March BOT meeting

St Dominic’s Catholic Primary School

Board of Trustees

March 2015 Meeting

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Strategic goals reported on from Strategic plan

Engaging Families/Whanau

Consult and make connections with our parish and local community to promote St Dominic’s Catholic Primary School and celebrate what makes our school the place it is.

·         Inserts into the parish newsletter when appropriate

·         School newsletter online

·         Bay newstalk

Consultation meetings with all main Cultural groups within the school at least once a year.

·         Meeting with Pacifica group planned twice a term.

·         Indian group meeting took place and we had a great turn out.

·         Student well-being presented on the night.

Develop the Pastoral care group so that they support our families in need when needed.

·         To meet with Pastoral care group twice a term.

·         Families continue to be tracked and support offered when needed.

·         Will be working with Parish to develop this further.

Plan to organise at least 2 community events each year that encourages families coming together and socialising. (PTA support here)

·         Bowling Afternoon after mass. Building a sense of community with parents and parishioners. This is a work in progress.

Teaching

Develop and implement programmes that raises student abilities in literacy and numeracy.

·         Targets have been set up based on last year’s results

·         Mutukaroa across the junior school continues at least end of Term 1. Currently getting feedback from teacher on the importance of this initiative in the school. Financially we have to see if we can continue this in regard teacher release.

·         ALIM in the Year 3 and 4 has been dropped due to time pressure on staff.

·         ALL in the junior school is up and running.

·         This year we continue the whole school focus on Numeracy.

Use integrated curriculum delivery, inquiry learning and the key competencies in our teaching and learning programmes.

·         We plan to review the new planning document at the end of Term 1 to see if it is working in regards highlighting the Key Competencies across the school.    New format Curriculum 18th Nov.docx

·         We are currently working on handbooks to support this document.

Develop further formative assessment practice and encourage students to personalise their learning.

·         Staff have chosen their goals for their personal reflection that build on previous year’s personal development.

·         Staff will be self-monitoring their own evidence gathering in relation to the teacher criteria.

·         Process for 2015 Final.docx

·         All staff have had their initial meetings and have been informed of the process. Management of evidence will now be tracked.

·         http://www.teacherscouncil.govt.nz/rtc

Report to parents on student achievement in relation to the national standards.

·         This will take place as Assessment timetable sets out

·         STAR results discussed.

Student engagement and independence: student voice, goal setting and AKO concepts.

·         Goal setting took place with most children doing this on their devices.

·         This was well received by the parents.

·         Students need to reflect on this goals as the year progresses.

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Develop a culture of learning where ICT is an everyday learning tool.

·         IT survey as part of the self-review process discussed.

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Develop and implement differentiated learning programmes to meet the needs of students across all learning areas.

·         Target groups have been set up within the classrooms for Maths, Writing and Reading

·         Data wall will become more and more a focus and will continue to be so. We need to know if we are making more of an impact on our children. What impact is our teaching making and how do we know?

School Catholic Culture

Reviewing the annual plan from previous year

·         First meeting has taken pace with DRS and we are well on board for a great review. St Dominic’s already has great system and structures behind the scene for real pastoral care.

·         This year the focus is Pastoral Care.

·         What does our school actually do to support our school families?

http://www.ero.govt.nz/Review-Process/Frameworks-and-Evaluation-Indicators-for-ERO-Reviews/Wellbeing-Indicators-for-Schools

Visually our school looks more Catholic using images and pictures

·         Work in progress

Professional development in this area is looked into and encouraged through the appraisal process.

·         We need to develop systems and procedures to ensure that the 12 credits become the least amount of professional development achievements their teachers experience in a year.

·         There seems to be ever increasing pressure on our schools to up skill and seek higher qualifications for our teachers.

·         This is great however what is not discussed are issues like teacher release impacts on students, budgeting to allow this to happen and how our rural Catholic schools are supposed to meet these obligations.

·         No one disputes the need to encourage our teachers of the Catholic faith to up skill, what we need to be mindful of however is getting to the point when all teachers who apply for a job in a Catholic school have to have a Catholic Qualification.

Key competencies are developed through the school values.

·         Example of planning using KC

·         Staff meeting have been set up to make sure this is in the forefront of our teachers minds.

More student voice and action into all things Catholic at school

·         Will oversee the sharing shed idea set up by the pastoral care group. We have received the money for this so can go ahead with it.

All staff expected to attend 2 PD courses each year.

·         This opportunity is open to all staff including Support

Exchanges with other catholic schools for mass and sport exchange where our faith can be celebrated Catholic School’s Day

·         N/A

Teacher’s video practice and this is used to reflect upon. This will form part of teacher appraisal process.

·         Ongoing and as part of individual teachers evidence gathering

Managing and Learning

Design and implement a school wide curriculum that meets the needs of NZC and our school community.

·         The new St Dominic’s Curriculum has been introduced however we need to go back to this to ensure that this is leading the schools drive.

·         We have unpacked the Year 6 leaver and now will move into the Student achievement statement so that the teachers understand their roles in the new curriculum.

Build a professional learning community that focuses on student learning as their core purpose. Share good practice.

·         All staff are well aware that they are in the ‘drivers-seat’ regarding their own evidence gathering. They will have maintain a very robust and rigorous plan to ensure they are meeting the teacher council criteria.

·         I see Community of Schools being a leading factor in making this happen further.

Provide professional development opportunities to support student achievement through improved understandings in Curriculum, Pedagogy, Literacy, Numeracy, Assessment, National Standards and E- Learning.

·         Mutokaroa project

·         Whole school Mathematical focus

·         Catholic strand meetings

·         ALL

·         NZC support

·         Reciprocal teaching professional practice

·         Sharing practice within the staff

Grow Great leaders. Build leadership capability of principal and teachers who hold positions of responsibility and leadership and also Student leaders.

·         N/A

Provide a safe secure learning environment for our students.

·         Current areas of concern

ü  Junior playground. Have given this as the target for the bi-annual fair. PTA happy with this.

The Health and Safety Reform Bill will create the new Health and Safety at Work Act, replacing the Health and Safety in Employment Act 1992.

The Health and Safety Reform Bill is currently before Parliament. The select committee considering the Bill is due to report back by 30 March 2015 and then the Bill will continue its progression through the parliamentary process. It is likely that the Bill will come into force in the second half of 2015.

We have reviewed and changed our process around this at St Dominic’s.

Governing

Enrolment and Office procedures - monitor the enrolment procedures

·         This is working well and we are on track for 278 students by the end of the year.

Promote high levels of staff performance.

·         This has been set up and all teacher having to come up with 3 gaols based on IT, Teacher practice and Maths

·         This will then lead into formal observations and reflection through evidence gathering

·         All part of the teacher inquiry model and building teacher capability.

Continue to upgrade the school grounds, ensure the property is able to meet the needs of a 21st Century education, continue environmental education

Monitor school budget to ensure purchasing is strategic.

·         Business as usual

Ensure there is a planned cycle of review and self-review in the school.

·         New format rolled out that is simpler and easy to follow BoT  Self Review 2015.docx

·         Self-review on IT developments and its impact on students discussed on the night.

Staff feedback at BOT meetings leading the reports in their areas

·         Staff yet to be set up for this however they are very keen to get this off the ground.

Current school roll 228

Points to discuss

·         SNUP up date

·         IES update/Thoughts on BOT meeting.

Collective Statement as follows from the school one of which is St Dominics.

As a community of schools we are exploring the advantages of a collaborative model of community. This comprises of ten secondary and primary Catholic schools which our students transition through.

In particular we are focussing on

-Ways to enable Collaborative best practice and expertise in teaching and learning by sharing and supporting each other

-Pursuing an achievement focus that provides commonality for seamless transition

-A high trust model between schools within the community

The common link between us is we are Catholic and we see this as the most important aspect to a joint community.

This statement aligns broadly with the MOE current thinking. Resourcing is projected to follow these particular trends.

This model could include:

·         Shared achievement challenges

·         Monitoring progress on the shared achievement challenges

·         Structured support

·         A collective data bank for transition (eg special needs learners)

The Community of Schools are:

St Peter's College

St Paul's College

St Mary's College

Marcellin College

Marist College

St Dominics

Marist Mt Albert

Monte Cecilia

St Therese

Marist Herne Bay

Good Shepherd

St Joseph's Grey Lynn

Christ the King Owairaka

St Francis Pt Chev

Date of Acceptance 30 March 2015 4pm

We must restore hope to young people, help the old, be open to the future, spread love. Be poor among the poor. We need to include the excluded and preach peace.

Pope Francis