April 5, 2017

Time: 4:00 pm
Place: BCS/BCSF Board Room – St. Pat’s

Present:
Ken Frazier, Chair
Reverend Steve Zabrocki, Parish Representative
Carlos Arce
Leo O’Brien
Bucky Heringer
Mary Susan Fishbaugh
Brian McGovern
Brittney Souza
A.J. Miller
Bob Cerkovnik
Alex McCready
Shaun Harrington, President BCS
Superintendent Tim Uhl (phone conference)
Jan Haider, Foundation President
Kathy Harris, Marketing Director
Shel Hanser, Principal BCCHS
Deb Hayes, Principal SFP

Opening Prayer: A.J.

Approval of Minutes: Vote: Shaun made a motion to approve the School Board minutes from March 1, 2017. Bob seconded the motion. Motion carried unanimously.

Vote:
A.J. made a motion to approve the School Board minutes from March 15, 2017. Carlos seconded the motion. Motion carried unanimously.

Foundation Update: Mayfair is exactly 1 month away and the invitations were mailed out yesterday. There are 32 tables sponsored and the event will have a total of 65 tables.

The Foundation partnered with KTVQ-2 for Mayfair and enrollment promotion. Jay Kohn and Jon Stepanek from KTVQ-2 will emcee the Mayfair live auction.

There will be some great new items at Mayfair this year:
• Swarovski binoculars for the hunter
• Neil Diamond tickets for July 20th in Denver
• Viking Tickets
• Full-size “kegerator” from John Newbury
• Yellowstone Bank and Jim Harris donated their box at the Metra for the Paul Simon concert which includes dinner and a limo for 8 people

The School Board and the Foundation Boards are donating a “Whiskey Wagon” for Mayfair this year. Each Board member will donate $125 which will be used to purchase the wagon, some accessories, and various kinds of whiskey.

Business Committee Report: The committee recommends the use of the enterprise fund from the foreign exchange students tuition for the renewal center architecture study. The enterprise fund is tuition money the exchange students pay above the regular full tuition.

There was a question about the plan. EEG guarantees 15 students and the breakeven point is 18 students. At 15 students, there will not be a financial loss. Currently there are 3 exchange students registered for the 17-18 school year. There is a possibility of a need for a loan on the project. The study is to acquire definite numbers before anything is done. The vote will be to establish the enterprise fund. Butte and Great Falls are doing a similar program.

Vote: Leo made a motion to adopt an enterprise fund for foreign exchange student program and the excess money may be used for the study of remodeling the Sacred Heart Renewal Center. Bob seconded the motion. Motion carried unanimously.

Marketing Enrollment Report: Upcoming Events: Kindergarten Roundup and Preschool Preview will be Friday at SFP. Next Wednesday the 8th grade class will visit the high school.

Shel, Kathy, and Katie Hogan visited St. Charles. They attended Mass and spoke to the 8th grade students and some of the parents after church inviting them to attend BCS. There are some students living in Billings that attend St. Charles School. It is possible that 3 St. Charles students will apply at BCS for next year.

BCS is fortunate that they are not competing with any other Catholic school system in Billings.

Driver’s Ed at BCS: In the upcoming school year, BCCHS will have their own Driver’s Ed course. The course will be for one semester and the students will receive a ½ course credit. There will be room for 16 students and the cost will be about the same as School District 2. Students will still be allowed to take Driver’s Ed at School District 2.

Catholic Mutual will insure the Driver’s Ed course. Ernie Lee at Rimrock Subaru is researching the lease of a car to BCS for the class.

Enrollment Numbers: There is concern about the Kindergarten. There are 26 new students registered for a total of 56. There are several new students registered for 3rd and 4th grade. Of the currently enrolled students, approximately 19 per cent have not registered and several of the students not registered are employee families. There are new students in every grade level. The Smart Aid deadline is May 18th.

Catholic Culture Committee: There will be one more CCC meeting this year. In the 2013-2014 Strategic Plan, the Catholic Culture Committee was established. CCC tries to maintain a cross section of people representing the BCS schools and other areas in the system.

The committee is currently working on faith based questions, answers, and resources. They are also working on a way to connect with the high school students. CCC is making plans to have the high school students mentor the lower grades in religious matters. Some of the high school staff and students are already involved in helping the younger students with their studies and Catholicism. CCC hopes to assist in connecting the schools before the end of this school year.

President’s Report:
Open Positions on the Staff:
• Tim Lowe, Education Director
• Radene Ostwald, 1st Grade
• Jeanine Reed, 2nd Grade
• Kevin Andriolo, 4th Grade
• Meg Rude, 10th Grade English
Daniel Tate will move from Library/Media Specialist to the English position. That will open the Library/Media Specialist position.
• Misty Keyser, Maintenance
Will be replaced with a half time person working evenings
Some of the position and schedule changes will create savings in pay and benefits.

Mayfair Special Projects: The Mayfair Special Project this year will be lockers for the high school. Alumni have been given an opportunity to donate on a smaller scale.

Strategic Planning: The Foundation would like to have a combined executive meeting with the School Board executive committee to discuss long term goals. The meeting will take place after Mother’s Day and Rita Turley will facilitate.

CEEDAR Grant Meeting – Great Falls: Jim and Deb went to Great Falls for a Collaboration for an Effective Education and Development of Accountability and Reform (CEEDAR) Grant meeting with Mary Susan and the professors from the partnership. The meeting was on Wednesday afternoon and Thursday morning.

CEEDAR is a federally funded grant in Florida and is based on multisystem support and getting educators together. It has taken different paths since conception.

There was a panel from Lewistown made up of teachers and administrators that spoke about having all students stay in the regular classrooms and having all the student’s needs met. Merging the 3 schools together is a great opportunity to for all the students and staff.

At least 6 BCS staff will be able to participate in the Montana Behavior Initiative Summer Institute. When they return, they will be able to provide support for instruction and a unified culture in the new school.

The staff was invited to the Elk River Writing institute and the cost was waived. BCS is excited to be part of this group and being taught how to be better instructors.

BCS Foundation Board Representative: When Craig Barthel left the School Board, Shaun was asked by Jan to be the School Board representative on the Foundation Board which would reduce the number of meetings the volunteer Board members must attend.

The Foundation Board Bylaws state that the School President is not allowed to be a voting member on the Foundation Board. Jan requested a member of the School Board to fill the representative position. The Foundation Board meets at 4:00 pm the 1st Monday of the month.

The composition of the School Board ex-officio voting members are the Superintendent of Catholic Schools, BCS President, a member of the BCS Foundation and 9 to 15 members. There has not been an operating agreement between BCS and the BCS Foundation since 2005. Ken will review the bylaws and it will be discussed further at the Board meeting on May 3rd.

Daycare/Pre-School /Summer Program: The plan was always to move the preschool / daycare to SFI. The hope was to do the move in August so everything could be moved from SFI to the new building, move from SFP to SFI in one move, and then move SFU so everything was moved only once.

The SFP property has hopefully been sold to the Head Start Program. The closing date has not been determined. Shaun called Jennifer Owen, the Director of Head Start. Jennifer informed Shaun that the buildings were not a concern but they would be tearing out the playground and doing some construction. Head Start plans to start the demolition and construction immediately after school gets out for the year. Mary Queen of Peace informed Head Start that BCS would remove the playground structures because they are BCS property.

If BCS maintains the summer program at SFP this summer, they won’t have a playground next door, it will be a constructions site. The teachers will have to go a block to the park to take the children outside. They could move into the basement of the SFP building and the license would have to be transferred to the SFP building and then again in August transfer it to the SFI building.

May 22, which is 2 weeks before school gets out, Mary Queen of Peace plans to start the demolition of the church area removing pews, stained glass windows, and other items. BCS is hoping to convince them to wait until school is out to start the demotion. There are some logistics that need to be worked out and everything will depend on the closing date.

School closes June 2nd and BCS will close the daycare from June 5th through the 9th and move it to SFI. St. Pius X has Vacation Bible School from the 12th through the 16th. They need 4 classrooms and the gym from 9:00 am until noon. Sue can work around the Vacation Bible School for 1 week and then she will have use of the entire SFI building for the rest of the summer. Part of the property will need to be fenced off and the city will not approve the facility until the preschool/daycare is in there and set up.

New blacktop will be put in the parking lot at St. Pius X to include the area that is now the playground at SFI. During the week BCS wants to move the daycare June 5th through the 9th the following needs to be done is:
• Move the Preschool / Daycare
• Get the blacktop done
• Get the fence up
• Have the accrediting agency do the inspection

Anytime during the summer the sinks can be placed in the 4 classrooms for the preschool and be ready when school starts. At some point the rest of SFI, SFP, and SFU will be moved to the new building.

Mini Pods will be placed at each school so the teachers can place items from the classrooms in them and then the pods will be moved to the new school and items placed in the new classrooms. Dumpsters will also be provided. Those expenses have not been included in the plan.

Shaun met with the people from St. Pius X and they have Religious Ed on Wednesdays from 4:15 pm to 5:30 pm and another section from 6:00 pm to 7:30 pm. The largest group is from 4:15 pm to 5:30 pm which is about 75 students and currently they use all 8 classrooms upstairs for that program. That would leave the daycare in the downstairs. There is also an afterschool program and there may be between 80 and 90 students after school.

Deb, Jim, and Shaun met with Mark Lambot of United Way and they have afterschool programs. They provide snacks. BCS will charge $185 per child for after school care and they charge $240 per child. $185 in the BCS program goes into the BCS general fund. After everything is paid for, between daycare and the afterschool program BCS will clear between $40,000 and $50,000 a year. If the afterschool program is turned over, the entire $240 goes to the United Way program and BCS would lose approximately $30,000 to $40,000 a year out of the budget.

Shaun spoke to Fr. Steve and will meet the people at St. Pius X. It would be difficult to add the afterschool care to everything else that must be organized at the new school this year. The staff would have to be split between the daycare and the new building.

There would have to be someone in charge of the program discipline, snacks, and set up programing. Shaun hopes to have the program stay at St. Pius X for the 2017-2018 school year and then move to the new school the next year.

The plan is to increase the preschool program and it will go from 2 fulltime teachers to 3 fulltime teachers. The fulltime teacher in charge of the building will receive a pay increase because of the increase in responsibility.

Right now, 2 teachers instruct a morning section and an afternoon section. With the change, all 3 teachers will teach a morning section, 2 teachers will have an afternoon section and the 3rd one will be the lead person. There will need to be a fulltime secretary, and a custodian. That use to be handled by Principal Deb Hayes and SFP. The hope is to increase the number of students to pay for the additional staffing.

The afterschool program will need to be at SFI for 1 year and then moved to the new school before the following year. Fr. Wayne will allow the afterschool program at St. Pius X for 1 year but other arrangements must be made after that.

Moving 3 schools into 1 is a huge undertaking and everything needs a great deal of planning. The schools have been separate since 1971 and to merge those cultures is monumental. The scheduling for the new building is still being perfected. There will be a lot of things that will need to be adjusted. It will be important to get the school organized before adding another scheduling scenario. Everything will need to be done between June 5th and the 9th. The daycare staff will be taking vacations during the summer rather than 2 weeks at the end of school this year.

ACE Gathering Karen & Russ Fagg
May 23rd: There will be an ACE reception on May 23rd at Russ & Karen Fagg’s home. The ACE receptions are a celebration of the ACE scholarships and a fundraising event. Greg Geinforte is the current Board Chair for ACE, a donor to ACE scholarships, and a donor to the BCS capital campaign.

The BCS Board and the Foundation Board are invited to the celebration. BCS is the largest recipient of ACE scholarships in possibly 2 states. There will be 150 students in the BCS system that will receive ACE scholarships. It appears that everyone in tiers 14, 13, and a few 12s will receive ACE scholarships thanks to them. The information on the celebration will be coming out soon and it would be nice to have as many people attend as possible.

Gym Floor Signing: Lane Huffman, Superintendent of the new school project, invited the K-8th grade students to the St. Francis School site and write something on the gym floor before they lay the hardwood floor. Teachers have been working with the kids on Bible verses, prayers, poems and personal wishes for the future of our new school for the kids to write on the floor that twill be there forever. Shaun will contact the media.

New Business:
Diocese and Bankruptcies: Shaun met with Jan. Rita Turley, and Mike Herringer to discuss the Diocesan bankruptcy and how it pertains to BCS and the new school. If there are questions concerning that, none of the school properties are listed in the estate of the bankruptcy that has been filed. Donors will want to know if the money donated to the new school will still go to the new building.

The building is owned by the Foundation which is separate. All money that goes to the Foundation and the new building will still to go to the building. The bankruptcy that has been filed should not have any consequences to the Catholic Schools of the Eastern Diocese or their operation. In no case in the USA concerning Catholic Diocese bankruptcies, were their school systems affected in any way. It should have no impact on BCS.

Adjournment: The meeting adjourned at 5:45 pm.
Respectfully Submitted: Shaun Harrington, Billings Catholic Schools President