May Board Meeting Notes

Post date: May 21, 2015 8:17:31 PM

It's the last day of school in one of my districts, and the second-to-last day in another. Let me tell you, there's not a lot of academic instruction happening today. I've wrapped up the bulk of what I needed to accomplish prior to leaving for the summer. As such, I'm taking a little time out of my day to type up my notes from the May 15th Executive Board meeting.

The Board met following the presentation by Dr. Feifer about the neuropsychology of reading. If you weren't able to attend, you missed a good day of learning! From my quick count, I saw six school psychologists from our region who attended.

• • Review of Conference

    • Board discussed that extending the deadline for conference registration was a smart idea. We had enough late registrations to effectively break even this year. It was not the turnout that we had hoped to see, but at least we aren't going to be losing money. The information presented will benefit students in Kansas, regardless of the cost.

    • Discussed that moving the event to an earlier date next year would be helpful. Board members expressed that other school psychologists could not attend because it is a busy time of year with many graduations, end-of-year deadlines, etc. Next year the the spring conference will be held May 6th (so mark that in your calendars!)

    • See section below from the Executive Director.

  • President (Ashley)

    • Fall 2015 Conference will be October 8th and 9th.

    • Steven Brock and Melissa Reeves will be the key speakers.

    • Breakout sessions are still under development.

      • One session will be on assessment of ESOL students, and another breakout session about social/emotional learning.

      • A third breakout session is still to be determined. (If you know of a topic or presenter, let the board know!)

    • Fall 2016 Conference

      • Primary speaker will be Sam Ortiz.

      • Looking for secondary speaker.

  • Communications Director (Brandi)

    • Presented board members with a sample of sticky notes with the KASP logo on them. These will be purchased for use in goody bags for future attendees, or other related uses. It's a simply product, but what school psychologist doesn't like sticky notes?!

    • So far, we have no zero submissions for the Edna Harrison award, or the other awards presented as the KASP conference. Despite sending an announcement on the ECSET email distribution list, still no responses.

      • Discussed possibly putting the award form online, as a fillable form. By making the nomination process simpler, it may encourage more people to complete the nomination form. No final decision was made.

  • Executive Director (Keely)

    • The tentative totals from the current conference (Dr. Feifer/May 15, 2015) indicate that we will have collected about $2400 from current KASP members, and about $950 from nonmembers. This brings the gross income from the conference to about $3350.

    • We currently have 88 KASP members in the state of Kansas.

  • Regional Directors

    • Western Region (Dave)

      • Not present. Kyle reported on Dave's behalf.

      • 29 attendees at the regional meeting.

    • Northeast Region (Lisa)

      • Current regional director resigned. The President will offer the position to the individual who ran against Lisa during elections.

      • Read a resignation letter from Lisa. She appreciates the time she has spent on the board. Lisa did attend the conference, but did not stay for the board meeting.

    • Southeast (Jason)

      • Nothing to report. See old business below.

    • Central (Judy)

      • Not present. No report provided.

  • Governmental Relations (Jenny)

    • Nothing new to report. She has had no contact with NASP, and would like to have some. Requested that the board provide her with assistance on getting information from NASP. Board members discussed suggestions for how to complete those connections.

  • NASP Delegate (Charlie)

    • This will be her last board meeting. Sad face.

    • She introduced Coleen Riley, who will be attending future KASP board meetings in order to represent KSDE. Coleen also indicated she was happy to be invited to attend and looks forward to working with KASP in the future.

    • Reminded the board members about NASP Summer Conferences. They are geared toward practitioners in the field who need help with school psychology. Other NASP conferences have information for people other than practitioners (grad students, behavior analysts, etc.) The summer conferences are designated to help school psychologists improve their practice.

  • SPAN (Susan)

    • Continued the discussion Jenny started. No news to report. Looking for more help from NASP.

  • Webmaster (Jim)

    • Reminded regional directors that if CPDs will be offered for attending regional meetings to make sure procedures are followed. Certain things must be present in order to offer CPDs.

    • Discussed the possibility of not being so involved with the website as he transitions to his new role as the NASP Delegate. He would like to see the other officers begin to update the website.

    • Discussed options for creating other administrator roles with the website hosting company. This would allow other individuals to have administrator privileges and add/modify content without him being involved.

  • Conference Chair (Judy)

    • Fall 2015 Conference

      • Melissa Reeves will speak on Thursday, all day.

      • Breakouts will happen Friday morning. Still seeking a third breakout option (maybe autism or Down Syndrome information?)

      • Steven Brock will close the conference on Friday afternoon.

    • Fall 2016 Conference

      • Dates are October 13th and 14th.

  • University Training Representative

    • Her first meeting; she's excited to be a part of it.

    • Introduced the student representative who was joining the meeting via Skype.

    • Both the trainer and representative asked for clarification of their role within the board. Neither of them had input for the board at this time.

  • Old Business

    • Continued the discussion about changing the regional boundaries.

      • President reminded the board that Jason had previously suggested redrawing the regional boundaries. Board discussed options and decided to table the idea until all regional directors could participate in the discussion.)

      • Jason indicated that he had been asked if members should register by where they work or where they live. The consensus is that members would be given the choice how to register.

      • No decisions were made.

  • New Business

    • Ashley presented that she has digitized the Strategic Plan. They plan had previously been handwritten on large sheets of paper. This will allow the plan to be shared easier with stakeholders.

    • Asked the board to create a Vision Statement for KASP. We currently don't have one. Ashley explained the reason for the statement, and offered examples. Board discussed and agreed to accept "Empowering children and youth for success through their lifelong journey."

    • Ashely would like to assign specific responsibilities/persons to complete certain aspects of the Strategic Plan. No assignments were made today. These people would also be responsible for updating the timelines on the current plan.

    • Ashley introduced the idea of using Google Nonprofit as a method for storing KASP documents and for our general use as an organization. This idea was quickly dismissed because KASP is not a nonprofit organization. We may still utilize Google Drive (or other file-sharing service) to host our files.

    • Next board meeting date will be August 8th, 2015 in Salina.