Friends of SW Charter School

Monthly Meeting Minutes

February 9, 2016

Upcoming Dates

• February 15 No School ~ Presidents’ Day
• February 17 Student Auction Art Preview in Great Room
• February 18 SWCS Board Mtg. 7:30 pm
• February 20 Vintage Hollywood Ball Dinner & Auction 5 pm
• February 24 Family Dinner Night Fundraiser at Burgerville (25^th & Powell)
• March 1 Pizzicato Dough for Dollars Fundraiser (Hillsdale location)
• March 3 & 4 No School ~ Conferences
• March 8 FoSWCS Mtg. 6:30 pm at Elephants Deli
• March 21-25 Spring Break

Auction

Adrienne passed along an update from Sarah Mutal:

• Auction ticket sales are going well. We have sold 140 tickets and just a few free silent auction only (5-7pm) tickets.  Need help spreading the word that registering early helps us in seating and/or getting bid cards ready.
• We have a lot of fun new things planned for this year, including:
  • Hanne Rousing is working on a fun and informative video that involves the students!
  • We have a life sized Marilyn Monroe cut out that will be sold in the Live Auction as ‘Bid to send Marilyn home with…”
  • Plus a new 50/50 raffle, where for $10 you can take a chance to take home 1/2 of the winnings, while SWCS gets the other half.
  • Arborbrook Vineyards has donated the wine for all the dinner tables. Elephants Deli has donated all the wine for our Wall of Wine, i.e.  Purchase a mystery bottle for $15 and you might walk away with one valued at $60 or $80.

• We have sold almost $20,000 in sponsorships and catalog advertising (up from $14,000 last year) and the live auction catalog is going to print soon, thanks to Chris Beckley and Sarah Anderson who wrote an article in it about our school.
• Please sign up on Sign Up Genius to help set up silent auction tables at the MAC (Multnomah Athletic Club) from 10-1pm on Saturday, February 20th. Free parking is in the garage across the street.

Laura Bracke Volunteer Award

Kathy has received quite a few nominations for the Laura Bracke Volunteer Award. She’ll send out a Survey Monkey this week for the community to vote on nominees.

Earthquake/Emergency Preparedness Committee
Emilie met briefly with Marlene last Monday. Marlene is enthusiastic about the committee and she may have a little bit of a budget to work with. She wants to purchase red buckets for each classroom to keep emergency supplies such as first aid kits, flashlights, water, snacks, etc. She has delegated this job to the committee. We need to make sure the teachers want the buckets and have space for them in their classrooms.

A group of parents are hoping to set a date with Marlene to go through the building and note things that need to be tied down or made safer, etc.

The committee needs to spend more time with administration to know what the school has already established for the school regarding emergency preparedness. We have many questions regarding what the protocol is for example if the kids are trapped in the school or are required to leave the building due to an emergency.

Once we know what guidelines the school has already established, the committee will be compiling their goals for the year. They want to be very specific about what to accomplish. We need to make sure all requests to Marlene are in writing (via email) and cc’d to Suzanne and Amanda.

Other Committee Reports

Finance (Elise)

Per Amanda, hot lunch program will not happen this year.

Carpooling

Marlene has still not sent carpooling information out to the community.

Kathy offered to send out carpool information to all classroom Shutterfly pages and Liz will send out on Friends blog and Facebook again.

Student Directory

An email went out to the community regarding inclusion in a student directory. We’re in the legal waiting period for families to opt out.

Hanne would like to link the Family Business Directory and Resource Directory with the Student Directory. We’ll work on how to add this information to next year’s directory.

Restaurant Nights

Our 1^st restaurant night of the year will be at Burgerville (25^th & Powell location) on Wednesday, February 24^th. 10% of all sales from 5-8 pm go to the school. We need volunteers to serve food and clean tables. A SignUpGenius volunteer request has been sent out.

We will also be participating in Pizzicato’s Dough for Dollars on March 9^th and May 24^th. Good at the Hillsdale location.

Lisa has received no response from the Old Spaghetti Factory. All fundraising requests are handled at the corporate level. We also received no response from McMenamins.

Lisa will start approaching some brewpubs next week.

Kathy was wondering if the S. Waterfront food carts might be willing to do a fundraiser.

Budget

No changes since last meeting.

Open Comments

We continue to struggle with not being in control of the funds we raise nor being able to rollover any unused portion of our budget to the following school year. Elise has received no response from the office about ways for us to manage our funds.

While we understand that not all of the money raised at the auction can go to “sexy” things and that some goes toward operational expenses, we continue to wonder where did the money go? Besides funding Sarah’s field work coordinator position, what happened to the rest of the money raised at last year’s auction? What technology was purchased and why did it take so long to hire a part-time counselor? There isn’t trust that the money we raise is being well spent. There needs to be more transparency.

Jessica, head of the Board fundraising committee, assured us that her committee is committed to making a fundraising plan in time for the Board’s March meeting. They’re researching 5 sustainable fundraising plans. Jessica’s mission is to make this happen. The Board understands that the financial success of the school shouldn’t be on the backs of the parents.

Any member of the school community can be on the Board fundraising committee. You don’t have to be a board member. We all agreed that we should have a dedicated Friends representative on the fundraising committee.

We have not heard what this year’s auction money is going towards. The staff have had no input this year.

Google Docs version available here.