HTC Early Childhood Centers
School Board Report – April 2011
Melissa Pieper, Director

Faith Development:

Instructional Leadership/Curriculum:

1. I will be continuing to work on our QRS application for both the Fort Madison and St. Paul sites.  This application will be turned in by June 30^th. 
2. Cathy Garrels and I completed the ECERS class for the QRS application and know we will both be able to do the classroom assessments needed for the QRS application.  Cathy will be able to complete the assessment for St. Paul and I will be able to complete it for Fort Madison. 

Public Relations/Marketing & Development:

1. With the help of Donna Borst and Shelley Sheerin I wrote a letter and sent it to the families that were baptized in the church, but have not enrolled in HTC kindergarten.  My hope is that this letter will generate some additional enrollment for the kindergarten class. 

Building Updates-

1. Beginning this summer it will be necessary to pay a $35 dollar fee for each employee to have their fingerprints done.  This is a new guideline by DHS.  Our staff has started the process of having the fingerprints done and then they will just need to be mailed into DHS. 
2. We sent out a parent survey in the middle of March.  We asked that they surveys be turned in by April 15^th.  We will make adjustments and improvements to the center based on the feedback from the surveys.
3. The teachers have started making lists of things that they will need for next school year.  We will begin to order supplies for the classrooms so that we will have them for the fall. 

Fort Madison:

1. We have 10 children on the list for pre-kindergarten.  Not all of the families have paid their deposit yet, however many of them are families that are currently enrolled in daycare and will be attending pre-kindergarten. 
2. Our morning and afternoon 4 year old preschool classes are full.  We have been adding people to a wait list.  We have 12 children signed up for 3 year old preschool and are hopeful that we will gain some additional enrollment this summer. 
3. Summer contracts went out yesterday to all of our families who will be enrolling in daycare during the summer months.  It looks as if our daycare and school age care rooms will be full during the summer months. 

St. Paul:

1. I sent in the Children First Grant Application, which was due April 15^th.  This money has helped us to pay the teacher and associate salaries in St. Paul.  The hope is that the Children First funding is not cut much and we are still awarded a decent amount of money to cover these salaries. 

DO WE HAVE THE TUITION SCHEDULE FOR THE 2011-2012 SCHOOL YEAR YET?

 HTC Board of Education Report - April 27, 2011
Doris S. Turner, Chief Administrator, K-12 Principal

Faith Development - Holy Trinity students were provided with multiple
opportunities to develop their personal faith during the Lenten
season with reconciliation services, Stations of the Cross, individual
and group service projects. All practices during Holy Week allowed
participants to attend Holy Thursday Masses and services on Good
Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter Sunday.
-Jordan Brown was a lector at the Chrism Mass in Davenport.
Thanks to the priests who arranged our reconciliation services.
School Leadership - As of this date, I have not received any formal
report from the State of Iowa concerning our site certification visit.
the chair group of the School Improvement Committee met on
April 20 to review the long term goals for Holy Trinity for the next 5
years. This was part of the presentation to the site visit team and we
are fine tuning wording, etc. before asking for Board of Education
approval.
-HTC faculty are entering their enacted curricula into the alignment
tool provided by the state to check CORE alignment. The faculty is
entering the 21st century skills section.
Certified personnel have been given contracts,
return date was April 15 and those contracts will be up for approval
at the April 27 meeting. Non-certified employment will be given the
end of April with a May 15 return date.
-The annual learning goals for students for the 2011 - 2012 school
year are being developed after examining Iowa test results and
individual teacher formative assessments. Teachers are doing this
during after school time because the professional development
time was used for snow make-up days.
-I'll be working on Spring reports to the state of Iowa starting May 1.
-The school system is giving Diocesan assessments at the various
levels during these ending days of April in math, reading, and
science. These tests are the "second assessment" we use for
state reports and we also have feedback from the Diocese on our
performance.
-The "safe environment" audit for the Diocese is
due the end of May. This is documented by Linda Reding with
assistance from Mary Lynn Panther for employee information.
Currently the school documents these things 4 times a year, twice
for the schools through the superintendent's office and twice for
Diocese through Lynnette Soulle's office. The data bases for the
audits are not compatible so hopefully the collection process
will be simplified very soon. (If it sounds like I am complaining. . .I
am!)
Professional Development We are planning to have a professional
development training opportunity for our faculty to continue use
of the promethean/smart boards in their instructional strategies. This
training will be provided by Natalie Ulloa Sandoval and offer
professional development credit through Great Prairie AEA.
Teachers are being surveyed as to times and topics. This year's
training will be geared to the teacher's experience level.
-Senior Darien Auge tested out of 3 semesters of Spanish at St.
Ambrose University. Congratulations to Darien as well as to Natalie
Ulloa Sandoval, HTC Spanish instructor. . . it speaks highly of the
success of our Spanish program. This current senior class is the first
class to have the benefit of Profe's instruction for 4 years!
-I am recommending that the professional development for next
year include ongoing Catholic doctrine education for our faculty as delineated by the Diocese of Davenport, alignment with
CORE, increasing teacher implementation of technology into the
Daily teaching strategies, and a continuation of the "love and logic" initiative that is going into year 4. Cyber bullying is continuing
to be an ever widening problem and training in how to combat it at the school level will continue to be in the forefront of educators and society's concern. The 24-7 impact on young people is huge and HTC needs to be sure that parents are aware and diligent in how to
combat this issue at home as well as how the school can help.
School Programs, etc. The month of May is always super busy. Please pay
close attention to the calendar. We hope to have tennis and
soccer teams in competition at the State level. . . .which falls on top of dates that are scheduled for semester testing at the 7-12 level. We will work hard to keep the schedule such that student athletes are able to complete requirements in a reasonable manner.
Misc. info:

We will be posting jobs that need to be filled for certified and non-certified personnel. Currently we do not have a teacher position that is not filled, however, I have given 2 teachers until June 1 to turn in contracts.

With the new chief administrator able to arrive the first week in June that should lead to an opportunity for a smooth transition. He will be able to meet the students and faculty before they leave for the summer. I plan to take a week of vacation the third week of June. Rick and I will be able to work together through June 17, I'll be gone June 20 - 24, and then return the last week of June to see if he has any additional questions, etc.

Additional info: (added Tuesday, April 26)

1. The gym at the high school will have the paint repaired on
May 31. P.E. classes will be held outside or use the YMCA.
2. I have adjusted my June schedule so that I can vacation with
my son and his family. My last official day at Holy Trinity will
be Friday, June 24. I will take the last week of June for vacation
rather than June 20 - June 24.
3. The school participated in a voluntary survey through Great
Prairie AEA concerning 21st century teaching & learning technology, 19 teachers participated, 61 students. It asked
basic questions as to what type of technology the teachers and students used at home and in the classroom. A copy is available in my office if you would like to see it. It is a good starting point for discussion of how to enlarge opportunities for our faculty and students. This is another example of how the AEAs help small schools such as HTC. The AEA just sent individual copies to all the
certified personnel of "Atomic Learning",Iowa AEA Online which reminds faculty of the various tools and tutorials that are available. The Atomic Learning 21st Century skills Collection includes professional development resources and curriculum materials to aid teachers in infusing 21st century skills into classrooms.
4. Drake Hardware will be sending an agreement for HTC for the
upcoming school year. The plan that we discussed earlier in the month was within the budget for technology for HTC for next year. I have asked Dana to provide information for the April meeting, if it is not available we will have it for the May meeting.
5. The shared sports programs that we have with Ft. Madison Public Schools will not change for the 2011 - 2012 school year. Girls soccer is hosted by HTC, football, wrestling is hosted by Ft. Madison public.
6.