving a solid proposal. If they do the state will sponsor it.
  • The Coburg charter spends $50k on each teacher. That includes all costs associated with their employment.
  • The ADM/w funding we receive can be used for leasing building space.
  • He doesn’t think we will be able to afford to cap our class sizes at 15. 25 students per class is the norm for charter schools.
  • The state funding funnels through the sponsoring school district. If the state sponsors us the money will funnel through our local school district.
  • We will want to track all volunteer hours. The number of volunteers and their hours are required for most grants.
  • The number one reason that charter schools fail is finances.
  • We will want to sponsor community service activities for our school.
  • We should meet with the ODE charter school contact and develop a relationship with her.
  • We should give input into the superintendent hire.
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April 19th

Posted by on Apr 6, 2013 in Board Meetings

This meeting took place on April 19th at the Plahn’s house. The following people attended: Jake Plahn, Dionne Plahn, Kelly Harris, Tammy Garlitz, Kirsten Cardwell, Laurie Cardwell, and Jessica Cardwell.

Agenda

  • Discuss Action Items from our last meeting
    • Jake
      • Start an email thread about possible school names – Completed
      • Email the ODE charter school coordinator the following questions:
        • In ORS 338.035 what do they define an “alternative education program” as? – Completed
          • Defined in ORS 336.615 as a school or separate class group designed to best serve students’ educational needs and interests and assist students in achieving the academic standards of the school district and the state.
        • Is their any advantage to establishing a charter school from an existing alternative education program? – Completed, The advantage is if you already have one setup, there is no advantage in starting one from scratch just to convert it to a charter school.
    • Everyone
      • Respond to the email thread with their name ideas. – Completed
  • Review the decisions made at our last meeting
  • Activities since our last meeting
  • Talk about changing our establishment option and type
  • Schedule the next meeting and discuss having it at a neutral location 🙂

Notes

  •  Updates were given on the Action Items from our last meeting.
  • We discussed the email thread on school names. Mountain View Academy was chosen as our name.
  • We went through the decisions made at our last meeting.
  • Reviewed the Activities since last meeting page.
  • There was some debate on the Budget and financial plan and the The Budget. My thought was to estimate 10 kids per class in case we can’t fill all 15 spots. This puts us in the red. To make up the shortfall I recommended that we ask the community and local businesses for donations. Laurie and Dionne explained how we need to be in the black for our budget and that we can assume $50,000 in annual donations. They also said the total students should be 100 and we should assume the classes will be filled at 15.
  • The proposed budget was presented and discussed. The following changes were made:
    • 100 total students
    • 15 students per class instead of cautiously setting it at 10 with a maximum of 15.
    • Added an Administrative Consultant at $20,000 per year. This resource would be at the school one afternoon a week and attend board meetings.
    • Added a secretary at $20,000 per year. This resource will be at the school M-R 8:00 AM – 2:30 PM.
    • Added $50,000 in donations to our income.
  • We all agreed that the budget is sound and financially viable.
  • Tammy mentioned that Rick would be more than happy to do any presentations for the community or the board that need to be made for the Academy.
  • She also mentioned that we might be able to meet at Rick’s work in their conference room for our next meeting.
  • Our next meeting is set for 11:00 AM on May 3rd at the Papa’s Pizza in Springfield.

Action Items

  • Jake
    • Ask Kate
      • What happens if the sponsoring district ceases to exist or merges with another district? – Completed
      • Does the charter school get the state property tax funding if the entire district is chartered? – Completed
    • Figure out if an administrator is required and if that person needs to be certified – Completed
    • Register mtviewacademy.org – Completed
    • Move the web site to mtviewacademy.org – In Progress
    • Add “outdoor recreational area” to the budget services and resources section. – Completed
    • Update budget with substitute number based on Coburg’s budget. – Completed
    • Update web site, with the new type and establishment option New Public School and Brick and Mortar. – Completed
    • Do we have to pay PERS and benefits to employees that aren’t teachers? – Completed
  • Tammy
    • Ask Rick if we can use his conference room for one of our meetings. – Completed
  • Everyone
    • Look over the items we haven’t completed on the Starting a Charter School page and starting working on or thinking about how they will be added to our proposal.
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Preparing for our first meeting

Posted by on Apr 4, 2013 in Blog

Here are some questions I need to answer before our meeting tomorrow:

  • What is a virtual public charter school?
    • a public charter school that provides online courses
    • does not include a public charter school that primarily serves students in a physical location
  • How do you convert a portion of an existing public school?
    • I’m not sure. ORS 338.035 gives options on how a charter school may be established. Item (c) is From an existing public school or a portion of the school. It doesn’t provide any additional details.
  • Can “Starting a Charter School” #3 and #4 be merged?
    • I don’t think so. They are a little confusing, but #3 is your establishment option and #4 is the type of charter school being created. For example you could choose “a new public school” as your establishment option and “brick and mortar” or “virtual” as your type.
  • Can “Starting a Charter School” #11 subitems be removed since they also exist on the “Proposal” page.
    • Yes – I have removed them
  • Is the Starting a Charter School list complete?
    • No – it is not complete
  • Is the “State Requirements” page complete?
    • No – it still needs some work
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