PS26 Jesse Owens PTA Executive meeting

August 2, 2023

Present: Sam Posner, Rachel Hills, Sophie Richards, Jessica Jones

Sam met with Ms Jones and Principal Funtleyder in July.

• Family Orientation is scheduled for Wednesday August 30.
  • Action: Sam to review and revise last year’s parent survey for distribution at Orientation, and share with PTA Executive Board for feedback. Purpose of survey is to collect parent information, and learn more about what people want from the PTA.
  • Committee discussed how to get survey in front of as many people as possible. Eg, orientation event, poster with QR code, flyers distributed in student home packs, engaging parents at Dads Take Your Kids To School Day.
  • Action: Sophie volunteered to stand in front of the school for 20 minutes each morning in the first week, putting the survey flyer in people’s hands.
• The school is going to create a Class Dojo account for the PTA - need email access first.
  • Sam says he would like to use not just to share events, but also photos of things that are happening at the school.
  • Action: Sam to go to the school directly after today’s meeting to set up an account with Ms Jones.

Ms Moore is moving from 5th grade teacher to science cluster teacher. Needs ~$150 for additional curriculum activities.

• Rachel and Sophie agree that this is a good use of funds.
• Rachel confirms with Sam that there are a few thousand dollars in the treasury already, so our funds can easily cover.
• Sam says that supporting cluster teachers is a good way to maximise the number of students PTA funds impact.

Notion workspace

• Sam has created a Notion workspace to manage PTA tasks.
• Action: Sam to invite all executive board members to join the Notion workspace.

Mission statement

• Executive board members share the draft mission statements they wrote ahead of the meeting, as below:

Mish: My mission is to work with the staff, Principal, and parents to assess and agree on what the school needs. Allowing the PTA to be more purposeful and transparent regarding fundraising. I would also love to see more parent involvement, however possible.

Sophie: My mission statement is to foster a strong, vibrant and welcoming forum where parents, teachers and students work together to build meaningful events and effective fundraising representative of P.S. 26 Jesse Owen’s diverse student body and history in the Bedford-Stuyvesant community.

Rachel: To strengthen the connection of PS 26 Jesse Owens parents, guardians, and teachers with each other and the school, for the benefit of the whole school community.

Sam: The Jesse Owens School PTA is a partnership between families and teachers to engage and support our school community while enriching the education and growth of all students at the school.

Alisha: My mission is to work with staff & faculty members to better ps.26 and to access the needs of the school and the children to make the school year better for everyone . Also to seek opportunities to help with fundraising.