Alpine CC Board Minutes
6:00 pm Wednesday, March 9th, 2022 at ACC
Present: Joyce Long, Rachelle Payne, Melissa Meyer, John Scott, Roger Irvin
Absent: Dorothy Brinckerhoff
1. Discuss & approve minutes of the previous meeting
Approved as corrected.
2. Review board email votes since last meeting
None.
3. Prioritize Agenda
4. Review and Accept Financial Reports
Board reviewed and accepted the financial reports for February.
5. Reopening of the Resale Shop
We still do not have a sublet agreement on 5th street side of the 540 Main St. building for the Resale Shop. Melissa volunteered to start drafting a sub-let agreement to circulate for refinement, that we can present to Andi as an opening draft for the negotiation.
6. Preschool Status
Rachelle reported that two 4 yr olds have dropped, leaving 5 in the 4yr class and 3 in 3yr class. There is currently one Co-oping parent.
Joyce and Rachelle have updated tri-fold brochure for the preschool. Melissa will have a booth at the April 30th Monroe Festival, where she will represent ACC, SBCE, the preschool, and the Resale Shop.. Joyce will reformat the tri-fold to make a flyer, and post the flyers around town and around the internet. Melissa moved we donate $100 to the Monroe Festival as a sponsorship donation. Rachelle seconded. Approved.
Neither Joyce or Rachelle have received any responses to the communication of testing policy, emailed to the parents on Feb 12th. There have been 2 kids get sick, with one family bringing the kid to school while sick. As the state rules around masking change next week, some parents are keen to drop masking. Rachel and Joyce will compose a reminder email to be sent from the board to the parents. It will stress our baseline policy that sick children must stay home and not come to preschool.
The parent group will not be organizing a Scamper this year.
The Kindergarten round-up at Monroe Grade School is scheduled for April 20.
Rachelle will be getting back quotes next week for repairing the fence around the play yard.
We received an application for tuition assistance. Rachelle moved that we grant 50% tuition assistance, retroactive to the current months behind and through the end of the year. Roger seconded. Approved. Melissa pointed out that we would do well to adopt a clear written policy about when and how we approve tuition assistance, so that we are prepared to answer questions about the practice from potential funders and awardees.
Co-op-ing is falling out of favor compared to its prevalence years ago. It may be time to re-think our relationship to the co-op philosophy. (We will add that topic to the April agenda.)
Rachelle suggested that our tuition rates are far below market rates, and need to be re-evaluated for the 2022-23 school year.
A parent has offered to bring a load of rock to fill the potholes on Webster Avenue and the parking lot. We are pleased to accept that generous donation.
7. Background Checks for Co-Op Parent Volunteers
Report (Rachelle & Joyce) Confirmation that batch has been submitted to ODE. Tabled.
8. Move from MadMimi to MailChimp
Progress report (Dorothy, Melissa) tabled
9. Developing a plan for Knutsen Grant funds
The board has deferred following through on Roger’s December suggestion that we develop a comprehensive plan for using the funds designated to support preschool physical activity prioritized across the various needs for the two play areas. We will repair the play yard fence, then make plans later.
10. Plan for sign construction, grant proposal
Roger has been talking with Jeanne about the grant process. He has made no headway on sourcing the preferred metal materials for the letter-support channels.
11. New Business
One of the board members was reminded recently about the Dollar General literacy grant program. She wondered if we were going to apply for a grant there. Rachelle will consult with Dorothy.
Melissa will also use her booth at the Monroe Festival to try to recruit new board members. We discussed our documented procedure for recruiting board members and reviewing their applications, along with the fact that we haven’t used that procedure for the last several new members.
12. Proposed agenda for April
The continuing value of running as a Parent Co-op preschool
Updating our COVID related building use policy
13. Schedule
ACC Board 4/13, Monroe 1J Kindergarten round up 4/20, Monroe Festival 4/30