Minutes: Leadership Meeting—June 9, 2016

1. Emphasis for next year/ Keith King: CEC is going into its 10th year, and it has been incredible. It’s a journey where we can create more opportunities—to give students something they haven’t had before.

2. Structure of the meetings/ Keith King: CEC is in its second year of Leadership Meetings. This year, meeting agendas will be posted on Google Docs.

3. Yearly meetings/ Main points from Leadership Team: Ideas on how to improve Leadership Meetings:

 Meeting Preparation: Meetings should be more dedicated to solving issues and allow more time for group projects; this could include making sure each person has an assigned role—as an individual or as a small group—before the meeting to allow adequate time to prepare to deliver a presentation or update at the meeting. Would be good to have all Leadership Meeting documents one week before meeting.  Online Forums: Create online forums for Leadership small groups to provide input on various topics. Possible forum: Schoology. People can post comments, share ideas, etc.  Meeting Follow-Up Information: Meeting minutes, which will include notes, items discussed and action items, will be sent to members of the Leadership Team within a week of each Leadership Meeting.

Action Item—Yearly Meetings: Assign topics to teams in small groups so they can create the agenda item and present to upcoming Leadership Meeting.

4. Hope Beyond Yourself—Next Year/ Keith: Grit and Growth has been effective and competitions will continue in the school. Keith will rewrite “Build the Future” song to include hope theme. Aurora song to be based on Matthew West song “Hello, My Name Is.”

1 | P a g e Action Item—New Logo: Revise new logo to include: Charter School Network, dates schools were established, a picture of a college, and maybe “future” instead of “hope.”

Action Item—New Poster: Change “Douglas County” to “Parker.”

5. Teacher/Staff Evaluations: Dan and Jennifer: Jennifer: Evaluations are based on the Marzano Teacher Evaluation Model. Goals: To recognize staff contributions; create effective evaluation tool to measure effectiveness and recognize areas that need growth. Jennifer’s goals: Do formal teacher evaluations twice a year; visit every classroom once a week for brief observation.

Dan: Next conversation will be on job descriptions because this is what teachers and staff are evaluated on. Formal evaluation is for non-teachers and is a snapshot; Laura is working on one for advisors; hope to have all of them rolled out by this fall; Linda will work with team to ensure language is legal; terms are appropriate.

Action Item—Evaluations: Heads of School, Deans, Advisors: Create an evaluation rubric created by Jenn and Dan and present a draft of your rubric at July Meeting; review, comment and spend time filling out “responsibilities” over next few months.

6. Policy Manual/ Robin:

 Guiding principles and directory are on CEC website; Katrina emailed login info  Policies are public and anyone can get to those; each school’s website must have a link to policies. Policies to be followed by all schools; any stake holder can submit a request for change (this policy is currently being drafted).  Procedures: Some are in policies and some are in guiding principles.  All old documents should be deleted; Everything you need to go forward is on CEC website

Action Items—Policy Manual: 1) Determine who is in charge of the next phases. 2) Work on procedures. 3) Edit policies. 4) Admissions handbook and other handbooks 5) Come up with two-year plan and put on Google Docs

7. Student Handbook/ Robin: CEC will provide list of what schools must include in handbooks; schools can decide format and if they want to add anything else.

2 | P a g e Action Item—Handbooks: CEC has created a list of what schools need to include in handbooks; schools may choose handbook formats and may add items.

8. Group Work—Aurora Event, CEC Celebration, Handbooks, Cultural Climate

A. Aurora Event—John Etzell: Event to go from 8:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. and to include: breakfast, break-out groups—including team-building exercises and getting-to-know-you events as well as a Grit Speak from Aims, lunch and a closing ceremony.

Action Item: Aurora event planning group to meet June 30th for follow-up meeting.

B. Handbooks—Robin Zook: Student & Family Handbook

Each school must make a student handbook readily available to all students and parents.  Schools may determine the appropriate format of the handbook: printed, electronic, living document. Hard copies must be available to those families who need or request one.  Teachers are encouraged to add the student handbook to their syllabi.  Each school must require students and parents to indicate that they have read and agree to abide by the directives in the student handbook.

Action Item: Robin will organize into categories and place in a template for schools to fill in the info and add their own information.

C. School Climate—Chris Ghigliotty Group will create a Google Docs file to include 10 principles for all students to use in postsecondary education or in the workforce; principles to include ways to help students build stronger resilience. Action Item: Create file and place on Google Docs.

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