Department Chair Notes for November 20, 1008
November 20th, 2008
DEPARTMENT CHAIR MEETING NOTES
November 20, 2008
7:15 to 7:45 AM
Conference Room
Present: K. Kroener, L. Carey, J. Zum Mallen, D. Aper, J. Fiers, M. Haugse, S. Eberhardt, L. VanDerLeest, S. Scherer, A. Ringenberg, T. Minnaert, J. Swanson, J. DePauw, T. Mackey
Word of the Week: Mike will give one word a day. It will be defined, spelled, and used in a sentence. He will try to have it incorporated into the daily announcements wherever appropriate. He was looking for ideas for a culminating activity for every couple of weeks, or so. Suggestions included some type of a contest, mad libs, etc. Mike will take ideas.
Fibal Exam Schedule: The first draft of the exam schedule for first semester was distributed. Itt will be discussed at the next meeting.
CPG Update: Linda said that it was in the hands of the BOE. They will approve it in December, and then she will ask for any last checks for grammar, typos, etc.
The next here items on the agenda (How are we doing as a school, audit on syllabi, and audit on vocabulary strategies) were for self reflection
Make-up Work Policy: Mike asked for each chair to review policies/procedures within their own department. He wanrts to know what kind of coinsistency is out there. There is an issue at the Middle School that is bringing this to the surface. The distribution of report cards was also discussed, in reference to many of them not making it to the hands of parents. There were many suggestions on this topic, but one was to add something to the registration paperwork asking where parents would like information sent. It was also questioned if there could be something in Skyward that could trigger a notice to parents of a grade goes too low, of could Scottt use school messenger to notify parents
School Board Policy: Mike did a good job of explaining how this procedure works in a democracy, and that we should continue to be professional. And work within our procedures. It was brought up that the chairs wondered if the BOE always knew what went into our thinking. Mike said that Joni did a good job of conveying this information. They also asked if it might be possible to hear the resoning that the BOE used to make their decisions. Joe indicated that the BOE meetings were open meetings and anyone can attend, especially when they know there is something on the agenda that is of particular interest to them. This would allow them to hear, first hand, the discussions.
December 10, 2008: This is a one-hour early release. There may be time for some department meetings.
January 16, 2009: There will be a ½ day in-service following the last day of finbal exams. This is not for grading exams. It could be for test item analysis. Mr. Kuffel will have about twenty teachers from the district in a teacher leader workshop. Thjose names will be given at a later date.
Differentiation of Instruciton: This should be getting done. We would like to know of anyone who has attended any kind of a workshop/conference on this topic.
Weeding the Garden: We did an activity at our unit administrator’s meeting yesterday on this topic. Reflectiopn on this topic will continue, with potential action. The idea is to look at what is going on, keep what is good and valuable, and weed out what is in the way to success, or, at least, try to accomplish it in another way.
