Board Meeting Dates

I.

Call to Order

A.

Adoption of the Policy Agenda and Approval of the Minutes of September 11, 2012 (Discussion/Action)

II.

Update on the Truancy Prevention/Intervention Plan  (Discussion)
Presenter: Dr. Kristine Meurer, Ron Lucero

III.

Consideration of Approval of New Board of Education Policy I.12 Instructional Credit Acceptance (Discussion/Action)
Presenter: Carrie Menapace, Shelly Green, Eddie Soto

A.

Procedural Directive (Discussion)
Presenter: Carrie Menapace

IV.

Distribution of Policies and Procedural Directives to be Discussed at November Policy and Instruction Committee meeting  (Discussion)
Presenter: Carrie Robin Menapace

A.

Finance Procedural Directives

B.

Title IX Compliance for Parent Organizations

C.

Non-School Use of APS Facilities

V.

Future Topics: Various topics will be presented as time allows.

VI.

Announcement of the Next Policy Meeting - the next meeting will be held Tuesday, November 13, 2012, 5:00 p.m., in the DeLayo-Martin Community Room.

VII.

Adjournment

I.

Call to Order – the meeting was called to order at 5:03 p.m.

A.

Adoption of the Policy Agenda and Approval of the Minutes of September 11, 2012 - Lorenzo Garcia motioned for approval of the agenda and minutes.  Analee Maestas seconded the motion.  All were in favor.

II.

Update on the Truancy Prevention/Intervention Plan  - Dr. Kristine Meurer introduced the new truancy manager, Ron Lucero, saying that the district was lucky to have him as he had many years of experience and had connections to the courts.
Dr. Meurer and Mr. Lucero presented the APS Truancy Prevention/Intervention Plan.  The plan had been presented at the District Council meeting, and 10 schools had volunteered to pilot the plan.  A PowerPoint presentation was shown.  Among the many things discussed were:  the truancy law, the components of early interventions, the key players, referrals, truancy prevention outreach, documentation and the last step is notification through School Messenger and letters sent home and then the referral to probation with all documentation.  There is another piece to the plan which was to identify truant families and to evaluate the success of the plan.  Dr. Meurer and Mr. Lucero took questions from the committee:

Has there been an analysis done using 2010 data (yes); Are you using social workers (Will be using Americorps volunteers).  Are there any issues with private information and the volunteers? (They only know there is an intervention plan.)  Will messages from School Messenger be in Spanish? (Yes).  What about families with no phones or if they move before contact? (May require home visit/follow-up).  What is the follow-up for repeated absences?  Mr. Robbins felt there was a need to work with the legislature and perhaps Children Youth and Families Department.  Ms. Korte suggested working with Teen Court.  More questions and discussion followed.  Mr. Lucero said we may have to work with our resources in the community.  Dr. Meurer and Mr. Lucero were commended for their work on the plan and all were asked to support them.

III.

Consideration of Approval of New Board of Education Policy I.12 Instructional Credit Acceptance – Carrie Menapace began by saying they would do four things:  talk about the history in APS and what we’ve done in the past, how we came up with the recommendation we have, and ask basic questions to determine what the board would like to do in regard to the policy.  Zack McCormick of Modrall Sperling was present.  The transcript evaluation procedural directive was passed out.  The recommendations brought forth came from a large amount of research that RoseAnn McKernan, executive director of the Instruction and Accountability Department had requested.  Ms. McKernan said they looked at several pieces of information; they had asked a research partner, Hanover Research, to look at ten school districts (Broad finalists) to gather information pertaining to this subject; they also spoke to high school and assistant principals.  She went over the information and answered questions from the board members about what the other school districts were doing in regard to on-line courses.  Some districts were restrictive and others were fairly open.  Generally, they did have some standard that was applied.

A.

Procedural Directive – Ms. Menapace said in regard to the policy, she had not heard of anything that warranted any changes from the last time it was presented.  In the procedural directive there was agreement by the committee to better define “on-line” and the need to tighten up the language.  Further discussion followed in regard to the courses and the difference between transfer of credits to an APS student and a transfer student. The courses should be ones that are not readily available from APS.  Mr. McCormick suggested that the district maintain control over what they give credit.  Ms. Korte said students should go through their counseling department.  Carrie Menapace said they currently were looking at whether the school is accredited, if an MOU is in place and if the student received prior approval.  She said they did need to have and make changes before the next grading period.  There was discussion about the accredited institutions. Ms. Maestas asked for the comments that came in to the board via the website.  Ms. Menapace said she would provide. Dr. Peercy felt they could not vote on this agenda item right now because of too many questions and concerns.  Relative to the policy and procedural directive, they need to come together.  Discussion followed on wording and the need to be careful that the standards do not supersede PEDs regulations.  Discussion about IEPs followed.  More discussion followed about the student approval process.  There will be a template for the MOU. Mr. Esquivel felt the administration had to be a gatekeeper and make the decisions in regard to integrity of the MOU and end of course exams and that an MOU template was important.  Dr. Peercy said they would have to go through a process before an MOU was agreed to.  Dr. Peercy said a vote would not be taken at this meeting for this item as the committee wanted to wait for the comments taken from the community.  This item was to come back on the next Policy agenda.

IV.

Distribution of Policies and Procedural Directives to be Discussed at November Policy and Instruction Committee meeting- The board members were given the information pertaining to the items to be discussed at the November Policy meeting.  Dr. Peercy asked the board members to review them all and bring forth their comments.

A.

Finance Procedural Directives

B.

Title IX Compliance for Parent Organizations

C.

Non-School Use of APS Facilities

V.

Future Topics: Various topics will be presented as time allows.

VI.

Announcement of the Next Policy Meeting - the next meeting will be held Tuesday, November 13, 2012, 5:00 p.m., in the DeLayo-Martin Community Room.

VII.

Adjournment – the meeting was adjourned at 6:50 p.m.