Graham Hill Elementary

Graham Hill
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Graham Hill Elementary School/PTA meeting summaries

PTA meeting summaries

PTA meeting summaries

Summary for 12/4/2025 6:30-7:30 PM

Attendees: about 20 members in total
Action items

  • Afterschool Enrichment Program Registration is open 

Ways to Get Involved:

  • Ask fellow grade level parents if they know about the What’sApp groups 
  • Volunteer to support events 
  • Volunteer to support Move-a-Thon
  • Volunteer to help with clothing exchange or Donate clothing
    • Contact Ms. Janet 
  • Volunteer to support Teacher Appreciation
  • Volunteer to support Heritage night
  • Plan a grounds and beautification event 
  • Discuss PTA budget planning for 2026-2027 school year: Molly, molly@grahamhillpta.org

Upcoming Events:

  • Dec. 19 1st trimester progress reports available on The Source
  • Jan 13, 15 School tours for Open Enrollment
  • GH Math Family Saturdays with SUM Jan 17-Mar 7 at 1-2:30, 2:30-4
  • Jan. 22 Open House Curriculum Night
  • Feb 6 and 10 Finding Nemo Performances
  • Move-a-thon Mar. 18 to Apr. 3
  • Heritage Night Mar. 27

Agenda and Notes

Set up interpretation rooms

Introduce interpreters and provide instruction to access rooms

Introduction

Board Members

Welcome to new families (first time at the PTA meeting or new to GH, invite to introduce themselves if they’d like)

Q&A with Principal Gardner

  • GH Math Family Saturdays with SUM 
  • Jan 17-Mar 7 (except mid-winter break) 
  • 2 sessions, twelve families in each; 1-2:30, 2:30-4 (10 sessions total) –look for a flier with signup info coming home
  • After-school tutoring program Jan 20-Mar 31st; Grades 2-5 –look for a flier with more info coming home 
  • 5th grade student leadership team working with The Good Foot (2 cohorts, 1 in Fall and 1 and Spring)
    • Students explore what it means to be a student leader and create a culminating project that they present at the end of the year 
  • Focus this year in SEL on restorative practices, including circle practice; student leaders (4th graders) will be trained to lead restorative circles during POD times
    • Students sit in a circle have opportunities to share thoughts and feelings in a safe space; includes guidelines and allows kids to dig into certain topics more deeply 
  • Jan. 22 Open House–Students will share what they have been working on in class 
  • Trimester 1 is finished and progress reports are available on the Source starting Dec. 19–look for information being sent home about how to access The Source (should be accessible in other languages as well)
  • Open Enrollment is earlier this year so school tours will take place in Jan. (Jan 6 and 8) 

QA with Ms. Janet

  • More food being ordered to give to families
  • Will be having a clothing exchange (most likely at the end of Jan.)
    • VOLUNTEERS AND CLOTHING DONATIONS (gently used) NEEDED 

Dia de Los Muertos – Thanks for a great event!

Update on Fall Fundraiser 

  • Raised $6,700+ from community and matching
    • Money will be used for Right Now Needs, Classroom supports and scholarships 

SESSFA – continue discussion regarding participation in SESSFA

Update on Holiday Craft Fair – Shana

MoveAThon – Jess

  • SESSFA event that our school puts on; between March 23 and April 3 we will have move-a-thon
    • Looking for volunteers to support planning and coordinating efforts 
    • Last year SESSFA raised about $500,000 and GH received about $23,000 of that 
  • Also Holiday Craft fair (happened last weekend and raised more than last year) and Mother’s Day Flower Sale 

Budget – Molly

Spending Report

  • Have spent about $10K so far this year, our proposed budget for the entire school year is $55K
  • Team of 5th grade parents have had a lot of success raising money to make sure 5th graders can go to Islandwood 
  • Contact Molly with any questions about employer matching: molly@grahamhillpta.com

Discussions about budget reflecting whole community

Updates

Nemo

  • Kids who participated in Lion King got to go see Lion King downtown today
  • Feb 6 and Feb 10 are performance dates this year to accommodate Ramadan 
  • Kids are working really hard 

SPED – Megan or Shana

  • Not present

Teacher Appreciation – Hilary

  • Trying out having a grade level adopt a snack date
  • Look for a recent email re: December appreciation (5th, 2nd, and 3rd grades are needed) 

Upcoming events – Curriculum Night, Open Houses, Move-A-Thon, Heritage Night

  • Looking for VOLUNTEERS for these events 

Grounds and beautification – Any events planned?

Family Engagement – WhatsApp Groups, Coffee Chats, 

  • Next coffee chat is coming up…stay tuned for more details 

PTA Meeting Notes for 10/9/25 6:15-7:15 pm

Important Dates:

  • Coffee and Chat, Nov. 7 at 8-9am–next one is specifically for Spanish-speaking families
  • Dia de Los Muertos Nov 7 at 5:30pm in Cafeteria
  • Families Crafting Change craft market Sat.11/29 from 10am-3pm at Southshore K-8

Upcoming Ways to Get Involved

  • Share a tradition at Dia de los Muertes (contact Sheila Ruiz )
  • Support the GH Fall fundraiser or join the fundraising team (contact PTA)
  • Become of a vendor or be a Santa at the Families Crafting Change craft market (contact Shana Schasteen)
  • Join the teacher appreciation committee (contact Hilary Wilson)
  • Join the SESSFA team to support equitable fundraising in South Seattle schools *especially in need of people with grant writing experience contact Antonia Eberhart
  • Join the PTA board as treasurer (contact Molly McElroy )
  • Looking for an Afterschool Program Coordinator (contact Rebekah Binns )
  • Lead Heritage Night event planning (contact PTA)

MEETING MINUTES:
23 Attendees 

Welcome and Introductions 

  • Board Members
    • Antonia Eberhart, President
    • Rebekah Binns, Vice President
    • Molly McElroy, Treasurer
    • Alyssa Everitt, Secretary
    • Sheila Ruiz, Board Member at Large
    • Tamiko Nietering, Board Member at Large
  • Staff and Teachers
  • New families to Graham Hill by grade

Hear from Staff –Ms. Maggie

SESSFA–Jess

  • Group of PTAs across SE Seattle (17 schools participating); way to promote equity in fundraising
    • Started during COVID: goal is to increase access for ALL kids in SE (pools PTA funds and redistributes them based on equity algorithm)
    • Shana
      • Event coming up that benefits SESSFA: Families Crafting Change craft market
        • Sat. after Thanksgiving at Southshore at 10am-3pm
        • Santa will be there
          • Looking for a second Santa for the afternoon 
          • Looking for vendors if you make goods to sell 
        • Funding: Makers have an application fee, then donate 10% of sales; also a couple of donation opportunities and a Quilt Raffle 
    • SESSFA Kick-off meeting 10/22
      • Looking for support for organizing fundraising events at GH and 

Fall Fundraiser –Antonia 

  • This fundraiser is specifically for Graham Hill
    • Context: GH does not receive Levy Funds 
    • This money goes toward Afterschool Programming scholarships; meeting family needs (e.g. gas/groceries), emergencies, supplies, teacher appreciation events; student snacks
      • Critical needs 
    • Bright orange document coming home in backpack mail 

Budget -Molly

  • Review
    • Budget reflects money we already have in our bank account
      • Planning to spend about $55,000 this year
      • Main buckets
        • Teacher supplies
        • Community events
        • School snack program
      • Hard to predict amount of funds that will be raised each year
        • SESSFA
          • If you have grant writing skills or connections to broader business community and want to contribute to SESSFA it would be greatly appreciated
        • Disney play (raised their own money and will use what they raised last year)
        • Will be fundraising for Islandwood camp for the 5th graders (because it was cut from State budget)
        • Molly sends out a treasurer report each month (sent to PTA listserve)
  • Budget Vote
    • Alyssa calls motion to vote to approve budget
      • Budget approved by 20 yays
      • 0 nays
      • 0 abstentions 

Announcements

  • Ways to Get Involved
    • Treasurer
      • Need a treasurer next year; would like to train someone to work with Molly to learn how to do it this year
    • Afterschool Coordinator
      • Need an afterschool coordinator is needed in order for programming to continue –
  • Dia de Los Muertos –Nov 7th Sheila and Gloria
    • Gloria: will be inviting parents from indigenous communities to share their traditional foods and ceremonies 
  • Heritage Night (in Spring) –Still looking for folks to lead
  • Teacher Appreciation– Hilary
    • Looking for committee members to support teacher appreciation events and snacks
      • Provide food and drinks for events where staff works late 
      • Budget available for reimbursement 
      • Contact Hilary if you are interested 
      • Can also help teachers with projects like cutting, copies, laminating etc. 
  • Curriculum Night 

Ms. Maggie: Staff Update

Thanksgiving week, but specific dates to be determined

Curriculum night: each teacher will do 2 sessions at 5-5:40pm and 5:50-6:30pm (same presentation both times to accommodate families with multiple kids)

Looking for interpreters 

Question about childcare

Will hear an overview of the year in all subject areas 

Coffee and Chat –next one is specifically for Spanish-speaking families

Affinity group format 

Nov. 7 at 8-9 

Fall Testing

K-2 already took Dibbels, which measures reading skills

1-5 are finishing up MAP testing next week –adaptable test so it measures where kids are at; scores are used to form Splash Groups (math and reading intervention groups) so that kids get intervention at their level

Results will be provided at Fall Conferences 

Jocelyn attended a meeting about Highly Capable and they are only assessing in two grades now (1 and 4) but you can request to have your child assessed in grades 1-5 (opens Monday); request form is online

You can opt out of testing

MAP is just for teachers to understand kids’ levels

SBA is for federal accountability –if you opt out your child’s score goes in as a 0 (not connected to funding)  

November conferences

In two weeks Multilingual department will start reaching out to families to schedule conferences with interpretation

Summary for 4/25/2025 5:30-7 PM

Upcoming Events

  • Grounds Work Part 5/9 2:30-4:30 
  • Heritage Night April 25th at 5:30-7:30pm
  • Teacher Appreciation week is the 1st Week of May

Ways for Folks to Get Involved

  • Volunteer–after school clubs, lunch and recess support, Heritage Night 
  • Join a committee (have committee sign ups) 
  • Serve as interpreters/translators for people and documents for the school and PTA 
  • Start a grade-level WhatsApp/Signal group to help with communication/spread of information (need grades 2-5)
    • Can also be language-specific–we have Spanish already 
    • Need Somali, Oromo, Vietnamese, Amharic
  • Text D7 moves to 44321 for a link to donate to SESSFA/share with people you know
  • Sign Katie Kribb’s advocacy letter to the district (see below/ email to come)

Minutes 

  • Welcome–PTA Board introductions–Arlene
  • Invite new GH families to introduce themselves (kids’ grades, where they’re coming from if they want, leave time for Zoom participants to respond)
  • Table Introductions (introduce self)–discuss what is your favorite thing/memory of Graham Hill this year (5 minutes)–Rebekah 
    • Quick share out–record on poster paper
  • Update from Principal Gardner–Principal Gardner
    • Heritage night
      • LOTS of volunteers needed
        • 30 min shifts
        • Especially need people to help monitor hallway activities 
        • Email Principal Gardner if available 
    • School budget
      • Budget is hard, especially with limited resources (we are not a levy school); puts us in a position of making really hard decisions (trade-offs)
      • We are allocated staff and then get a very small amount of money from Title 1 funding
      • We are allotted .2 nurse and a .5 social work –felt them impact of not having a full time social worker this year
        • Felt it was important based on needs of the entire school to use some title 1 funding to have a full time social worker and .5 nurse
      • 3 week process with multiple scenarios considered; lots of staff conversations and multiple votes; budget is 100% staff vote and has to pass by a ⅔ vote
      • GH was allotted one extra teacher for next year
        • If they use that 1 teacher in one grade, the benefits of having smaller classes affect only one grad band
          • Staff opted to choose an interventionist that can benefit every grade band
            • More students will benefit from this choice than by putting an extra teacher in one grade band 
            • Also allows us to have 5 tutors from the beginning of the year to offer tier 1 support (academic support)
              • Tier one support is instruction that happens in the classroom (tier 3 = SPED and tier 2 = not SPED, but need a little extra academic support)
  • Community questions for Principal Gardner
    • Why aren’t we a levy school and how do we become a Levy school? (City of Seattle Early Education Levy)
      • To be a levy school you have to renew the application and somewhere along the way a few years ago the application wasn’t renewed 
      • The city is revising the application process now, but as soon as it is available we will apply –could possibly receive levy funding for 26/27 school year, but not 25/26
      • Current tutors are funded by an OSSI grant that we won’t be able to get next year 
    • Next year can make a decision if needed to open more classroom if classes are too large
      • By end of may they will know what the classroom configurations will be for next year 
    • Early enrollment and counts
      • SPED has rolling counts (throughout the year) and staff can be allotted throughout the year; it is hard to hire for those positions during the year; often because those positions get displaced 
      • General ed counts happen in Spring and October and those are the only time staff allocations are made
      • Uncertainty around what will happen with Title 1 (federal funding)–but once we have the funds, the government can’t take it back 
      • Although there are class size ratios set by the state (18 is the recommendation for K-2), teachers are bound by their contracts which allow for 26 in K-2 and 28 in 3-5
        • Ratios aren’t based per building, but on a districtwide average 
  • Advocacy on 2.0 FTE rule and Distinct IAs–Katie Kribbs 
    • Katie has written a letter to advocate for 2.0 rule and SPED IA’s
      • 2.0 rule requires that schools reach a threshold of needing 2 teachers before they can receive any teachers (even if they have enough teachers for 1 full classroom) *also says they won’t take away a teacher unless a school is under enrolled enough to lose 2 teachers, but we could advocate for them to separate those two parts of the rule
        • Next year we already have fewer teachers than the number of students enrolled 
        • First part of the letter asks the district to remove this policy and give us one teacher that we are owed 
        • The rule began in 2017, but wasn’t enforced until now (as a cost saving effort)
      • SPED is understaffed for next year; programs aren’t full yet, but they will be
        • Second part of the letter asks to let us keep the IAs we have, knowing that kids will come 
  • Move-a-thon and SESSFA (Arlene, Jess)
    • 17 SE schools are trying to raise $500,000 to be (mostly) equitably distributed
      • Helps support Principal and students 
      • Please reach out to 5 people and ask if they will donate something to SESSFA–give what feels comfortable 
      • Last year 460,000 was raised and GH received about 20,000
      • Text D7 moves to 44321 for a donation link 
      • Examples of what that money goes toward: Covers snacks for whole school; teacher grants for $400; needs fund for Ms. Janet; etc. 
      • Messaging directly from teachers to students about the fundraiser is really important and helpful 
  • How to get your child screened for special education (Shana)
    • Shana created a flyer explaining what to do if you think your kid might benefit from SPED services and what to do if your kid is not yet in elementary school (Child Find can help you get everything in order before school starts–takes a while so start early) 
  • Teacher Appreciation week is the 1st Week of May –there are many ways to help:
    • Bring something for a Potluck 
    • Bring flowers 
    • A few other volunteer opportunities–look for an email from the committee
  • Grounds Work Part 5/9 2:30-4:30 
  • Graham Hill Sounders Game –talk to Arlene if you are interested
  • Table Discussions/Popcorn–need recording materials for each table or big poster (ask an audience member to help)–Rebekah
    • What are your priorities for Graham Hill?
    • What do you want to stay the same at Graham Hill?
    • What do you want done differently? 
    • How can the PTA support these efforts? 

Summary for 10/16/2024 6-7 PM

Upcoming Events

Next General PTA Meetings 

  • Wednesday, January 8th from 6-7PM on zoom
  • Wednesday, March 5th, from 6-7PM on zoom
  • Wednesday, May 7th, from 6-7pm on zoom

Graham Hill Staff and Teacher Needs 

  • Amazon wishlist is updated throughout the year –
  • 40 packs of playing cards for APTT night
  • New underwear, slightly used or new socks and pants, all sizes, all genders
  • For Mr. Cole – Disinfectant wipes, kleenex, wooden puzzles (Melissa and Doug), playdoh, and wet wipes

Become a member of Graham Hill PTA 

Budget Proposal and Approval– for more information contact molly@grahamhillpta.com or lisa@grahamhillpta.com

Updates and Announcements 

  • School closure update should be announced October 21st

The Lion King – Graham Hill needs support with the Lion King musical after school club. Reach out to Kathleen at kaclevenger@seattleschools.org if you can help.