The document summarizes the agenda and key discussion points from a PTA meeting at Park School. The treasurer's report showed a balance of $16,797. The API scores for the school increased from 747 to 760, exceeding the state target. A presentation discussed research showing that character traits like persistence and self-control are better predictors of success than IQ. Safety procedures at the school were reviewed. Upcoming enrichment programs and volunteer opportunities were highlighted.

1. Welcome to Park School
PTA
November 27,2012

2. Tonight’s Agenda
• Treasurer’s Report Kevin Consani
• Update on API Bob Abaya
• Brief Report on How Children Succeed
Karen McCormick
– Park School Character traits of the Month
• Update on Safety at Park Bob Abaya
• Enrichment Program Spotlight
– Lego Engineering
• Volunteer Spotlight
– 4th //5th Science Fair Posters
• Update on Elections Teddy Singer

3. SAN MATEO PARK SCHOOL PTA TREASURER’S REPORT (October 1, 2012-November 21, 2012)
BALANCE ON HAND 10/1/2012 $7,981.01
INCOME
10/4/2012 DEP: Membership $540.00
10/31/2012 DEP: Interest $0.34
11/1/2012 DEP: Membership $45.00
11/1/2012 DEP: Fall 2012 Sport Camp $914.00
11/13/2012 DEP: Foundation Transfer $10,000.00
11/16/2012 DEP: Movie Night $200.00
11/16/2012 DEP: Fall 2012 Aviator Program $525.00
TOTAL $ 12,224.34
TOTAL INCOME $20,205.35
EXPENSES
CK 4824 Robin Parsons-Gee, Teacher Reimb $150.00
CK 4828 Colleen Forbs, PTA Child Care $40.00
CK 4830 SMFC PTA, PTA Dues, Insurance $612.00
CK 4816 Shauna Mullins, WAJ Expenses $870.95
CK 4822 Karen McCormick, Opening Day Coffee $67.41
CK 4827 Lindsay Taylor, Teacher Reimbursement $124.12
CK 4832 Attorney Gen, PTA Admin $25.00
CK 4833 Michael K White CPA, 2011 Taxes $350.00
CK 4831 Franchise Tax Board $10.00
Charge Back Insufficient Funds from deposited check $20.00
CK 4835 Alexandra Gillen, Back to School $22.44
CK 4836 Alexandra Gillen, Volunteer Appreciation $53.64
CK 4839 Mary Maso, Movie Night Concessions $71.64
CK 4834 Alexandra Gillen, PTA Meeting $10.37
CK 4840 Charles Neal, Fall Sports Camp $914.00
CK 4837 Margie Roeckel, Library Books $66.78
TOTAL $3,408.35
TOTAL EXPENSES $3,408.35
BALANCE ON HAND 11/21/2012 $16,797.00
Kevin Consani, Treasurer Date__11/21/2012____

4. Free Money
• Are you going to purchase anything from
Amazon this gift giving season? Go to our
website (www.smparkschool.org)
– 6% to Park School.
– You can double dip by using our gift cards (6%
+4%=10%)
• Do you shop at Safeway? Sign up for e-scrip
and contribute to our school for no extra cost.
– Just fill out a form from the office or go on-line at
www.Safeway.com
– Last year we earned over $1836 for this one simple
step!

5. API
• Park School’s API for 2011 for
747.
• State of California set the API
growth of +5 points, or 752.
• Park School actually gained
+13, an API of 760.
• 5th grade scored very low last
year, and actually pulled the
scores quite low.
• With the removal of last year’s
class, the API was 797, a
significant rise.
• Of course, that means that the
teachers must maintain the
high average of the current 5th
grade, while doing a good job
with the incoming second
grade.

6. Other Terms to Know
• API: The California Academic Performance
Index
– A number between 200 and 1000
– Each school receives an API for the year & a target
for the next year
• AYP: Adequate Yearly Progress
– A part of the Federal “No Child Left Behind Act” of
2001
– Focuses on specific subgroups of students
– Mandates that an increasing number of students in
each subgroup must score as ‘proficient’ or
‘advanced’ in reading & mathematics

7. Brief Report on How Children
Succeed by Paul Tough
• Relies on work performed by James Heckman,
a Nobel prize-winning economist at the
University of Chicago.
• Findings: IQ, as a driver of success,
is subordinate to:
– persistence,
– curiosity,
– conscientiousness,
– optimism, and
– self-control
• Economists call these non-cognitive skills. Psychologists call them
personality traits. Neuroscientists sometimes use the term executive
functions. The rest of us often sum them up with the word
character.

8. Where the Research Started..
• Heckman’s curiosity was piqued when he saw data that
GED graduates had the same future prospects as high
school dropouts
• His inclinations were confirmed when he dug into the
findings of the famous Perry Preschool Project. In the
early days of the federal War on Poverty in the 1960s:
– three- and four-year-olds from impoverished Ypsilanti, Michigan,
– Were provided enriched preschooling, and then
– compared their life trajectories over several decades with those
of Ypsilanti peers who had not received any early childhood
education.

9. Perry School Findings
(Heckman)
• The cognitive advantages of being in the Perry program faded after
a couple of years.
• Test scores between the two groups evened out, and the program
was considered something of a failure.
• But Heckman and others discovered that years later the Perry
preschoolers were living much better lives, including earning more
and staying out of trouble with the law.
• And because under the Perry program teachers systematically
reported on a range of students’ behavioral and social skills,
Heckman was able to learn that students’ success later in life was
predicted not by their IQs but by the noncognitive skills like curiosity
and self-control that the Perry program had imparted.

10. More from Paul Tough’s analysis
• Research demonstrates that resilience, optimism, perseverance, focus, and
the other noncognitive skills that Heckman and others have found to be so
important to success in school and beyond are malleable—they can be
taught, practiced, learned, and improved, even into adulthood.
• Martin Seligman, a University of Pennsylvania psychologist and author
of Learned Optimism, and Stanford psychologist Carol Dweck, research has
demonstrated that students taught to believe that people can grow
intellectually earn higher grades than those who sense that intelligence is
fixed.
– This commitment to the possibility of improvement, Seligman, Dweck, and others
contend, invests students with the ability to persevere, rebound from setbacks,
and overcome fears.
• Psychologist Angela Duckworth, a protégé of Seligman’s, has done a range
of studies—on college students with low SAT scores, West Point plebes,
and national spelling bee contestants, among others—and has found that
a determined response to setbacks, an ability to focus on a task, and
other non-cognitive character strengths are highly predictive of
success, much more so than IQ scores.

11. This is good news…and makes sense
• Tough suggests (in interviews) that we pay attention to these traits
and support their development by
– letting our children meet the challenge of homework, book reports, and
science projects, etc on their own, all the while supporting and
discussing their progress with them
– having them deal with upset & disappointment themselves
– “help(ing) young people improve their sense of self-efficacy – if we can
help them develop what the psychologist Carol Dweck calls a growth
mindset – they do better not just in the long run, but right away, in class.
Dweck’s data shows that students who believe that they can improve
their own abilities deal better with setbacks and apply themselves more
energetically to difficult tasks – all of which would be very useful to a
student about to tackle Homer or the Pythagorean Theorem.
– being in conversation, perhaps
• discussing the ‘Character Trait of the Month’ with your child (found in the
Park Press, on the school office window)
• asking our children’s teachers how they are implementing the ‘Character
Trait of the Month’

12. Park School Character Traits of
the Month 2012-2013
• September: Effort
• October: No Put Downs
• November: Cooperation
• December: Patience
• January: Perseverance (persistence)
• February: Pride
• March: Curiosity
• April: Self-discipline (self-control)
• May: Sense of Humor (optimism)
• June: Friendship

13. Update on Security at Park School
• Last meeting we discussed security at Park
• Since then, Superintendent Simms has issued a letter regarding updated
safety policies, and even gave each principal a checklist of security
measures to be implemented at each site, and required them all to be
part of principals’ individual goals for the year.
• Park has completed or are currently addressing each of the checklist
items, including a walk-through with the principal, lead of operations, and
head of facilities to review campus security.
• We have also acquired 2 videos and a CD from The Safe Side
– Stranger Safety
– Internet Safety
• These videos are available by filling out the simple form, and placing it in
my file folder in the office. First come first served. The videos have
Spanish translations.
• Video Clip

14. Park School Campus Security
TEACH YOUR
CHILDREN:
•Who a stranger is…may not always
be a person that looks strange.
•First/last name, address and phone
number.
•9-1-1
•To run away, scream, and find a
trusted adult if approached by a
stranger.
•Always walk or ride bikes (use
helmets always) with a friend or family
member, using safe routes, and
avoiding vacant buildings, alleys and
potentially dangerous places.

15. Spotlight on Enrichment-
LEGO® Pre-Engineering
First and Second Grades
Thursdays 3:00-4:30
January 17-March 21
• Let your imagination run wild with over 100,000
pieces of LEGO®!
• Build engineer-designed projects such as
boats, bridges, mazes and motorized cars, and
use special pieces to create your own unique
design.
• Explore the endless creative possibilities of the
LEGO® building system with the guidance of
an experienced Play-Well instructor.

16. Spotlight on Volunteering-
4th & 5th grade Science Fair
Posters
Objective: To support our children in completing their required posters
Your Engagement: 1 or 2 afternoons (Wednesday February X & X)
from 1-2:50
What We Do:
• Listen to their presentation. Ask thoughtful questions.
• Become familiar with the Scientific Process and required elements of the
poster
• Support (artistic materials, looking up spelling in dictionaries, etc) students
in the construction of their posters (gluing, etc)
We Do NOT:
• Critique their posters
• Rearrange their posters
• Do their posters

17. Update on CA Education
Budget
• Proposition 30 passed! Thanks for voting! $6 billion in
additional state revenues will occur this year, with continued
but less amounts through 2017 with smaller additional
amounts through 2019. $6 billion in education cuts in CA was
avoided.
• Stay informed! There are proposed cuts for federal education
spending, including Title I programs that help pay for tutors
and supplemental help in schools in high-poverty areas,
special ed programs covered under IDEA, funding that helps
English Language Learners, or Head Start.
• Budget Development Assumptions Fiscal Year 2012-2013 is
posted on district’s website. On December 15, 2012 the first
interim report is due.

18. Dates to Know!
• Through December 2nd: Scholastic Book Fair!
– Books are great gifts for Family, Friends, and Classrooms!
• Sunday, December 2nd: 1-4pm
Holiday Craft fair
– Children can visit each booth to make holiday crafts
– $5 donation
• December 3rd, 4pm: SMFC District Study Session
– Open to public
– Questions/statements from the public only at the end of the
session

19. Next PTA meeting is January 15th
‘Coffee with Bob’
Goodnight & Drive Safely!