Public Board Meeting

Minutes

Meeting #:
Date:
Time:
-
Location:
Central Services Board Room
Trustees
  • Bev Manning, Chair
  • Nicole Buchanan, Vice Chair
  • Bill Christie, Trustee
  • Dianne Macaulay, Trustee
  • Bill Stuebing, Trustee
  • Cathy Peacocke, Trustee
  • Laurette Woodward, Trustee
Senior Administration
  • Stu Henry, Superintendent of Schools
  • Bruce Buruma, Corporate Secretary
  • Colin Cairney, Corporate Treasurer
  • Ron Eberts, Associate Superintendent
  • Chad Erickson, Associate Superintendent
  • Nicola Golby, Associate Superintendent
  • Rob Moltzahn, Associate Superintendent
  • Della Ruston, Associate Superintendent

The public meeting of the Board of Trustees was called to order at (1:04 p.m.).

Approve appointment of new administrator.

Second would be re-appointment - Say the names in the resolution

  • Moved By:Bill Christie, Trustee

Caden Johnson, grade 6 student the Westpark Middle School placed first for the third consecutive year at the Alberta Regional Braille Challenge in Calgary.


The Braille Challenge is a national reading and writing contest that helps promote the importance of Braille literacy skills amongst students with vision loss. During the challenge, Caden participated in reading comprehension, reading charts and graphs, proofreading and aspeed and accuracy test.

  • Moved By:Laurette Woodward, Trustee

    THAT the Board of Trustees recognize Caden Johnson for his impressive accomplishment.

    Carried
  • Moved By:Laurette Woodward, Trustee

    That the minutes for Board Meeting (insert date) be approved as presented.

    Carried
  • Moved By:Nicole Buchanan, Vice Chair

    That the agenda for Board Meeting (insert date) b approved with the following additions:

    Carried

Governance Agenda
 

The Board of Trustees reviewed a field studies request for students from Gateway Christian School to travel to the Dominican Republic for April 9 - 20, 2020.  The trip is offered to students that have attended the HANDS course as a Field Study Experience connected to Intercultural Studies.  

  • Moved By:Bill Christie, Trustee

    THAT the Board of Trustees approve the proposed Gateway trip to the Dominican Republic from April 9-20, 2020.

    Carried

 
Chad Erickson

Associate Superintendent, Chad Erickson presented on the six schools that piloted the Student Support Rooms in the district this year.  Student Support Rooms:

  • Provide a safe place for children to expend excess emotional energy without
    repercussion
  • Help children take up a relationship with their emotions
  • Prevention – arranging pre-scheduled times for children to access
  • Pre-empt full crisis – divert attention and implement a proactive plan
  • Crisis Management
  • ​​

    Moved By:Nicole Buchanan, Vice Chair

    ​THAT the Board of Trustees receive the report on Student Support Rooms as information.

    Carried

Associate Superintendent, Nicola Golby provided information on Locally Developed Courses that require approval by the Board of Trustees.  New courses include Avid Readers, Film and Media Art and Reading.

A number of existing courses, Adv. Act/Tour Theatre, Ceramics, Creative Writing and Publishing, Dance, ESL Intro to Canadian Studies, ESL Intro to Science, Physics and Yoga were also requested for renewal.

  • ​​

    Moved By:Nicole Buchanan, Vice Chair

    ​THAT the Board of Trustees approve the listed Locally Developed Senior high Courses for the period of August 31, 2019 - August 1, 2023.

    Carried

Bruce Buruma provided an update on the District values and character attributes was provided to the Board of Trustees at their meeting on April 10, 2018.

Based on that feedback and support, we have been working on two components to move this this forward:

  • Branding: visual identity and strategy to promote within our schools and across the community
  • Implementation: strategy of creating awareness and understanding among students and staff within our schools while complement existing character education programming 

Updates on the progress to date were provided at the meeting on the direction of where District is going around the branding and implementation of the values.

There are strategies being developed on how these values will be unveiled.

  • Moved By:Nicole Buchanan, Vice Chair

    THAT the update on District Values be received as information.

    Carried

Bruce Buruma discussed the Spring General Meeting of the Alberta School Boards Association takes place June 3, 2019. The Budget and Bylaws Bulletin Spring 2019 highlights the proposed business of the meeting and is provided to trustees as information.

The Board of Trustees were invited to consider proposed bylaws and policy positions and
establishing positions of the Board on these or suggest amendments at the June 3rd ASBA meeting.

  • ​​

    Moved By:Laurette Woodward, Trustee

    ​THAT the Board of Trustees receive the ASBA Budget and Bylaws Bulletin - Spring 2019 as information.

    Carried

 
Laurette Woodward

Trustee Woodward reported on the April 2019 ASBA Zone 4 meeting. 

Red Deer Public’s motion on vaping received zone support. Wetaskiwin will second the motion. There was an amendment to change the wording from provincial and federal government to also include municipal governments. So - the wording will say ‘all levels of government’.

  • Moved By:Laurette Woodward, Trustee

    THAT the Board of Trustees accept the ASBA Report as information.  

    Carried

 
Bill Stuebing

Trustee Stuebing provided a verbal report.

  • Moved By:Bill Stuebing, Trustee

    THAT the Board of Trustees accepts the PBSA Report as information.  

    Carried

Student Enrolment at the end of April 2019 was 11,161 students.

  • Moved By:Bill Christie, Trustee

    THAT the Board of Trustees accept the Enrolment Summary Report for April 30, 2019 as information.  

    Carried

At the regular public board meeting on January 10, 2018, trustees were presented with the
option of changing how the board expenses were to be reported for professional development and board assigned work. It was recommended that these two types of expenditure categories be divided into two separate budgets. This would provide trustee with improved tracking of expenses in the 2018/19 school year.

Feedback on the new reporting format was provided.   Trustees are overall pleased and feel more at ease with how the new reporting is being provided.   It was agreed by all that ASBA and PSBAA meetings are supported as being a Board Governance expenditure.

  • Moved By:Nicole Buchanan, Vice Chair


    THAT the Board of Trustees support the feedback provided for the Trustee professional development and board assigned work expenditures reporting review.

    Carried

Superintendent Stu Henry highlighted a number of activities he was involved in during the month of April.  

  • Moved By:Bev Manning, Chair

    THAT the Board of Trustees accepts the Superintendent's Report as information.  

    Carried

Board Chair Manning had nothing to report.

  • Moved By:Bev Manning, Chair

    THAT the Board of Trustees accepts the Board Chair's Report as information.  

    Carried

The Board of Trustees and Senior Administration shared celebrations of events and activities taking place in the District over the last month:

Chair Manning declared the meeting adjournment at (3:21 p.m.).

No Item Selected