Job Descriptions Chairperson  |  Catering  Coordinator  |  Enrichment  Coordinator Fundraising Coordinator  |  Parent Education Coordinator Volunteer Coordinator   |  Room Representative Chairperson The Community Council at PCCS is close to the equivalent of the traditional PTA; however, the community council (CC) is not made up of elected positions. The community council is made up of all parents in the school and is reliant on people stepping up to fill the necessary positions. As community council chairperson, you will be the central coordinator for all that is the community council. Your attitude sets the tone for all volunteering which is vital for PCCS to operate at its best. This is a rewarding position that gets you in touch with all of the families and staff throughout the year and really helps you understand just how PCCS operates. This position is a year long commitment; however, it would be best if this position were held for two years. This would allow the new person to become familiar with all that is required during your second year and they would act as a co-chair during that year. At the beginning of the year you are responsible for: Organizing coffee and rolls for the first day of school. Set dates with the Director for the Community Council calendar. Collect and organize volunteer survey information and distribute relevant information to coordinators or teachers. Match-up catering events and class rooms with catering coordinator and volunteer coordinator. Be available for Curriculum night to recruit room reps and answer questions about community council. (Send out a letter prior to curriculum night telling parents of what positions you need to fill so they can come to curriculum night ready to commit. You must explain that these positions are not optional—they must be filled otherwise an unfair burden is placed on a few.) Enlist enrichment class coordinator. This person will coordinate volunteers to teach enrichment classes for a month in winter. Write up class descriptions and organize volunteers to assist if needed. Hopefully there will be a list from the volunteer survey to give to this coordinator of interested volunteers. Enlist parent education coordinator. This person will need to organize a speaker on a  relevant parent education topic to be at an evening event during the year (this has traditionally being the  spring membership meeting) and any other parent related educational workshops. Throughout the year you are responsible for: Writing up a monthly CC newsletter about upcoming CC events, thanking relevant classes for catering and any other notices. Check with coordinators for necessary thank you notices and announcements to be included in the newsletter. File newsletters in CC folder. Organize and conduct CC meetings. There should be at least three a year. Check with the Director for any specific topics to be addressed at the meeting. Write up notes on the meeting and file in CC folder. Check with coordinators throughout the year how they are managing their responsibilities. The CC calendar will determine what event you need to attend to next. Check in with coordinators two weeks prior to event so they will have time to arrange and prompt. This may not even need to be done. At the end of the year or before the start of the new school year: Update parent volunteer survey form to be sent out in fall package. With the director, select people for volunteer, fundraising and catering coordinator positions and replacement CC chair. Write welcome and description of the role of CC for the new school year (can be included in fall pack) Catering Coordinator The responsibilities of the catering coordinator require attention throughout the year. Your responsibilities will be: Work with the CC chair and volunteer coordinator to set the calendar of catering events. You will prompt the relevant room reps of the upcoming event their class is responsible for (if they have not called you) and tell them where to find paper supplies and coffee and tea making supplies.  It would be a good idea to meet with room reps at the beginning of the year to go over their particular catering obligations and answer questions. You will check basic supplies such as coffee, sugar, paper-ware, flat-ware etc and buy from Sam’s club or other wholesale outlet when needed. The receipts can be turned into the office for reimbursement or taken as a tax deduction. If you wish to make a donation, contact office staff for a form letter to be used in your income tax files. You will become familiar with coffee making and kitchen equipment used for catering. An eye for themed decoration is an advantage—it doesn’t have to be elaborate but it is always appreciated. You will order necessary foods for whole school events and arrange for pick-up. These are typically from local Northfield businesses such as Quality Bakery, Brick Oven etc. Communication is probably what will take most of your time in this position. If you can communicate with the various room reps via email throughout the year you will save yourself a lot of time in chasing up phone calls and you will always have a written account of who is doing what. Notify CC chair of any thank you notices or upcoming announcements to be included in the monthly CC newsletter. Prairie creek has a tradition of catering events that make up our community council calendar. Each event has instructions for set-up, types of food necessary etc. so there is no need to re-invent the wheel unless of course you want to. Most of the events are shared amongst the six classrooms. These events are the core of community activity for our school and are always a wonderful opportunity to catch up with other families. The following events are to be divided amongst the six classrooms: Curriculum Night Fall Conference catering Pumpkin Carving Night Winter concert (set-up and pack-up instruments) Winter conference catering Parent Education Night Spring conference catering Honoring Night Graduation The following events are whole-school events and therefore call on volunteers to serve and / or donate food from all parents. Notice of these events is put into the school newsletter and the CC monthly newsletter. Organization for these events will be shared with CC chair, volunteer coordinator and yourself. Artist in Residency event Arts Festival and Grandparents day (community council supplies) May Day (salad, veggie and fruit pot-luck picnic) Enrichment Coordinator Enrichment classes are held every year at the school as an additional experience for the children.  They are often taught by parents, family members, community members, or others who have an expertise in a certain area, or an interest in teaching a small group of children a specific topic.  Classes in past years include, grossology, horsemanship, goat cheese making, multicultural printmaking, ukrainian egg decorating, Chinese, kitchen chemistry, origami, etc. As the coordinator you will find 10-12 adults to a lead a multi-age class for the first three Monday's of March.  You will also collect a brief description of each class from the adult leaders and assign them to the proper space in the school depending on the nature of his/her class.  A week before classes begin you will distrubute the enrichment class schedule to the teachers to sign up children. Fundraising Coordinator Community Council has a few fundraisers during the year which are as much about community building as they are money-makers. The main fundraisers we would like to concentrate on are: 1. T-shirt production and sales 2. Mothers Day plant sale 3. Scholastic book orders The auction and the Giving Fund (the other main fundraising events for PCCS) are handled separately by other committees. We will not be doing gift or cookie dough catalogs this year as we feel we are better off concentrating on a few great events rather than cluttering the year with many little events. The events we will focus on are well established. The responsibilities of the fundraising coordinator require attention throughout the year. Your responsibilities will be: Make up teams to run fundraising events. Contact Mark and Shana Leipnitz to see if they want to supply plants for the plant sale. Contact Northfield city council to book Bridge Square for plant sale at beginning of year. Put add in Northfield news for plant sale. Set-up person doing Scholastic book orders with relevant account information and scholastic contact details (Check with Elisabeth Hurlbert who beautifully ran scholastic orders last year). Help get art work of children together for T-shirt. Take art work to printer Put out order form for T-shirts and distribute orders. Write up spreadsheet of all money received from these events or get copy from Ona to put into CC file. Notify CC chair of any thank you notices or upcoming announcements to be included in th monthly CC newsletter. Parent Education Coordinator The emphasis on parent education at Prairie Creek varies from year to year.  It may be helpful to discuss possible parent education topics at the Community Council meeting in the fall, and then survey parents about their priorities before making decisions about what will be offered during the year.  At a minimum, the Parent Education Chair is responsible for: Spring Membership Meeting.  This meeting is held in March or April on the date of the regular Community Council meeting.  All parents are urged to attend.  They typical format for the evening is to find an educational topic of interest to parents, and hold it from 7-9 pm, with a break in the middle for visiting. In the Spring of 1998, two classes were offered for the fourth and fifth graders, one for boys and one for girls, called "Talking Together About Growing Up."  Community Council recommends these classes be offered yearly, and that the Parent Education Chair is responsible for: Talking Together About Growing Up.  Two separate classes offered in the spring, one for fourth and fifths grade girls and their parents, and one for fourth and fifth grade boys and their parents.  The class addresses physical and emotional changes that occur during puberty, and include general information about sexuality.  Children, parents, (and teachers) participate, which is intended to create a strong emphasis on support and building respectful relationships.  Each class is offered for three consecutive weeks (either after school or in the early evening) for 1 1/2 hours each time.  Joan Janusz, who works for the Rice County Public Health Department, currently offers these classes.  Her work number is (507) 645-9567.  a class of 6 to 10 families works well. Though the possibilities are numerous, the following are options which have been requested, considered or offered in the past few years: Building respectful gender relationships Talking with children about sexuality (offered to parents who have younger children) Community building, how to make parents feel welcome and valued at PCCS Support for Growing Parents, a guidance class by John Halpburn and Jeff Fink Children as Life-Long Learners Volunteer Coordinator The responsibilities of the volunteer coordinator require attention throughout the year. Your responsibilities are: Be the main contact person for the room representatives (rep). It would be preferable if you are a room rep yourself. Help with orientation of room reps and organize a meeting with room reps and staff at the beginning of the school year to maximize service to teachers and children. Coordinate volunteers for whole school volunteer events such as vision & hearing screening and photo day. Work with the catering coordinator and CC chair to allocate catering events to classes at beginning of the year. Notify CC chair of any thank you notices or upcoming announcements to be included in the monthly CC newsletter. Room Representative Two people representing parents of a class room The room reps will be the contact point for the teacher if help is needed in the classroom, for field trips or special occasions. As a room rep you will delegate tasks for catered events (only 1 or 2 per year per class) and organize volunteers for before/during and after the event. You will also help gather volunteers from your class for all-school events such as Grandparents Day or May Day. Put together an email list (if one does not exist) for your class to help with getting information out to the families in your class. Each room rep is given a three ring binders with complete information of what a room rep can do and the catering needs for the year as well as volunteer information of the families in your class.