Draft Minutes from NEF meeting 10/20/14
Attendees:
Gina Anderson, Jill Barnhardt, Marile Bordon, Joy Cayer, Emily Collins, Kirsten
Forbush, Karena Hansen, Meredith Kent, Karla Miller, Liz Nolan, Sue Ogar, Janet
Robbins, Jennifer Shields, Amy Staunton
Agenda:





Voting in New Officer: Gina Anderson, Clerk - all in favor
Questions about roles/responsibilities - Karena (LSS rep) - talked to teachers
about when to meet with them about NEF - they said not until after the new year
which is fine since the grant cycle starts in the Spring.
New Bylaws:
o Article I, Section 2 - Purposes - after "developing the resources of
the....."add "Northborough Education community including but not limited
to"
o Article III, Officers - Secretary vs. Clerk - easier to change Clerk to
Secretary in bylaws than change Secretary to Clerk on website and other
materials, add the Communications Chair
o Article IV, Board of Directors, Section 2 - Terms of Office - because most
of the board is new this year, consider changing the terms of office so not
everyone is turning over at the same time. Decision was to review other
options because the feeling was that it was helpful to have limits but it
would be nice to have some flexibility.
o Article V, Corporation Meetings and Calendar, Section 3 - Fiscal Year:
Change bylaws to 6/30
Financial Update (Amy Staunton)
o Approximately $8800 in checking account and $25,800 in Money Market
Account. MM account is traditionally not touched and all expenses are
paid from the checking account.
o $8100 in grants last year
o Some of the fundraisers will require some money which we don't have yet.
We can dip into the MM account to fund some of the fundraisers.
o The purpose of the Money Market Account is sort of a back up account for
years when there isn't enough raised to give out grants like when the NEF
wasn't active. There hasn't been a process for spending this money
o Amy needs to see receipts for any expenses for people to get
reimbursement.
o Amy is going to put together a discretionary budget with money from the
Money Market Account to use for the fundraisers
Committee updates
Events Committee (Joy Cayer)
o Event Committee met and discussed the following:
o Quiz Night - consider changing the name to something like Team Trivia
so that people don't think they are taking a test & to make it more fun
o They are considering a different location - Indian Meadows in particular
because their function rate is better, it's bigger and we are able to bring in
food.
o Targeting the end of March/beginning of April, possibly 3/27/15
o Discussion: Do the school teams that are funded by the PTO counter
intuitive? PTO is funding the team but then the school is asking us for a
grant - doesn't make sense. Possible solutions:
 Maybe the teacher teams could have a discounted rate?
 Maybe businesses could sponsor the teacher teams?
 Donations from parents to sponsor the teacher teams?
 Restrict it to one per school?
 Could school reps bring up the subject of the teachers teams not
being funded by their PTOs with the teachers when they meet with
them in January.
o Current fundraisers are girl oriented. Committee is trying to put together
some boy oriented fundraisers - ex: Jedi Jim
o Other ideas:
 Dance with Sugar Plum Fairies
 Talent Show during Applefest (It hasn't been done the past couple
of years, target MMS & AHRS students, charge a low admission,
need to try to expand audience size beyond participants families)
 Roller Kingdom
 Robotics
 Guest Bartenders at local restaurants with tips to NEF - could have
liability issues
 Golf Ball Drop - perhaps at Applefest?
 Donation jars at local restaurants with a competition to see who
has the most donations
 Elementary School Principal Trivia night with fun questions(ex:
what is the favorite lunch) based on their school information
 Small Businesses in Northborough give back a portion to NEF ex:
L Boutique. (A) Joy to reach out to the committee to find people to
head up some events.
Fundraising Committee (Marile Borden)
o Narrowed in on four areas
1. Big Corporation to endow the NEF funding the $10K in grants for the
next 15-20 years
2. Residential Letter Campaign - target 100-150 high income households
across Northborough. They would look like holiday cards.
3. Kim Haven & John Kane are targeting 100 businesses with $500,000+
in revenue, especially those business that typically don't get asked to
donate. They are sending a mailing and following up with phone calls.
4. An online application for Quiz Night and Princess Tea


Reworked the sponsorship opportunities to allow for different levels purpose was to ask for bigger dollar amounts instead of starting with
smaller dollar amounts
 Added an option for companies to match the teacher appreciation gifts this would put the company logo on the teacher appreciation application
 Sue Ogar discussed the Teacher Appreciation application. She and
Marilee created a new application to increase visibility.
 Need to brand the Teacher Appreciation application
 This is a great opportunity to brand all of NEF.
 Ideas: HATS (Honoring, Appreciating, Teachers, Staff), Gold Star,
Gold Apple.
 Sample Tag line: Honoring a Teacher while giving back to your Child
 Southborough uses an apple as their Teacher Appreciation award consider if we want to use the same icon as Southborough or
something different.
 Generally people liked the apple - ties in with Applefest and people
traditionally think of "giving an apple to a teacher"
 Teachers could promote the program by letting families know that "in
lieu of holiday gifts, you could make a donation to the NEF"
 (A) Sue - Research what other schools to and need to implement this
soon to take advantage of this holiday season
November Teacher Conferences - it was decided that there wasn't a need to have
tables set up at Elementary School conferences in November. AHRS has already
taken place and Melican is next week.