Stoke Gabriel Pre-School Committee Meeting

8^th June 2005

Present: Helen Tattersall, Alex Dunn, Sue Stacey, Laura Kies, Luke Peakman

Apologies: Thomas Goodall, Sam Marney, Vicky Porter

Chairs Report: see attached

Toilets:

The full history of this refurbishment of the Old School Rooms project has been reviewed and was summarised for the committee. This has allowed us to better make decisions regarding this work. OFSTED are now being consulted and brought up to speed with the progress so far and we are aware that they are not happy with the amount of time we are taking. We considered the future of the project in the context of the exact requirements of OFSTED and discussed these three ideas:

Ø Proceed with the project as it now stands (completely new toilet area and kitchen): agree plans with The PCC, The Parish Council, South Hams District Council, then find and agree a builder and final price and fixtures and fittings for the refurbishment, fundraise the substantial funds required and carry out the work.

Ø Amend the plans to simply add one toilet next to the current toilet in the boiler room.

Ø Ask OFSTED if it will satisfy the legal requirements (two toilets/20 children with a separate toilet for the adults) by the staff simply using the toilet at the Church House Inn. The Landlady, Mel, has already agreed to this.

We felt that at this late stage in the proceedings, bearing in mind we already have £1000, it would be best if we could go with the second option. This is subject to OFSTED agreeing that this is OK, The PCC agreeing this new plan of action and that we are not bound by any building regulations to make a disabled toilet.

Helen is going to contact OFSTED in order to discover if they are happy for us to do this. I will approach Phil Yunnie, a local architect who has offered advice to us about the feasibility of this plan and any building regulations we need to be aware of and then we will go back to The PCC with the new plan.

Recruitment

Sue Price has decided not to take up the position of Pre-School Assistant which leaves us in need of someone to fill this role on Mondays and Thursdays. We will advertise around the village for this position hoping that someone local will apply. We have some breathing room because Claire has very kindly said that until the end of term she will be able to cover these sessions.

Constitution

We need to get a copy of our adopted pre-school constitution as this is missing from our records. We then need to ensure that all the committee members read this and sign it. Any changes to the constitution must be discussed in time for the next AGM.

Direct Management

Recently The Pre-School Learning Alliance (PLA) (an advisory body to which our pre-school is a member) has completed a trial where they took on the management of independent pre-schools like ours. The arrangement worked by the PLA taking care of many of the legal and employment aspects of running a pre-school leaving the committee to deal with the other day-to-day running issues and focussing on arranging events and fundraising. The trial was deemed a success by the PLA and now other pre-schools are able to apply for this sort of thing. The committee feels that at this time it would be a good idea for our pre-school to register our interest in this idea as something that would be extremely valuable to us and help to secure the successful continuation of the pre-school long after our children, and the current committee have moved on.

Parent Info Pack

It was felt that parents should be given something more substantial and informative upon joining the pre-school and so a new parent information pack is being drafted.

It was also felt that the prospectus may need slight amendment to contain less detail. We would like to distribute it to local estate agents in order to better inform people buying houses in Stoke Gabriel about our pre-school.

Parent Questionnaire

The committee decided that it would be helpful for us and the staff, parents and children if we got a bit of feedback. So we will shortly send out a questionnaire asking for your views about the pre-school and thoughts and ideas about the way things are running. Please find some time to fill out this questionnaire and pass it back to the staff.

Late Policy

The committee would like to take this opportunity to remind ALL parents of our pre-school opening hours:

Mondays and Wednesdays – 09:00 – 15:00

Thursdays – 09:00 – 12:00

Fridays – 09:00 – 13:00

Please could everyone be prompt in dropping their children off at the start time and picking them up at the finishing time.

The staff are only paid for a quarter of an hour after finishing time and in this time they must clean the pre-school and tidy away.

Please have some respect for the staff and stick closely to these times.

Thank you.

Equipment

Sarah has £500 to spend on new soft play equipment and toys for the pre-school. This should be a wonderful new treat for all the children (and staff) and well done to us all for running and supporting the fundraisers.

Fundraising

There is a coffee morning on 25^th June 2005 at the village hall. Letters have been sent out so please be supportive.

The Auction of Promises has been put off for now due to the coffee morning but will hopefully take place in the autumn.

Vicky is thinking of doing a fundraising card-making session and Alex is thinking of doing an Alternative Therapy morning.

Carnival

The carnival procession is confirmed as the theme of Peter Pan. Sam, Alex and Vicky are coordinating the procession and the carnival sub-committee are arranging the pet show and fancy dress that takes place during carnival week.

AOB

CRB checks are being done for all the committee members.

Sue is chasing up the smoke alarms that need to be put up in the school rooms.

Sue is also chasing up getting the grass cut in the orchard and the park.

The next committee meeting is scheduled for Wednesday 14^th September at 7.45pm at the V & A.

CHAIRS REPORT - 8 JUNE 2005

Staffing

Rachael has now left, thanks to parents who contributed to her collection. Kate arranged some Mothercare vouchers for her and I bought her some flowers. It is unlikely that she will return after her maternity leave, but we have to keep her job open just in case.

Claire has joined the staff this week and will be working full time from next week for the rest of this term as Sue Price changed her mind an took a job else-where. We will need to recruit another person to job share with Claire from September.

Children

A few new children have joined us this term. We welcome Alphie, Aaron, Freya and Emily. Numbers are remaining high, we are full on a Monday morning, Wednesday morning and Thursday morning. We are going to be printing and distributing a number of prospectus’ to promote the pre-school.

Committee

We are sorry to see Claire, Julie and David leave the committee, but welcome our new members – Laura, Sam, Alex, Bryony and Vicky (still to be officially voted on).

Laura and I have had our first meetings together and will share with you tonight some developments we are progressing. We are talking separately to Sarah and the team about other improvements we would like to see implented, i.e, staff induction programmes, space/storage, nutrition, staff files, team meetings and staff appraisals.

Meeting dates have been set through to next year as follows:

Committee Meetings, 7.45 V&A: Weds 8^th June 2005

Weds 14^th September 2005

Weds 18^th January 2006

AGM, 7.45 V&A: Weds 12th April 2006

Open Meetings, 12:00 Old Schoolrooms Thursday 10^th November 2005

Thursday 13^th April 2006

Fundraising activities

We decided not to go ahead with the Easter event due to lack of time and resource, but have outlined a plan for the event which can hopefully be taken forward for next year. At the last FOSS meeting, it was decided that they would not take part in the Christmas Bazaar this year, so this event is now available to pre-school to run as it wishes.