All members were present at the Falcon School District 49 Board of Education regular meeting in November. Evan Mahon from Vista Ridge High School and Emma Stanley from Falcon High School also attended as members of the student board of representatives.Before the meeting, the BOE held a ìFantastic 49î event, and representatives of the Falcon Education Foundation announced the winners of the FEF mini-grants. The representatives awarded $23,500 for 33 mini-grants to fund teachers throughout the district who proposed innovative projects that were not in their schoolsí budgets.Chief officer updatePeter Hilts, chief education officer, said the Falcon and Sand Creek JROTC programs earned the highest marks for their respective programs. Vista Ridge is planning to launch a JROTC program next fall.Student representatives updateStanley said the student board held a meeting and is planning on presenting at a national conference in March.Action itemsThe board unanimously approved the following:
- A resolution allowing the use of charter buses to transport district students to and from school events
- Review of the following policies: accident reports; compulsory attendance ages; care of school property by students; parking lot searches; student travel; and immunization of students
- Updates to the following job titles and descriptions: grant account I to accounting and grants fiscal compliance manager; accounts payable to accounting technician; and defining p-card coordinator (administers the purchasing card and travel card program)
- A resolution in support of American Education Week, Nov. 14-18
- The 2017 graduation dates and times at the World Arena in Colorado Springs: Saturday, May 27, with Vista Ridge at 9 a.m., Sand Creek at 1 p.m. and Falcon High at 5 p.m.
Discussion itemsDavid Rex, president of the district accountability advisory committee, presented the committeeís annual report and provided an overview of the DAAC responsibilities to the district.Mike Pickering, POWER zone leader, presented information on the zoneís performance dashboard. ìThis dashboard allows us to determine what areas we need to focus on for improvement,î he said. The dashboard focuses on six performance indicators: literacy, POWER pathways, critical thinking, problem solving, school climate and safety and security. The POWER zone would like to measure student performance using those six indicators rather than through the typical state models, Pickering said.Jen Newberg, a teacher at Skyview Middle School, said the current performance measurements are good, but they can be better. Literacy is a major indicator of performance, she said. ìWe want our students to learn to think critically,î Newberg said.Cathy Tinucci, principal at Skyview, said, ìOur performance plan gives us a menu of options to measure ourselves and move forward, besides through standardized testing.îMike Brandt and Audra Lane, members of the Sand Creek High School leadership team, updated the board on activities at the school. Brandt said the team developed a new initiative called the Campus Council, which will act as a steering committee to deal with issues.Lane said the team is going to develop a scorecard for student improvement using information from surveys, including parent and student satisfaction surveys and employment engagements surveys. ìWe are really glad you have allowed us to roll out this initiative,î she said.Stanley said the Sand Creek student representatives thought the leadership team model is successful and discipline is being handled more effectively.Matt Meister, director of communications, gave a performance report for his department, and said they have increased not only the quantity but the quality of communication attempts with the community. ìI believe our efforts are supporting the strategic plan of District 49,î he said. ìThe effort is unsustainable, though, so we are trying to figure out what is effective and what is not.îMeister also provided a post-election update and said that the districtís ballot measure 3B passed 65 percent in favor to 35 percent opposed. ìI see that as a mandate from our community that they like what we are doing,î he said.
Executive sessionFollowing the regular session, the BOE entered into an executive session and discussed the chief business officerís evaluation and performance review.The next regular meeting of the BOE is Dec. 15 at 6:30 p.m. in the board room of the D 49 Education Services Center.
