Minutes, 12/05/16 Steering Committee Meeting

Present:

Rob Greene, Angela Bartlett, James Gaj, Nicole Treadway, Suzanne Winters, Sharon Flesher-Duffy, Alan Tefft

Notes by: A. Tefft

Agenda items are included below, along with notes after each item.  

1. Adds to the binder:

Lists of committee assignments were distributed.

2. Note Taking and Blog Posting

It was noted that good professional practice would ensure that details about specific personnel would be avoided in minutes, blog posts etc.  

3. Standards Committee Changes

It was noted that no NTC staff were on the assessment committee, and there could be a lot of unique assessment practices across NTC.  Two members were re-assigned from other groups, and this led to additional changes.  Suzanne recorded all of the changes on paper, and agreed to send the updated lists to Rob for distribution.  It was noted that the variety of responses across the faculty were quite interesting regarding interests, preferences, etc.  

4. Plan for Dec. 14, Faculty meeting

A. After early release, floor is ours

B. We need places to assemble the committees

C. Materials: (principal’s office is making handouts), big paper, markers, chocolate?

D. Liaison tasks with Committee Chairs

1. Firm up chairs; get co-chair if there is not one.
2. Go over standards’ expectations
3. Divide committee into working groups along the expectations
4. Work groups review the tasks and come up with an action plan.
5. Do we expect the subgroups to meet and have something done by the January early release?
6. What else?

• In advance of the 12/14 faculty meeting, we (committee liaisons) will reach out to our committee chairs (pref. this week) to identify co-chairs, break the group into work groups, and develop plans for the 12/14 meeting.  
• We are coaches and facilitators in these teams, not leaders/ workers.  
• Each working group will be asked to identify/ develop an organizational structure for their information gathering, prior to the January Early Release.  
• Angela is reserving rooms for those committee meetings; many are choosing to use computer labs, but it is up to the committee liaisons.  
• Some staff may feel like we are having a lot of meetings.  We believe that there is a contractual/ administrative exception for accreditation years, in which staff can be required to attend more meetings.  We will check on that.  
• The need to meet and make plans during this week’s early release was discussed; Rob to check with Keith on that.  

V. Google Docs and Virtual Working

• Rob plans to set up Google folders for each committee, and subfolders for working groups.  Many staff did not supply a Gmail address on the survey.  Some staff do not know how to use their @nsd42.net Google accounts.  We decided to use those accounts exclusively for document sharing, and we will train staff on use and access during the first committee meeting.  
• Angela? to contact IT for a list of all @nsd42.net accounts for staff, so that a list of emails for each committee can be developed.  

VI. Chair expectations

It was decided that Steering Committee liaisons would record/ publish minutes/ notes/ action items from their committee meetings.  

Contact your committee chair(s) in the next few days!

VII. Other Biz

The popcorn supplied by Suzanne was quite tasty and served as an excellent icebreaker.  Thanks from all of us!