PS 87 PA Board Meeting Minutes, October 2022

10/24/2022 3:12 pm

PS 87 SLT Meeting Minutes  - October 24, 2022 

Present

Monica Berry, Principal

Lauri Posner - UFT Rep

Cindy Lachow, Teacher

Meredith Thompson, PA President 

Pam Unger, PA President 

Barbara Kissane, Assistant Principal

Katie Baker, Parent SLT Rep

Caren Mintz, Parent SLT Rep

Natalya Murakhver, Parent SLT Rep

Justin Schwarz, Parent SLT Rep

The meeting was called to order at 4:17pm. 

Principal’s Report

Monica raised a concern about the SLT size and ratio of staff to parents. The A-655 SLT Regulations stipulate that there must be an equal number of staff and parents. Currently, there are more newly elected parents than returning staff. Monica will reach out to the Superintendent’s Office for guidance and a parent will reach out to FACE. 

Monica explained how the SLT works to set goals for the school community and align resources through the DOE’s Comprehensive Education Plan. Most of PS 87’s resources go to staff salaries, but the school has historically worked with the PA to identify and fund enrichment opportunities. 

Budget

When we left in June, there was a 1.9M budget gap and the school was going to have to excess 7-9 teachers. Over the summer, PS 87 received an appeal for $800,000 and only one teacher was excessed. The student population continues to grow and the school ended up adding an additional ICT class in Kindergarten. There is currently a line item on the Table of Organization for a teacher who has a vaccination exemption and is not in the building. Monica is working with Gail Brewer to see if the school can get that funding released. 

There has been a student registration gain. The DOE projected 540 students for the new year and there are currently 661 students. The DOE continues to send new students and the school received an additional $200,000 in register gain funds. 

A question was raised about class size. Third grade and first grade now have 26/27 and 27/28 in each class, which is the largest size in several years. There are also 18 new students in 1st grade. The DOE will continue to send students up to a 32 student per class cap. Kindergarten has higher class sizes than last year – from 20 to 22/21 – and is almost at capacity. 

The Deputy Chancellor visited the school and remarked how there is a feeling of joy in the building. 

Middle School

The Superintendent put in his screening preference to the Central Office. Last year, PS 87 had more families get their top choice than ever before. This year there are fewer fifth graders in the school system than last year. An announcement on middle school screens will be made on 10/26 and there will be a school conversation on 10/28. We hope to help ease family anxiety around the process. 

DESSA Assessment

Per the DOE, the school has deployed a Devereux Student Strengths Assessment in classrooms. DESSA is a social emotional assessment tool for teachers to help better understand and group learners. 

New Business

A question was raised about Social Emotional learning and how it is being tracked in light of the pandemic. Last year the Fifth Grade Student Council created a Social Emotional survey, building from the DOE’s SEL surveys for students in grades 6-12. The survey was never used, but the new Student Council can take this up again as a possible CEP metric. 

Discussion turned to the CEP and the required Math and Reading/ELA tracking. Staff did not feel the MAP assessment data was useful. The school should have some new Math Task data soon. Math Tasks allow teachers to see what children are doing from both a conceptual and procedural understanding. Monica said she would try to bring some new data to the next SLT meeting. 

The 2022-2023 SLT meetings have been scheduled for: 11/21, 12/12, 1/23, 2/13, 3/20, 4/17, 5/15, and 6/12. 

The meeting was adjourned at 5:33pm.