| Name | Status | Arrival Time | Departure Time |
|---|---|---|---|
| William Greene | not present member | ||
| Daniel McKayhan | present member | On Time | At Adjournment |
| Kelly Pierce | present Non-voting Administration | On Time | At Adjournment |
| Karen Womack | present chair | 15 Minutes Late | At Adjournment |
| Eboni Chillis | present vice-chair | On Time | At Adjournment |
| Altrenesha Ervin | present secretary | On Time | At Adjournment |
| Pardes Sulaiman | present Treasurer | On Time | At Adjournment |
The meeting was called to order by Board Chair Karen Womack at 6:40 pm
So that there is agreement between board members on the agenda, and the amount of time spent on the meeting, the board shall vote to approve an agenda for the meeting. To the best of its ability, it will follow that agenda, and allow for the chair to move the board through the agenda as specified.
The Agenda is approved with the following changes: amend the Agenda to move the Budget Update/Projections to the Enrollment Update and add Executive Session before the Announcements section.
By: Pardes Sulaiman Seconded by: Altrenesha Ervin
There was no notable discussion on the motion.
Parent Joy McClendon - James Thomas is the student. Ms. McClendon said upon registeration she provided all of the required enrollment paperwork (lease, utility bills, etc.) and her student was accepted in the school. She has since been told that her child is out of district and should have never been accepted in the school. Ms. McCledon wanted to know the decision on whether or not her child will be allowed to continue as a student at SLAM.
to accept the meeting minutes as submitted
By: Pardes Sulaiman Seconded by: Daniel McKayhan
There was no notable discussion on the motion.
On December 20, 2018 we had our STEM Showcase and Winter Holiday Extravaganza and I am pleased to report that the evening was an overwhelming success. The students did an excellent presentation and the STEM showcase was exceptionally presented. There was standing room only during the event and all the parents and other guests were very pleased with the entire evening. I would like to thank Dr. Eboni Chillis for her attendance and also for Kelly Pierce and Angelia Howell for being in attendance as well. Tremendous job and effort by the staff and students.
Instructional Monitoring Plan
iReady Mid-Year Diagnostic
All students are scheduled to take the Mid-Year IReady Diagnostic Assessment.
Reading will take place on Monday, January 14th and Math will take place on Tuesday, January 15th.
Teacher Configuration Boards
Lourdes Isla introduced configuration boards to the staff. These boards are students friendly designed to keep students engaged with daily instruction and make them aware of what they will be learning each day. Teachers were charged with creating configuration boards for their classrooms. Lourdes will revisit us on January 25th to provide additional coaching and support.
Student Data Binders & Student Conferences
Lourdes Isla introduced student data binders to the staff. These binders will help students become aware of their reading and math data. Students will be able to track their student growth and set realistic learning and achievement scores fro themselves. Teachers are expected to conference with their students after the Mid-Year assessments are completed.
Title I Targeted Assisted Students Identified
These students were identified using our initial iReady Beginning of Year diagnostic assessment. The bottom 25% of each class in the areas of reading and math were selected, targeted, and invited to join our Tuesday/Thursday after school tutoring program.
Title I Targeted Assisted Remediation Paraprofessional
A Title I Targeted Assisted Paraprofessional was hired and began working on Monday, January 7, 2019. The TA paraprofessional utilizes a push-in and pull-out model to serve our most critical students who have shown reading and math deficits.
Title I Targeted Assisted Remediation Program
This tutoring program began on Tuesday, January 8th. This tutoring program will take place each Tuesday and Thursday from 3:30 to 5:30 and will extend through May. Students who were identified as our most critical students receive one hour of intense reading and one hour of intense math instruction on these days.
We did loose a few students due to them moving outside of the area. One moved to Clayton County and the other one to Fulton County.
At this time Mrs. McLaughlin introduced Lilly Salazar to the parents as the Academica National Special Education Leader.
Lilly provided the Special Education Department update to the Board. On today, Angela Crawford from the GADOE Special Education department came to the school for site visit. I was present for support during the visit with Ms. Sonya Jones, Special Education Coordinator for SLAM. The visit went very well. The Child Find process and procedures must be apart of the SPED procedures and transcribed to any parent in the language that they speak. All SPED procedures must be implemented with fidelity.
Evaluation Process & Determining Eligibility for Special Education Service
Make sure the all of the people that are involved in this process know their roles and document in the manual.
Maybe include job descriptions of all employees and highlight what has to do with special ed process. For example, the Registrar’s responsibilities regarding special ed. documents
Evaluation Process & Determining Eligibility for Special Education Service
Make sure the all of the people that are involved in this process know their roles and document in the manual.
Maybe include job descriptions of all employees and highlight what has to do with special ed process. For example, the Registrar’s responsibilities regarding special ed. Documents.
IEP Implementation
Similar to above, be specific and document how all stakeholders are involved in the process and what their responsibility is. For example: Special Ed Coordinator responsible for conducting meetings, giving copies of IEPs to teachers and reviewing accommodations, etc.
FTE Funding for Students who are only Speech or Language
Sonya will provide the next March FTE date and the 19-20 dates to Lilly so she can call Invo-Porgressus to make sure that we have our contracted SLP here for March and that the FTE dates are added to the 19-20 services contract so that the related service person(s) have to be here so we can get funding.
Guiding Questions Document
Sonya, review the Guiding Questions Document provided to you from Angela Crawford and ensure those points are in the manual when you tweak it again.
IDEA Funds – where are they?
Sonya will ask at her meeting on Monday to see how we can access our funds. She will get back to us!
Independent Educational Evaluations (IEE)
Lilly will create a list of providers just in case parents request one. Angela recommended to work off of the one from GaDOe as they have created a list of providers for IEEs. She also stated we need vendors for all evaluations, not just educational – like speech, language, occupational and physical, etc.
Sonya will attend Monday’s meeting and work with other charter schools to determine if we are missing any topics that are not covered in our manual. This was a recommendation from Angela.
11/30/18 financial highlights
Total Revenue projected for January is 1,487,527. If we are not allowed to keep the revenue for the 7 students that are out of district the school would receive a net loss of about $63,000. The school currently has 66 students enrolled.
On December 10, the Board received the response letter from the SCSC September 13, 2018 monitoring site visit. The letter has been throughly reviewed and the findings have been discussed. A plan to address each corrective action identified has been developed and shared with the Board Chair. The full Board will have an opportunity to review the responses to the corrective actions prior to the March 7, 2019 response deadline.
Daniel reached out to Deacon Chambler regarding our need to extend and expand on space. The available space on the first floor that we are not using is the choir room and the old kindergarten classroom that Mrs. Jackson used in the beginning of the year. It is my understanding that this room has been upgraded for the Shiloh Tutorial program and may not be available for our use.
The ideal solution is to update and upgrade the space on the 2nd floor but only if the church is willing to extend the lease.
@Eboni Chillis asked about additional signage around the school to help with bringing in interested parents.
@Daniel McKayhan what do you think the timeline would look like on this property.
@Danny Diaz a year or so from now we could use the current campus as a feeder school into the new campus. We could house pre-k through 4th grade or make this campus a pre-k - kindergarten campus to feed into the other location. We could bus kids from the current location to the new one even.
Angelia spoke to Deacon Chambler regarding the two additional classrooms that will be needed for the growth of SLAM Academy in the 2019-202o school year. Deacon Chamber informed me that the church will be flexible in the available space as long as it does not interfere with church operations, meaning when church funeral repasses, job fairs, etc are scheduled and the need for Fellowship Hall is a requirement the space has to be vacated by SLAM. I informed Deacon Chambler that the space that is available must be on the first floor of the church because the lease was only extended for one additional year and we are not able to make any changes on the 2nd floor unless the church is willing to give the school an extended year lease. I also proposed taking the 3 accordian rooms in Fellowship Hall and making more of a permanent structure in place. Meaning putting up walls and turning the space into two classrooms instead of the 3 small ones that are currently in place. He did not give me a concrete response but said that he would like to see what the space would look like. I told him that I will reach out to the construction company and see if they can provide me a layout and a quote. I have reached out to Level Construction Company and spoke with Mr. Mapp and told him that I would like to have the space turned into 2 more permanent classrooms with real walls. This could potentially provide additional space for the additional kindergarten class and the new 4th grade class. I am waiting on his quote to come in. I will share with Daniel when it does.
Danny shared the updated information on the 16 acre property. When conducting a 3-5 mile radius of the school the demographics do not change very much.
SLAM is approved to enroll 300 students for years 1-3 and in order to meet the target number that will help to support a positive budget we will need to be able to add more students
The NPU Process takes about 4-months
If we are going to move forward with due diligence on the property we will need to move forward over the next month or so.
SCSC Monitoring Visit Plan of Action - The Academica team met with the Board Chair to address the items that were outlined in the SCSC monitoring visit. A plan of action and a timeline has been developed to address each of the items. Those items that require Board vote will be available during the February Board Meeting.
Superintendent Search - A national search was done through GCSA, INDEED and Academica websites. As of today we have 90 applications. 45 of them qualify. The 45 candidates were offered the opportunity to take Principal Insight. 10 of the applicants did not respond so we are now down to 35 applicants. The results from Principal Insight was shared with the educators on the Board.
Dr. Chillis thanked Kelly for coordinating and organizing the process. The Board will review all the information and decide when the start the interviewing process.
Homeland Security Visit Update - Our Homeland Security contact met with us in December. He took a tour of the facility and has since provided his feedback on items that need to be addressed.
NSLP Update - Ms. Walker has received some additional forms from the NSLP division that require information for access to file claims and to report the number of students participating in the program. Once those documents are submitted notification should be given to her that she has the access that is necessary on the portal to provide required administrative information. @Pardes Sulaiman wanted to know if the revenue from the newly approved NSLP program help to offset the $38,000 deficient that we have in the lunch account. The response is yes it will help to offset the deficient. Any new revenue coming into the program at this time will offset the lost that is happening now with all students receiving their meals for free.
HR Update - Ms. Jeannie McCree has started as the Title I Paraprofessional to provide targeted assistance services to our most at risk students. She is pulling out students to assist as well as pushing into classes to provide additional assistance during class.
Security - A new controlled access system will be installed on the entry door and the door that leads to the hallway of the classrooms. This system will require a security access code or a key fob to be used to gain access. The Locksmith is also scheduled to come in the next week to install the new lock cores on all the new doors that were put in during the construction. Once the new locks are installed it will give us the capability to do a full lockdown and lockout procedure when there is a potential threat in the area.
Janitorial - presented a new Janitorial contract that would provide a more broader scope of cleaning at a cost savings to the school. 360clean is the name of the company and you have their proposal in your board packets for review and a board decision on whether or not to move forward with this company.
Dr. Chillis informed the Board that a search is underway to provide a TKES approved person to conduct the TKES evaluations at SLAM Academy. When that person has been identified and approved they will be introduced to the team.
The Board is looking into finding dates that will allow them to obtain the required annual LKES training. There will be a LKES board member identified and available to provide the LKES evaluation of the school leader.
Approve the Lotterease Contract for the 2019-2020 School Year
There was no notable discussion on the motion.
Approve the Lottery Date for SLAM Academy of Atlanta
By: Pardes Sulaiman Seconded by: Daniel McKayhan
The application process will close on March 15 and the Lottery date for 2019-2020 school year is March 22, 2019.
Approve the Paper Enrollment Application as submitted
By: Pardes Sulaiman Seconded by: Altrenesha Ervin
There was no notable discussion on the motion.
Enter Executive session to discuss Human Resource and Facilities
By: Pardes Sulaiman Seconded by: Altrenesha Ervin
Executive Session started at 7:54 PM
Resume the public Board Meeting
By: Altrenesha Ervin Seconded by: Daniel McKayhan
The Public Board Meeting was resumed at 8:20 PM.
SCSC Mandatory Board Training Dates: February 4-5, 2019. Athens, GA
GCEL Conference Dates: February 11-13, 2019. Savannah, GA
Georgia Charter School Conference Dates: February 13-15, 2019. Savannah, GA
The meeting adjourned at approximately 8:24 PM
Motion to adjourn
By: Pardes Sulaiman Seconded by: Eboni Chillis
There was no notable discussion on the motion.