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Frank Painter called the meeting to order.

A.   Minutes

1. The members in attendance unanimously accepted the minutes as written for the November 17, 2004 meeting.
   

2. Harriet passed out the Extra-curricular recommendations that will be presented to the BOE at the next Board meeting. She asked the members to review them and give her feedback if there are further adjustments to the recommendations. She also asked for a volunteer to present the recommendations at the Board meeting, but no one volunteered.

3. By-Laws

   1. Frank presented the recommended changes to the LTCAC By-Laws which were mailed to each member. The proposed change to ARTICLE III is on membership and is as follows: from "The Community Advisory Council shall consist of 60 members" to "The Community Advisory Council shall consist of 60 members made up of 12 LT Students, 8 LT faculty, and 40 Community members." The floor was opened to discussion and there were many comments. It was decided to change "faculty" to "staff" members as to not limit participation from anyone employed at LTHS. It was also decided not to use specific numbers for the Council population. The final wording reads: "The Community Advisory council shall consist of 60 (sixty) members, comprised of Community members, Lt Students and LT Staff and Faculty. The specific numerical representation of each of the above mentioned groups shall be decided within the reasonable discretion of the LTCAC."

   2. The second proposed change was to ARTICLE VI. This involved adding a sixth point which would read as follows: "Attendance at all meetings is necessary to provide adequate input to the Board of Education. Members may be permitted 2 (two) excused absences per year. Please contact the co-chairs if you are unable to attend a meeting. The membership committee may ask any member to resign for failure to comply with the attendance policy." Once again the floor was opened for discussion and most members felt the 2 excused absences were acceptable.

   3. A vote was called for by the council and both LTCAC By-Law changes/amendments were approved by the membership.

1. Bids for all three projects (Theater, Pool and Field House-all South Campus) are due back on February 2, 2005. School Board will review bids at the February 4, 2005 Meeting. The School Board will review the bids and award them in accordance with the +/- $13,000,000 budget allowance. At this time the budget will probably dictate that the Board will approve the Theater and Pool projects for 2005 and postpone the Field House project for a later fiscal year.

2. No Child Left Behind Non-Compliance

   1. LT has invited other schools to join in enrollment agreements and other schools have reciprocated similar requests to LT regarding the placement of Special Ed and low income students.

   2. Because no agreements were reached among the various schools regarding student enrollment, no official intergovernmental agreement has been established. LT is still actively pursuing resolution of this issue.

3. STRIDE

   1. The School Board passed a new after school homework program which will begin Fall 2005.

   2. This program will target South Campus students (freshman and sophomores) at risk for failing a class. The students will be hand picked for the program.

4. Fifty (50) Staff Positions (represents 25% of the teaching staff) will be vacant in June 2005

   1. How will LT’s historical integrity and status be maintained with this many faculty positions becoming vacant? Dr. Kelly said he is confident that very qualified people will be hired. Hiring high quality candidates is the top priority in recruiting for the next two months. Successful staff recruiting is pivotal to maintaining Lt’s high standards.

   2. Dr. Kelly mentioned the hiring of Ron Kiesewetter to replace Bob Boyd. Everyone was concerned about replacing Mr. Boyd, but his replacement with newly hired Mr. Kiesewetter (president elect for the Choir Association for the State of Illinois, among other distinctions) exceeds all expectations. Dr. Kelly said he would like to discuss the new hires at the April LTCAC meeting.

5. Willow Springs Property Sale

   1. Dr. Kelly mentioned that focus will be placed on this issue once the groundbreaking occurs for the South Campus construction projects for 2005. He anticipates activity in late summer/early fall. The property will go up for sale, but recent developments with the Timber Trails property assessment have precipitated an increased anticipated value for the Willow Springs property, up from 8 million to just short of 20 million.

1. The School Board has been very thoughtful in deliberating the construction projects for South campus. At minimum, the new pool project will be approved as it is clearly needed for the school and the community.

2. While Mike Morris is leaving as Athletic Director, Jim wanted to assure the Council that the School Board is obliged to finding a suitable replacement for Mr. Morris. The School Board wants to reinforce LT’s commitment to establishing sports practices and the resulting good health within the student body through athletics.

3. The Board is supporting the LT Marching Band’s trip to Disney World for spring break. The trip will be paid for by fund raising projects.

4. Jim asked that everyone come out to support the basketball team. He also wanted the Council to notice how the athletic program and the music program work together in cases where LT has a musical/band presence at their sporting events.

5. The filing for petitions to run for the District 204 School Board started on Tuesday, 1/25/2005.

   1. Al Polich, Mark Pera, and Jim Kohlstedt all plan to run again. There are four positions to be filled. One current member will not return to her position on the School Board.

   2. Being a School Board member is very rewarding, but does require a time commitment. Faculty labor negotiations and the sale of the Willow Springs property are two of the many items on the 2005-2006 docket that will require a lot of time and work to be successfully completed.

6. Expulsion hearings for two students were recently completed. These students were involved with drug sales and weapon possession on campus.

Rebecca Rivan and Kimberly Gerken gave a demonstration of Edline using Rebecca’s Advanced Calculus class home page. This demonstration also highlighted other features/uses of Edline.

1. It was noted that the ability to print pages of Edline is "computer specific". Configuring one’s computer to properly print will save a lot of frustration for parents and students who are having trouble with this feature today. The configuration/setting information will be made available to Edline users.

2. LT is not the host for the Edline server. Web Hosting is outsourced so capacity is not an issue. The Chicago schools are using Edline as are many other schools throughout the country.

3. Edline does not contain "mandatory" information, as it is still recognized that there are parents and students who do not have access to a computer and/or the internet at home.

4. 97% of the teaching staff has an activated Edline account. 55% of parents have activated accounts. It is estimated that 50% of the staff using Edline update their sites once a week. (This estimate can not be substantiated with hard data.) Approximately 100 of the total 255 teachers update their Edline web pages or use Edline.

5. LT has approached Edline developers to come up with a way to track who does web site updates and how often they are done.

6. The math, science, and social sciences use Edline more than the other divisions because these courses have curricula that work especially well with Edline’s format.

7. 90% of teachers use Grade Quick.

8. Individual teachers use Edline as they see fit for their classes.

9. LT is considering adding attendance reports to Edline as information that would be separate from Grade Quick.

10. If someone experiences Edline downtime, it was recommended that Edline be contacted directly to look for an explanation.

1. Round table discussions were conducted to determine recommendations for Edline.

2. These recommendations were not reviewed by the group due to a lack of time. Th tables were asked to turn in their written suggestions to Frank Painter. These recommendations will be condensed and presented to the School Board.

1. Three major events in LT Technology history

   1. 1991-92 – The Discovery Centers were started but LT was not really into technology. LT purchased 60 computers and built two computer labs for about $600,000. These labs were originally managed by the English Department. LT now has 11 labs and several mini-labs supervised by two full time IT staff who have part time assistants.

   2. 1995 – LT started the Staff Development Program. We offered to give each teacher $2000 to purchase a computer system with the agreement to go through 70 hours of training. 88% of the staff went through training and purchased computer over a four-year period.

   3. 2002 – Jason Hines and his team solved problems with the main frame to insure a stable environment and brought in the Internet on line. A computer was placed in every classroom.

2. Dr. Kelly’s Three Concerns;

   1. Reliability of the mainframe was an issue; now it works well

   2. Frequent changes in IT personnel are inherent to the field; it is difficult to keep good people because corporations can woo away our staff with better salaries and benefits. LT has had 4 different directors of IT within the last six years. A strong staff is critical to managing the 1200 computers, 11 labs, and a number of mini-labs, yet LT budget constraints present a reality within which we have to work.

   3. We have gone through a period of growth and have been so busy growing that we have not spent enough time in long range, thoughtful planning. We have had a hard time getting our arms around technology. Even defining technology – what does it include? Today we have about 1,200 computers with 11 labs and a number of mini-labs mostly in science/math. In the past several years, we have added additional computer support positions and two part-time staff developers. Excluding the Discovery Centers, we have gone from two full-time people to 12 full and part-time employees in technology.

3. How can LTCAC Help?

   1. The LTCAC can help us with setting goals for the future

   2. LT needs to create a "technology document" that will address the short-term future goals of the school.

   3. The following issues should be addressed by the LTCAC:

      1. What do we mean by "technology"? What should concepts/definitions should the term "technology" include for LT’s purposes?

      2. How much should we be spending? Purchase or lease?

      3. What results should we expect from our investment?

      4. How many computers are enough?

      5. Should we centralize computers in labs or distribute them throughout classrooms?

      6. How often should we replace computers every three years or every five years?

      7. Should we have a Proximas in every classroom or should they be distributed geographically at both campuses?

      8. How much support staff do we need to keep our computers running?

      9. How many staff developers do we need to bring technology into our curriculum with kids?

      10. How can we link students, parents, and teachers together with technology?

      11. How much money can we reasonably devote to technology without impacting other areas of the budget? What is our next big step?

   4. Technology Planning and our Technology Plan are not the same. The LT Technology Plan was written to meet requirements fro ISBE and to qualify for e-rate funding. The technology committee has not been active and needs to help focus the district on limited, specific goals. There are too many goals –27 pages in the current plan.

   5. At the end of the February LTCAC meeting, I would like the LTCAC to recommend a small number of specific goals to the BOE; we need to avoid a laundry list of items that would be difficult to implement.

   6. Dr. Kelly asked the LTCAC to focus/limit technology recommendations. Address what is really important only for the next couple of years.

4. Dr. Kelly introduces Susan Fishell, new interim Director of IT, who has been in the job for seven days.

5. The LT Tech plan is available as an Adobe Acrobat file accessible at the LTCAC website. For those interested in viewing the document in hard copy form, please contact Harriet VerGowe or Dr. Kelly and arrangements will be made to mail these documents to you.