David M.

Cox Elementary
Minutes of the Monthly Meeting of the School Organizational Team (SOT)
February 2, 2017
7:00 PM

Location of the Meeting

David M. Cox Library
280 Clark Drive
Henderson, NV 89074

Present at the meeting

Rich Friesz
Todd Nash
Kristy Coleman
Ryoko Ball-Aguilar
Ana Pisano
Anna Sowell
Jill Stackel
Tara Imboden

The meeting was called to order by SOT Chairman Rich Friesz at 7:04 PM on February 2, 2017.

Approval of the Agenda

The agenda for the meeting was distributed and unanimously approved.

Review of Previous Meetings

The SOT Committee reviewed and unanimously approved the notes from the last meeting. Todd Nash
motioned for the minutes to be approved; Ana Pisano seconded the motion.

Issues That Were Discussed This Meeting

The purpose of this meeting was to review and propose a budget for the 2017-2018 school year. Tara
Imboden provided us with four different documents to help aid us in our discussions. The documents
were titled SOT Information/Notes, Draft Proposal One, Draft Proposal Two, and Draft Proposal Three.
(Please see attached.) The SOT Information/Notes provided an overview of David M. Coxs staffing
allocation at this time. It was noted that the number of students projected for the following school year is
set at 600 students. At this time, we have 635 students that are attending our school. The difference of
35 students means that we could essentially need 1 intermediate or 2 primary teachers, depending on the
numbers next year. This was important to note as the team discussed the budget. This form also
included some scenarios to consider for the position of the librarian next year as well.
The four scenarios to consider were outlined as such (please see attachments for more details):
Move the librarian to the position of computer teacher
The librarian would become a humanities teacher in which a humanities grad can be entered. It
would be a 50 minute block of 30 minutes of computer lab and 20 minutes of check-out
Keep it as a librarian position of 30 minutes books/literacy and 20 minutes computer instruction.
Keep is as an librarian position but he/she would also provide additional reading teaching position
that would provide additional instruction to students that require interventions.
The SOT team discussed all of the scenarios, and though no decision was made, the team agreed that
the second and third scenario would be very beneficial for our students. We discussed the importance of
having our students utilize technology as part of their educational curriculum. Kristy Coleman of the SOT
Team was interested in starting a volunteer reading program possibly sponsored by the PTA.

Discussions then turned reviewing the three Draft Proposals for our 2017-2018 school year. The key
points of the budgets are outlined as follows (attachments are included):
Draft Proposal One: Short one teacher, two additional hours for the special education aides,
$52,000 for supplies/expenses, in the negative $6,732.82
Draft Proposal Two:Short one teacher, no additional hours or instructional aides, $52,000 for
supplies/expenses
Draft Proposal Three: Short one teacher, instructional aide added, only $29,000 for
supplies/expenses

Some of the things that were discussed was the importance of instructional aides as part of our
educational needs. The teachers discussed how difficult it can be to schedule the school day when so
many students are receiving push-in and/or pull-out services. This does not include the fact that our
student population also has students that are pulled-out for other services such as GATE and Speech.
For that reason, Draft Proposal Three was no longer considered as we discussed Draft Proposals One
and Two.

As we discussed Proposals One and Two, we talked about how we are technically in the hole for field
trips based on checks. We also discussed how we have raised money in other ways, such as the
Harvest Festival, that could essentially help us to recoup this funds. There is also a David M. Cox
account that has enough funds that can cover the negative in the budget easily. As the discussion
progressed, the SOT Team also talked about other ways that we could save money. The team agreed
that such things such as going green (sending out the newsletter and other correspondence out
digitally) and having the staff members have codes would be easy ways to help save money. All of the
things mentioned above would offset the negative amount of $6,732.82 as outlined in Proposal One.

Ana Pisano motioned for Draft Proposal One to be approved; Todd Nash seconded the motion; the SOT
unanimously agreed that Proposal One would be the one that we would like to set in motion.

After the decision was made, parent Sandra Hernandez said that she would like to add her input to our
meeting. She has a student in Ms. Blooms class. As a parent, she wanted to note the following:
She loved the student work that was displayed in the library
She liked what she heard throughout the meeting and that we were accounting for the incoming
students next year
She agreed that Proposal Three was not a great way to start the year. She felt that if other
parents heard that we would start the year with only $29,000 that they would not be happy with
that
She feels that parents would not mind bringing in supplies
She is from San Diego and she understands coding; she agrees that this would be a great way
to save money
As an environmental major, she would love to see our school go green. She pointed out how
she gets multiple copies of things, especially when you have more than one child that attends our
school
She would like to see teachers send out Class Dojos if they need things like paper
 As an employee of the Regional Transportation Department, she sees paper memos as a waste
She would like to see the librarian teach technology as part of the curriculum; she favored the 30
minutes of computer lab, then 20 minutes of students checking out books
She knows of grants for schools and that she would hope that we can petition parents to look for
them; she recommended putting that in our newsletters; she also said she was willing to do it fir
need be
She feels that we need to make it clear to parents of issues with the budget that money is right
down to the line
She likes how we send out a supply list and agrees with Todd Nash that a second semester
supply list is a great idea
She feels that money should never be an issue

She ended her comments with a thank you.

Agenda and Time of Next Meeting

The next meeting will be held at 5:00 PM* on March 7, 2017* at the David M. Cox Library

The meeting was adjourned at 8:03 PM by Chairman Rich Friesz

Minutes were submitted by Ryoko Ball-Aguilar

Minutes to be approved by the SOT Committee

*amendment - our next meeting has been rescheduled for February 16, 2017 at 5:30 PM. We must
reconvene to discuss the proposed budget as set forth in this meeting.