Dugsi Academy Board Meeting
Thursday, February 19, 2009
Griggs Midway Building
1821 University Avenue W., St. Paul, MN

Minutes

Board Members Present:  Kimberly Prechel, Patty McCauley, Amber Ringwelski, Saeed Farhia, and Shukri Hassan
Absent:  Abdulkadir Khayre, Katherine Waterman
Ex-officio and others:  Abdulkadir Osman (Director), Virginia Heesch (Assistant Director), Pam Young (Designs for Learning), and Mohamed Osman.

Notes:  All notes were unanimous unless otherwise stated

1.      Meeting was called to order by Saeed Farhia at 3:44pm.

2.      Approval of the agenda:  Abdulkadir Osman would like to add the new teacher contract under PTO staff request and Virginia would like to add By-Laws and Mission under Other Business.   Kimberly moves to accept the agenda, Patty seconded and the motion carried.

3.      Approval of the minutes from the January 15, 2009 Board Meeting:  Virginia would like to change the date in the last bullet of 5.d. 2009-2010 needs to be changed to 2008-2009.  Amber moves to approve the minutes with changes, Kimberly seconded, and the motion carried.

4.      Community Comments:  Mohamed Osman was invited by SPPS (St. Paul Public Schools) superintendant to have a meeting with other elders in the Somali community; SPPS wants to make a partnership with Dugsi Academy.  Mohamed said he would carry the idea of partnership to the board.  He has some reservations about the idea but wants the board to discuss.  He feels Charter schools are for parents to choose for their children to take them away from Public Schools. It is unclear how SPPS wants to absorb Dugsi Academy. 

5.      School financial updates:  Pam Young from Designs for Learning

Patty  and Pam went through the financial report summary for January 31, 2009. 

a.       Pam: there is a Fund 01 negative balance, take loss and subtract what we should have gotten and the loss is only 83,174.  This loss is attributed to the hold back.  The budget is looking more positive than we thought.  The question was asked, how close is revenue estimate and how much is spending going to increase or level out this school year, for us to think about when looking at the budget.  Budget is looking good.  She will take the updated ADM’s from Tami and will calculate as of today.  Mr. Osman says we will have 248 students as of Monday.  Virginia is totally impressed at Osman’s marketing skills.   As of today we will earn a .31 ADM.

b.       Income:  Patty had some questions about the Special Ed salary but we did not have the Special Ed Para included.  Virginia added that we will also be increasing Federal Special Education by 43,000 dollars.  Abdulkadir Osman adds that we will be picking up Mohamed Bashir’s salary with this new money as a preventative special ed para.  Transportation for two students will also be  included.

c.       Saeed asked how the state deficit is.  Pam Young responded that she has heard many different scenarios.

d.      Saeed moves to accept the financial report, Amber seconded, the motion passed.

6.      Director and Assistant Director’s Reports

a.       After school program:  Very chaotic first day because of surplus of students in the program.  There are still obstacles including buses being on time.  We cancelled last week.  The question is to cancel next week as well.  Meeting with the Boys and Girls Club came to show that they do not have the accommodations for us that they initially promised because they are accepting other schools as well as Dugsi.  We are looking at another facility that can accommodate us on Tuesday nights.  Another option is to go to the YMCA and have the boys play basketball and have the girls do girls-only swimming.  Next Tuesday will be cancelled because of lack of facilities and teaching staff. 

b.      Grade expansion application update:  Virginia has to put together a three year budget which will take a long time.  She also has to put together proposed budgets if we don’t expand.  The proposal needs to be submitted in May.  Abdulkadir showed a floor plan of options for space on the second floor for the grade level expansion.  The Middle Schoolers will be completely separated from the 3^rd floor and will not ever need to access the 3^rd floor.  Mohamed Osman asks if the 9-12 is approved, if this facility will be enough space for all our students.  Abdulkadir and Virginia agreed that it will be plenty of space and there will always be options to lease more space.  Mohamed Osman also asks if the 9-12 eventually happens, do you think that this building will have space to have a gym or a playground; can we build a playground in the garden space?  Patty said that that garden area already has been taken.  Virginia says that in the grade expansion proposal the questions are addressed and that we are continually looking for facilities that will accommodate us better.

c.       Policy 302- Executive Director:  Virginia states that in our by-laws the assistant director is not addressed.  These new policies come from the Minnesota School Board Association.  Virginia will bring the policy on the evaluation of the executive director to the next board meeting. 

d.      All Policies are being reviewed by Board Members and will be placed on next month’s agenda.

e.       PTO staff request:  Ms. Abby has written a letter to request 5 days of PTO to borrow, which is 40 hours, or 5 months of PTO.  The policy now is that if an employee leaves before they earn the PTO back the employee will be responsible for paying it back.  Patty had asked Abby if she would like people to donate PTO and she declined.  There was a discussion of the importance of borrowing the PTO.  Patty moved that we approve the special case of PTO request for Abby Hendricks of 3 days, in addition to the 16 hours already in place by our policies.  Saeed seconds the motion, the motion carried.

f.       Math Teacher:  Scott Larson would like to have his salary be paid to him ending on the 22^nd of June instead of the end of August.  Patty would like to make sure that he is going to stay after he gets his first paycheck.  The concern is that he will get more money than he actually works, if he works out.  A discussion about what stipulations should be put in the contract concerning pay followed.  We will only pay him for what he is going to be working.  His first payment will only be for the 5 days that he will have worked.  He will start February 23^rd.  For this particular individual, Scott Larson, we are agreeing to change how the payments of salary are distributed.  Patty motioned, Kimberly seconded, and the motion passed.

g.      February 23- Make into student contact day.  To make student contact day quota we want to cancel the staff development and make this day the student contact.  Patty motioned, Kimberly seconded, the motion passed.

h.      March 20- Early Release for Spring Conferences.  Patty moved, Amber seconded, the motion passed.

i.        Other business: the by-laws and the mission have been moved to next month’s meeting.

7.      The next meeting will be March 19^th, 2009 at 3:30.

8.      Adjourn:  Kimberly adjourns, Saheed seconded.  Meeting adjourned at 4:50pm.