Call to Order #
The virtual meeting was called to order at 8:00pm. Executive Board members in attendance:
- Sharon Burd, President
- Ken Venable, VP for Educational Programs
- Clare Rosenberger, VP for Fundraising
- Megan Miller, VP for Community Relations
- Meredith Greene, VP for Events
- Ashley Farrugia, VP for Staff Appreciation
- Christian Lindstrom, Treasurer
- Dan Burd, Secretary
The board voted to approve the June 8, 2022 Executive Board Meeting Minutes.
Old Business #
Photo for a “Meet the Board” flier #
Sharon Burd
- For those who haven’t sent a headshot for the “Meet the Board” flier, Sharon requested that they do so. We would like to put a face to the name and to build relationships with families and staff.
Abingdon PTA Staff Liaison(s) Needed #
Sharon Burd
- We need a liaison to send out messages on our behalf, when we’re trying to communicate with the staff.
- JoLynn Lopez suggested Sarah Tyson, a former teacher who is returning to Abingdon this year. However, we aren’t in touch with her at this point so we aren’t sure if she would be willing to serve in the role.
Recruiting for an after school enrichment coordinator for Baroody Camps #
Ken Venable and Sharon Burd
- We published an advertisement asking for someone to serve as an afterschool enrichment coordinator. It’d be great to have someone in that role.
- Who is Baroody? Baroody is the vendor who handles our afterschool activities.
- The coordinator would have overall accountability over the day-to-day operations of the program. They would have rosters, they would know what kids are walkers (only 3rd grade and above), which go back to extended day. The individual would have to be vetted by school.
- Where are we advertising the role? We reached out on social media and our website. We may want to reach out to Abingdon staff as they would be well-situated to serve in the role. This may be another question for Mr. Horak, to identify potential candidates or to advertise the role to staff in lieu of a staff liaison.
Family Engagement #
General Membership Meetings #
Sharon Burd
- We will generally hold our general membership meetings on the second Tuesdays of each month at 7 pm. We are awaiting confirmation from CCPTA as we require their Zoom account to hold our meetings.
- The tentative meeting dates are: September 13, October 11, November 8, December 13, January 10, February 21, March 14, April 11, May 9.
Tuesday Folder Backpack Flyer — PTA Welcome Letter #
Sharon Burd
- If anyone would like to draft a flyer explaining what the PTA does and asking people to join, let me know.
Inaugural Cardinal Courier newsletter #
Sharon Burd
- If you have content for the inaugural Cardinal Courier, let us know.
- Are the newsletters going to be the same format as before? Maybe a bit shorter and less dense than before.
- Who receives the newsletter? Anyone who has signed up in previous years. People can also sign up on our website.
- Will we try to use School Talk or Memberhub to share the newsletter more broadly? Relying on the school to share information on School Talk is risky as we don’t have any control over it. We can always ask them to share messages on our behalf.
- We intend to keep the website up-to-date and more heavily promote it, which could reduce our reliance on the newsletter.
- We will continue to share flyers via Tuesday folders, which we understand could be a bit messy and also weren’t shared with every class.
- We will try to get our message across using flyers, newsletter, social media and our website, sharing the same information on each, hopefully without overwhelming anybody.
Reflections #
Dan Burd
- This is a nationwide art program that we intend to bring back to Abingdon after a 10+ year hiatus.
- Mr. Horak has approved our participation, and we will reach out to Abingdon’s art teachers to make them aware of our plans while being clear that we aren’t burdening them with extra work as this will be a PTA program.
- We are awaiting CCPTA approval since we are not in good standing due to our tax situation. Update 8/5/2022: CCPTA has cleared us to participate in Reflections.
Girls on the Run #
Ashley Farrugia
- This is another program that we would like to bring back to Abingdon. It may have stopped due to the pandemic.
- I can serve as the liaison, but we need a coach. Those can be either school-based teachers or community members. Ms. Muscarella has supported it in the past. Ms. Jondahl would like to help but doesn’t want to take it on. Ashley can’t take girls out running every Wednesday.
- Maybe ask Mr. Horak if there is a good staff contact
- Update 8/5/2022: Ashley has said that Girls on the Run will help us find coaches, but we will continue to seek one within our community.
School Directory (pending Mr. Horak’s approval) #
Dan Burd
- We intend to work with a vendor to publish a student directory this year. We used to do this several years ago but stopped doing it. Most Arlington PTA’s make a directory available.
- We are awaiting school approval, as we need them to provide us with family contact data that will be provided from the Annual Online Verification Process (AOVP). As part of the AOVP, families are asked to opt-in to make their information available to the PTA for a directory.
Multilingual WhatsApp Groups #
Dan Burd
- We intend to complement Ms. Branco’s successful Spanish WhatsApp group with four more to help build community and better communicate our message across to families.
- The four additional groups will be Arabic, Amharic, Mongolian, and “English and other languages.”
Speaking at the in-service #
Ashley Farrugia
- We might want to have Sharon or someone else speak at the school’s in-service days in August in order to get our message across to staff.
Updates on questions from previous meetings #
Ken Venable
- Ken received a response from the School Board on Resource Officers for this coming school year. They chose not to use police officer and instead hire security officer. As a personal matter he intends am going to challenge that decision because security is reduced to just the campus, while police officer can roam the county and have arrest authority. More to follow.
- SchoolTalk is the notification system APS uses, is not the same as Arlington County Alert (Everbridge). Arlington Alert sign up link is here: https://www.arlingtonva.us/Government/Programs/Emergency/Arlington-Alert
- Still awaiting a response on contacting parents in multiple languages
- Still awaiting a response on the policy for local or state politicians visiting the school
Money #
Budget #
Christian Lindstrom
- Christian showed our draft budget to the Board. It is based on previous years, especially with regard to income.
- We will meet again on Tuesday, August 9 at 8 PM to have a working session on the draft budget.
Fundraising #
Clare Rosenberger
- We aren’t sure sure if we want to do armchair fundraiser as parents might not want to start out the year by writing us a check.
- We are open to new ideas for fall-themed fundraiser ideas.
- We should have a fundraising spreadsheet which shows which businesses we asked for money, since several of us want to raise funds in this way and we don’t want to unknowingly ask the same businesses for money.
Spirit Gear #
Ashley Farrugia
- Ashley is taking this on.
- We may work with a vendor to open an online store which will be available for a couple of weeks, after which the PTA would take delivery of orders and distribute them. That way, we don’t order things we don’t need. We can bump up prices a bit if we want it to be a fundraiser.
- We intend to liquidate existing stock at upcoming events.
Audit #
Dan Burd
- We’re required to perform an audit (financial review) each year. This is the first year we’ve done it in several years.
- Ours was approved by the Virginia PTA last week.
- Key takeaways:
- Each transaction needs to have the documented approval of two signers — in our case, President and Treasurer. We are working on some kind of form or spreadsheet to document these approvals.
- Each check needs to be signed by the President and Treasurer as well.
- We need a receipt for every single transaction.
Events #
PTA Closet Clean-up #
- Friday, August 5, (1 pm)
Abingdon Community Garden Clean-up & Harvest #
- Sunday, August 7 (8:30 am-10:30 am)
Kindergarten Popsicle Playdate #
- Saturday, August 13 (9-11 am)
Back-to-School Picnic & Play #
- Saturday, August 20 (10 am – 12 pm)
PTA Table at Abingdon’s Open House #
- Thursday, August 25 (1 pm – 3 pm)
Tears/Cheers Coffee for Kindergarten Parents #
- Monday, August 29 (7:30 am – 8:30 am)
Discussion #
Ms. Trenia Lynch’s laminator repair request #
- The PTA received a request to arrange for a repair of a laminating machine that the PTA had apparently given to the school years ago, and to provide more laminator film.
- The Board was informed that the PTA spent $1,500 on laminator film during the 2021-2022 school year.
- The Board agreed that the PTA was not responsible for the maintenance of equipment that the PTA provided to the school as a gift.
Mr. Horak’s Spirit Gear request #
- The PTA received a request to provide new Spirit Gear t-shirts to all Abingdon staff, perhaps by the time of the Open House or the first day of school.
- The Board is aware that the PTA just did this in May.
- The Board agreed that we could not fulfill this request. We could offer to provide t-shirts to new staff that would match the ones that the PTA provided in May.
- We could do something else for the staff at the in-service days at a more modest cost. Maybe food and beverages.
Ms. Anne Oliveira’s August Columbia Pike popsicle playdate request #
- The PTA received a request to hold a popsicle playdate closer to Columbia Pike, at the north end of Abingdon’s attendance zone.
- Columbia Grove would not allow us to host the playdate at their playground, which is in close proximity to many Abingdon families and where the PTA and the school have held events in the past.
- The closest county park is at Bailey’s Branch Park, which is a little further away.
- We are waiting on Ms. Oliveira’s buy-in to hold the event there.
Mr. Horak’s landscaping request #
- We receieved a request to beautify the traffic island near the kiss and ride area.
- The water spigot doesn’t work on that side. Maybe we could plant native plants that don’t need much care.
- Maybe we should plant bulbs? They grow year after year
Potentially dangerous tree #
- There’s a dead, potentially dangerous tree in back of the school.
- Abingdon custodial staff are aware and are trying to get the attention of administrators to have it removed.
- Requests of this nature seem to linger without action for a long time, though it’s not obvious where the bottleneck is. There has been something similar happening with the see-saw repair.
- A similar, smaller tree fell in the same area 30 minutes after students had been nearby.
Adjournment #
- Meeting adjourned at 9:40 pm
- Next Board Meeting: Tuesday, August 23, 2022, 7 pm
- Working session on the draft budget: Tuesday, August 9 at 8 pm
/s/ Dan Burd, Secretary