Meeting Archives

Meeting was held on Wednesday, May 17th at the Community Lab School. A virtual option was offered. 

Full Meeting Minutes with attendance found here. 

• Dr. Haas gave an update on plans for redistricting and answered parent questions around recent engagement surveys of teachers and other parent topics.  

• The new 2-year school calendar proposal was discussed and parents were given the opportunity to provide feedback (calendar resource).  Your voice is needed - Please use the link that you were sent in your email to provide your feedback on the proposals.  

• Tessa Ashoff, Rebecca Berlin, and Heidi Gilman Bennett discussed with us the AFE purpose and we delved into PTO fundraising/donation as well as neighborhood differences.  For schools looking for funding - AFE has school grants available and we discussed how parent council could help support teachers with a crowd-source idea called Donor's choose.  

• We also reviewed some slides about putting together the mission of ACPS.  Finally we elected a new board for next year!   

All the presentations are linked here: 

PTO Money - Google Slides - Heidi

ACPS Neighborhood Equity Data - Google Slides  Heidi

AFE Parent Council slide.pptx - Google Slides - Tessa Ashoff 

First Meeting Calendar Development 24-25 and beyond - Google Slides - Jamie Gellner

Copy of Parent Council 05 17 23 - Google Slides - Matt Haas 

Meeting was held April 19, 2023. 

Full meeting minutes found here: Parent Council Minutes - April 19, 2023 - Google Docs 

PC Reps Roles & Responsibilities FAQ:  Parent Council Rep - Google Docs

PC Elections:  We must elect at least 2 officers at the next meeting (one of which needs to the president).  

Descriptions:  PC Officer Roles - Google Docs

Meeting held March 15, 2023 at 6:30pm virtually. Full Meeting minutes with links to documents and presentations found here. 

Meeting Summary: 

1. Dr. Haas updates for Parent Council includes topics on Budget, Freshman Seminar course, Middle School scheduling and workload, Sensitive materials and more. 

2. Audit of schools and programs, executed by 3rd party, Bellwether. Adminstration in the schools March 22-23. 

3. Family Helping Families: 20 families requested support in the last month, including urgent need for a vehicle. 

4. SEAC update Here 

5. Mid-Year Growth Assessments Results

6. Parent Council discussion on mission and goals

7. ByLaws discussion: Homework for members to review summary slides and share feedback before next meeting so a vote can be held. 

Next Meeting:  April 19th at Burley  which is located in the city of Charlottesville at 901 Rose Hill Drive.

Tour at 6pm, meeting to begin at 6:30pm

The school has a really interesting history, which you can read about here: https://bms.k12albemarle.org/about

Burley is a wonderfully diverse middle school, with nearly 60% of the 588 students non-white. 45% of students are considered "economically disadvantaged". 19% are English learners.

Burley is unusual in that it's both in northern and southern feeder patterns. Students previously attended Agnor-Hurt, Cale, Stone-Robinson, or Stony Point Elementary School, and will graduate from either Albemarle or Monticello High School.

1. February Meeting Minutes with links to the Jamboard; Dr. Haas presentation; CLC presentation and CLC FAQ

2. Summary of the Jamboard and Small Group Discussion

3.  Resources that were shared prior to the meeting to stimulate the small group discussion

4. Families Helping Familes (FHF) Update

5. Meeting Q&A Document 

6. Copy of the Parent Council Bylaws -  # if you are interested in being involved with review of these please let me know! We will meet once or twice via Zoom, and also reach out to everyone separately to solicit input on key questions. We need to propose changes at one meeting (March or April) and then vote a month later (April or May). 

7. If you have any questions about the board positions (listed in the ByLaws) please let me know. parentcouncilacps@gmail.com

8. County Book Club -- If you're interested in joining to discuss the book "Districts That Succeed", please email Heidi. We will meet in-person on Sunday, March 12 at noon at Heidi's home. You're welcome to come even if you haven't read or finished it ;) Heidi has one extra copy from ACPS if anyone is interested in a loaner.

9. Substance Misuse Prevention by Susie Bruce with the Gordie Center at UVA. Her presentation focuses primarily on preventing underage drinking but also incorporates some information about marijuana/cannabis. - Any PTO interested in this can contact Laura Handler  - lphandler@gmail.com

Next Parent Council Meeting scheduled for March 15, 2023 over zoom. Agenda will be published 1 week prior. 

• • Family Helping Families update

  • Meeting Minutes with links to presentations

    1. High School Career Learning Centers - Presentation by Katina Dudley.

    2. PC Board requests review of bylaws for February's meeting

    3. School Spotlight: Woodbrook Elementary

    4. Reading Intervention data highlights, presented by Debbie Collins

    5. SEAC update: suggestion for survey to community to advocate

    6. Dr. Haas update

November Meeting held November 16, 2022 at 5:30pm at Albemarle High School. 

Tour at 5:30pm, with meeting beginning at 6:30pm. 

Full meeting minutes found here, with summary and agenda with links to presentations below. 

1. Families Helping Families:  November Update for Parent Council - Google Docs

2. Outstanding Questions From October - Copy of Outstanding questions from Parent Council October Meeting - Google Docs

3. High School Redesign slides - High School Redesign--Board Presentation Oct. 13 - Google Slides

4. Corresponding School Board Meeting Link - School Board Meeting - October 13, 2022 - YouTube

5. School Safety updates

   • • PC Slide Presentation

     • 2021 Study from Journal of School Violence:  Teacher Perceptions of School Resource Officers and Associations with School Safety

6. Budget Slides - Parent Council - Budget Overview - Google Slides

7. District Book Club reading: Districts That Succeed: Breaking the Correlation Between Race, Poverty, and Achievement by Karin Chenoweth, if you want to join the reading! Copies are available on load, via Patrick McLaughlin.  Please email Heidi (heidigilmanbennett@gmail.com) if you'd like one.  FYI:  ACPS Leadership is reading this book and citing examples at many of their meetings. Author is a journalist, so it's very readable in case study format, not just academic. 

No meeting in December 2022. Thanks for a great first half of the year!

Meeting held October 19, 2022 at 6:30pm over Zoom.  

Full meeting minutes with attendance and links to presentations, found here. 

Agenda and Summary:

1. Family Helping Families  - October Update for Parent Council - Google Docs 

2. Parent Council dues - 1 abstain and the rest voted in favor of not collecting dues for this calendar year  

3. Lightning Round:  How are communities engaging with parents and plans for fund raising this year. 

4. Department of Community Engagement - Eric Irizarry presented on the purpose and goals for this department moving forward.  Community Engagement - Home - Albemarle County School District (k12albemarle.org) Powerpoint that was presented: Office Of Community Engagement FHF & Parent Council - Google Slides Twitter:  @engageACPS 

5. BUDGET BRAINSTORMING  - Dr. McLaughlin presented a framework for budget brainstorming.  (These were shared previously).  We did an exercises where we broke into 4 groups and were able to add ideas to these four documents so this could be discussed at the budget level and whether there were any community ideas that could help county-wide.  Community Budget Input Fall 2022--Parent Council.pptx - Google Slides 

6. Dr. Haas Update

Next meeting:  November 16, 2022 @ 6:30 Stony Point ES with zoom for streaming.  

The first parent council meeting of the 2022-2023 Albemarle County School year was held on Wednesday September 21st at 6:30PM.  This will be an IN-PERSON meeting and will be at Crozet Elementary School.    

Meeting Minutes with links to presentations, found here. 

Meeting agenda summary: 

1. Tour of Crozet Elementary School

2. Family Helping Families Updates -Guest Speakers Amanda Alger & Latarra Ragland

3. Composting at Our Schools - Guest Speaker Christine

4. Break-Out Groups - Who, Why, How 

5. Housekeeping - Board Positions, parent involvement, agenda setting, dues, facebook/social media

6. Q&A with Dr. Haas and Dr. McLaughlin and Dr. Eric Irizarry  - presubmit questions