News & Announcements

School updates, important dates, and other notices.

Board of Directors Meeting Minutes: May 15, 2018

  1. Call to Order, Roll Call and Recognition of Visitors and Board Co-Chairs
    1. Yelena Hardcopf:Present
    2. Elizaveta Lindman: Present
    3. Christian Schmidt: Present
    4. Alekej Abyzov: Absent
    5. Yelena Kurdyumova: Present
    6. Mark Eilers: Present – 7:05 PM
    7. Paul Kinsey, Executive Director, ex officio board member: Present
    8. Visitors in attendance: Nicole Nelson of IQS, Sergey Porada, Andrew Wood, and Natalia Kormina.
  2. Approval of the Agenda
    The board moves to approve the Agenda.
    Motion by: Elizaveta Lindman
    Seconded by: Christian Schmidt
    4-0-0
  3. Read the Nasha Shkola Mission and Vision – Paul Kinsley
    Vision:
    To be an academically rigorous school preparing students for the world.
    Mission: Nasha Shkola will be a multi-cultural charter school committed to academic excellence, provide a highly-structured learning environment based upon education best practices for students interested in the Russian language and culture, achieved through the collaborative efforts of parents, staff, and the communities we serve.
  4. Open Forum for members of the public wishing to address the board
    No public comments.
  5. Reports

    1. Executive Director report
      1. Enrollment – 120; claiming 115
      2. Other reports
        • Ms. Hardcopf delivered a report on academics at Nasha Shkola: MCA tests are finished, and the school will get results during the summer. The school is in the middle of NWEA testing. Russian Olympiad of Spoken Russian was on May 12th. Students who participated did well. The Olympiad is from the American Association of Russian Educators.
        • Ms. Kurdyumova delivered a report on marketing: She continued to spread the word about Nasha Shkola when at community events. Ms. Kurdyumova also made a critique of the website and stated that she would like to see the resumes of the Russian speaking teachers on the website. Flyers will be placed in banks. The Ms. Kurdyumova hopes changes will be made to the flyers. The board then discussed the findings of Ms. Kurdyumova and her critiques of the website.
    2. Financial Report
      1. Monthly Financial Report, Mark Eilers – Treasurer
        • Fud 01 has a deficit of $86,342. This amount will be repaid in August.
        • Fund 02 has a deficit of $5,044.
      2. Account Balance
        • The school had a balance of $3,931 on April 30, 2018.
        • Fund balance as of June 30, 2017 $63,791.00
  6. Consent Agenda
    1. Minutes of April 17, 2018 Board meeting.
    2. Financials April 2018.
      The board approves the consent agenda including the minutes for the April 17, 2018 board meeting and the financials for April 2018.

      Motion by Elizaveta Lindman
      Seconded by: Yelena Kurdyumova
      4-0-0

  7. Old Business
    1. Transportation services update.
      • The school will change our vendor for transportation to NorthStar for next year. This will keep the current four routes.
        1. Change of provider
          • The new company NorthStar will proved bus transportation and will keep all current bus routes. The school is not creating a radius because we are still growing. At some point we will need to have a radius as student count goes up.
        2. Van purchase
          • The school has talked about buying a van to transport special education students. The school would absorb the initial costs of purchasing the van but would be reimbursed by the state.
    2. Extended school day (9:00-4:00) in 2018-2019 and adjustment of school calendar
      • The school will need to expand the school day in order to accommodate the bus company we will contract with. The school day is longer and will result in a change to the calendar for next year. Two teachers are working on revising the calendar. This revised calendar will be brought before the board for approval in June.

        The board moves to change the school hours to 9:00AM-4:00pm.
        Motion by: Christian Schmidt
        Seconded by: Elizaveta Lindman
        4-0-0

    3. Grant writing opportunities update
      • The school is still waiting for a response to the literacy grant request.
        1. CSP update
          The school received news that we are not eligible for a CSP grant. Our school was told twice that we were eligible, but we were denied the grant because we are not currently a K-12 school.
    4. Strategic planning: updates and needs
      • The school must finalize the Strategic Plan. This will happen at the last Strategic Planning Meeting.
      • The school should figure out if we are going to keep the language component separate or fold it into academics. The board discussed this. The board hopes to involve teachers and parents in this final step in planning strategically. The date for the last Strategic Planning Meeting was set for May 22nd after school.
    5. Next school year enrollment projections, programming and staffing needs.
      1. Intent to return forms for 2018-2019
        • Out of 120 students we have 108 coming back. The drop was caused primarily by transportation problems encountered by the school in March.
        • The director discussed complaints of parents regarding a request for paper reams and stated that in concerned him that some parents show disrespect to the school.
        • The school it was also noted has positives Nasha Shkola has been recognized by the state for our improvements. Preschool will help the school.
      2. Staffing, Science, and Reading
        • The school has secured a science teacher for the upcoming school year. The prospective teacher has a degree in biology.
        • If the literacy grant is accepted, we can afford to employ a reading specialist but if we do not get the grant we will not be able to afford a reading specialist.
          1. Possibility of sharing staff with another school
            • Sage Academy is a charter school with grades 9-12 in Brooklyn Park. The director is set to meet with the administration of Sage to discuss possible partnerships. For example, our school could employee a part time physed teacher from their school to teach physed at Nasha Shkola.
          2. Sped contract with Designs for Learning
            • We do not have enough students to hire a full-time sped teacher. We will continue to have Mark as a director and another Designs teacher to provide services in school.
    6. Budget FY19 revised draft at 125 students
      • The board discussed the proposed budget for FY19. One third of the expenses are in salaries. $58,000 of extra money in the proposed budget. The budget has room for salary increases for returning teachers. The budget does away with Fund04. This budget will increase the fund balance assuming a positive outlook. The board will wait to see if more students commit to our school before we finalize. There were questions about advertising in a Russian Language local paper. A return to the discussion of the marketing report.
    7. Annual meeting planning and recruitment updates.
      • The school has two parents who have volunteered to serve on the board: Julia Ishanova and Ivanna Gradinar. Yelena Kurdyumova continues in a three-year term, Mark is up for election, Elizaveta and Christian are both serving two more years. Yelena Hardcopf is running again as no other teachers have volunteered for the position.
  8. New Business
    1. Stakeholder satisfaction survey 18-19 results
      • The board analyzed the results going through survey questions and answers.
      • The board looked for areas of discontent in order to plan for the future.
  9. Other
  10. Adjourn
    The board moves to adjourn at 8:31pm.
    Motion by: Christian Schmidt
    Seconded by: Yelena Hardcopf.

The Nasha Shkola Board meets the 3rd Tuesday of each month at 6:30
The finance Committee meets at 5:30 prior to the board meeting.

ACTION ITEMS !!!!!!

  1. Update parents to change in hours.

About Nasha Shkola

Nasha Shkola — Russian for Our School — is an academically rigorous K-8 charter school, providing a highly-structured learning environment for students interested in Russian language and culture.

Contact Us

    School Info

    Nasha Shkola
    6717 85th Ave North
    Brooklyn Park, MN 55445

    Phone: 763-496-5550
    Fax: 763-424-8520

    School Hours
    Monday – Friday:
    8:30 am – 4:30 pm

    Office Hours
    Monday – Friday:
    8 am – 4 pm