Monday, May 20, 2013

May 23rd AGM Agenda and other updates

A few reminders and a couple of information items:

  • May 23rd- 7pm - NVPAC  Annual General Meeting 
  • May 21st -May 31st - NorthVanPAC Parent Survey
  • May 23rd - RSVP deadline for Technology EdCamp
  • May 23rd - RSVP deadline for PAC 101
  • BCAA School Safety Program
North Van PAC Annual General Meeting - May 23rd. 

Meeting
Event: North Van PAC Annual General Meeting
Time: May 23rd, 7 pm
Location: Mountainview room - 5th floor - 2121 Lonsdale Ave

April general meeting minutes: https://docs.google.com/a/northvanpac.org/document/d/1LF2Rqxw_Nnd-kbQjPStHJY6mT4Z825U79AthxDDkUpY/edit

2012 Annual General Meeting minutes: https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B73w-jxd1FVXWG5STEE5ZTc3dEE/edit?usp=sharing

Annual General Meeting Agenda
7:00 Approve 2012 Minutes
7:10 Chairs Report
7:20 Treasurers Report
7:30 Elections

General Meeting Agenda
7:40 Approval of April Minutes
7:50 Pac 101
8:00 EdCamp
8:10 BCCPAC Report
8:20 Parent Survey
8:30 School Calendar Changes
8:40 PAC Reports
9:00 Adjourn

Elections

We will be electing for all executive positions and would like representatives from all our PACs to attend to ensure we have quorum for the meeting. Nominations from the floor will be accepted at the meeting.

Positions available include:
• Chair - Primary liaison with District, chairs executive and general meetings
• Vice-Chair - Assists Chair
• Treasurer - Manages DPAC Finances
• Secretary - Records meeting minutes
• Registrar - Maintains PAC member lists
• Program Coordinator - Organizes meetings and events
• BCCPAC Liaison - Communicates with BCCPAC
• Communications - Manages website and email lists
• Members-at-Large (multiple) - Represent NorthVanPAC on various committees



May 21st-May31st North Van PAC Parent Survey

We expect our survey to gather parent feedback on North Vancouver Schools will be sent out to all parents via email using school connects on May 21st. The survey will be open till the end of May (10 days) and we are hoping to get good representation from all schools. Although being sent out via school connects this is a North Van PAC initiative. Please encourage parents in your schools to complete the survey as it is their opportunity to help us to provide feedback to the District.


If you or parents at your school have questions about the survey please send them to info@northvanpac.org



NVPAC EdCamp - PACs please RSVP with your attendees by May 23rd
EdCamp for Parents
June 4th, 6-7:30pm
Location: Education Service Centre, 5th Floor. 2121 Lonsdale Ave

We only have 60 spaces for the event and are inviting each PAC to send 2 representatives from their school to this initial session. If each PAC could please send your list of representatives and their contact info to us at rsvp@northvanpac.org by May 23rd. Please include the name of your school, 2 representatives and 1 alternate. If space is available we will invite alternates to attend.

Teachers will discuss and demonstrate what they do with technology to support education in the classroom. There will be 6 stations showing technology use at different elementary and secondary grade levels.

Potential items include such things as:
• Blogging in the classroom
• Collaboration using Google Docs
• Teaching programming
• Creative Apps (labelling, mind mapping, whiteboarding)

There is limited enrolment for this event but if successful we will try to do more next year.


PAC 101 Discussion - PACs please RSVP by May 23rd
June 6th, 7pm-9pm
Education Service Centre - 2121 Lonsdale Ave

As discussed at the last general meeting we would like to invite all PAC chairs and treasurers to a PAC 101 session to share best practices.

The format for the meeting will be discussion tables of 6 to discuss a variety of common challenges PACs face: roles&responsibilities, recruitment, running meetings, preparing over the summer, budgeting etc.

BCCPAC also have great info on this topic http://bccpac.bc.ca/pac-101

If you would like to attend this event please rsvp to treasurer@northvanpac.org with the names and contact info of your attendees.



BCAA Road Safety for Schools

My name is Mark Donnelly and I'm the President and COO of BCAA's Road Safety Foundation. I'm very excited to be writing you today to let you know that we're expanding our School Safety Patrol program for elementary schools in B.C.

I'm pleased to say, starting this year, we're offering the program to schools for free.

Children are at the greatest risk for pedestrian-related injuries or fatalities, especially in and near school zones. We, at BCAA and its Road Safety Foundation (RSF), want to help make our roads safer for children.

Endorsed nationally by the Canadian Automobile Association, the School Safety Patrol Program offers safety patrol equipment, training materials and resources to help schools get the program up and running — free of charge.

Please help us keep children safe on our roads by talking to your school principal about bringing the School Safety Patrol Program to your child’s school for this upcoming September. Schools can register now.

For information about the School Safety Patrol Program, visit our website at bcaaroadsafety.com, email us at roadsafety@bcaa.com, or call toll free 1-877-247-5551. 

Wednesday, May 15, 2013

PACs and Teacher Collaboration times.

A number of PACs have asked about arrangements to accommodate students whose families are unable to arrange supervision during the 7 elementary teacher collaboration times being introduced to the school calendar next year.

These late starts and early arrivals create difficulties for many families who need to make alternative arrangements for student supervision when the school is closed during those hours and the teachers are occupied working to coordinate teaching activities within the school.

The District has recommended to Principals that they work with the PACs to seek ways to accommodate the students and we recommend PACs seek ways to work with your Principals to help.

Our first recommendation is for PACs to assess actual the need in their schools. We suggest PACs survey your school community to determine how many parents and students expect to have difficulty with the collaboration times. This will help gauge the need and help to open up an appropriate discussion around how to support these children.




Sunday, May 5, 2013

Changes to North Van PAC meetings next school year

North Van PAC general meetings will move to the 3rd Monday of the month as of Oct 2013

A couple of weeks ago we asked about changing the North Van PAC meetings to another night next year in order to accommodate commercial bookings at the ESC.

Based on the feedback we received we all have quite a mix of schedules.

We have PACs with Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday night meetings. The 1st and 2nd Monday are taken as are the 1st and 2nd Wednesday. Overall it appears that the either the 3rd or 4th Monday of the month would be the least problematic and fit best into most PACs schedules.

For this reason I am recommending that we change our NorthVanPAC meetings to the 3rd Monday of the month starting in October 2013 with the 4th as a backup if the 3rd Monday is a holiday. We will work with the school district to confirm the change.

Hopefully this doesn't create too big a problem for those PACs we haven't from.

Thanks to everyone for providing your feedback.

North Van PAC Annual General Meeting - May 23rd.

The North Van PAC Annual General Meeting is May 23rd. 

Meeting

Event: North Van PAC Annual General Meeting
Time: May 23rd, 7 pm
Location: Mountainview room - 5th floor - 2121 Lonsdale Ave

Agenda

7:00 Chairs Report
7:10 Treasurers Report
7:20 Elections
7:40 Pac 101
7:50 EdCamp
8:00 BCCPAC Report
8:10 Parent Survey
8:20 PAC Reports
9:00 Adjourn

Elections

We will be electing for all executive positions and would like representatives from all our PACs to attend to ensure we have quorum for the meeting.

Positions available include:
  • Chair - Primary liaison with District, chairs executive and general meetings
  • Vice-Chair - Assists Chair
  • Treasurer - Manages DPAC Finances
  • Secretary - Records meeting minutes
  • Registrar - Maintains PAC member lists
  • Program Coordinator - Organizes meetings and events
  • BCCPAC Liaison - Communicates with BCCPAC
  • Communications - Manages website and email lists
  • Members-at-Large (multiple) - Represent NorthVanPAC on various committees

North Van PAC is your District PAC. We represent parents at the School District level and we need volunteers to come out to the AGM and join the executive to help maintain the strong parent voice in our school district.
  • Our volunteers get involved in how education is delivered in North Vancouver by providing the parent perspective to the school board on school programs and curriculum, the school calendar, student assessment, new projects (for example, renovating/rebuilding schools), and other funding/spending issues.
  • We help school PACs share issues and best practices.
  • We help parents support their children's education by arranging speakers and workshops. For example Steve Dotto spoke to more than 700 of you in March about social media and parenting. 
We need executive and members-at-large. There is a lot of opportunity to get involved. We have small roles, such as representing parents on various committees and larger roles on our executive for those who want more involvement. We need volunteers to represent parents on committees related to :
  • School program and capital funding, 
  • Education policies
  • Anti-bullying, special needs and other support programs 
  • Potential and current school programs
  • Changes to curriculum and graduation requirements
  • Parent communication and parent education
  • and many other parts of education. 

If you are interested in having a voice at the School District level we'd be glad to talk with you, to discuss the commitment we need, to see what interests you delete have have and invite you to see what we do.

Join us at our Annual General Meeting: May 23rd, 7 pm. Mountainview room - 5th floor - 2121 Lonsdale Ave

If you'd like to see more of what we have done talk to your school PAC about us or visit blog.northvanpac.org

If you'd like to talk with us and find out more about what we do and how you can get involved please send an email to chair@northvanpac.org