OCTM Board Meeting
Grandhaven Elementary
McMinnville, Oregon
Call to Order: 9:11
· Introductions: Guest Irving Lubliner TOTOM Teaching at Southern Oregon University.
· Introductions by name, OCTM job and which candy bar that explains or describes you as a leader, and when you are not working.
Present: Winnie Miller, Patty Sandoz, Gail Gerdemann, Cathy Bernhard, Jackie Cooke, Nancy Anderson, Lois Constine, Stephanie Legard, Elizabeth Warren, Molly Smith, Cheri Clausen, Charlotte Ogle, Shawna Dehler, Vickie Rooks, Tari Querin, Diane Kinney, Kim Clary, Laura Lethe, Marna Knoer, Inga Perham, Leslie Graham, Nancy Rogers, Nancy Swarat, Ann McMahon, DJ Mueller, Francie Bostwick, Brent Freeman, Mike Gould, Jane Osborn, Lynn Bonser, Trudy Mitchell, Ralph Schubothe, Giny Christensen, Cathy Brown, Jennifer Bell, Karen Ashcraft, Judy Johnson, Kristin Lavy and Jennifer Cox
Special thanks to Stephanie Legard for providing the goodies.
- Last meeting we brainstormed a list of things we thought were necessary to work in this group.
- Individually look at the list and combine them into sentences. We want 5-7 sentences that will become our community agreements.
- Each group will share their sentence strips and then hang like ideas together on the wall.
- Mike and Giny will type these up into themes and share at next meeting.
- Notebooks – discussion about each job having a notebook. Winnie said that each job should have a notebook.
- Welcoming – working to make sure that this group is being welcoming to new people as well as returning members. One suggestion was to have a greeter or two at the door to make people feel welcome.
- New Scholarship -Trudy Mitchell
· A motion by Vicky Rook with a second by Gail Gerdemann was made to accept the minutes of the May 6, 2006 Board Meeting. The motion passed
- Please start thinking about PI day on March 14.
Area 10 Cheri Clausen
- Dana Marlia had a baby girl.
- Molly Smith is a finalist for the Presidential Award.
- Eastern Oregon will be hosting a conference on October 13th
· Scholarships Brent Freeman
- OCTM offers three scholarships: Schaaf/McFadden for summer classes, Don Fineran and OCTM MATH scholarships for teachers to attend conferences. The Fineran and MATH scholarships have blended into one.
- Don sent a letter to Ross asking why his name was not on the scholarship. When the award was made the Treasurer would send information about the honoree to the award winner. When scholarships were advertised in TOMT (The Oregon Math Teacher) no one knew about the honorees, so Brent created a draft to go into TOMT to inform people about Schaaf, McFadden, Fineran and the OCTM Math scholarships. These drafts were handed out for everyone to read.
- Need a due date for scholarship application so it can be put into TOMT. Discussion to happen during lunch
- The Fineran description will be attached to scholarship for Northwest Math Conference and the OCTM Math scholarship attached to the scholarship for the NCTM Annual Conference.
· Constitutions Amendments Molly Smith
- Molly shared the changes that have been made to the Constitution. She proposed that we do one vote for all changes. Trudy suggested that if all the topics are the same then we can do a blanket vote for that topic. Vicky suggested creating two categories: cleaning up language changes and major changes. Jackie Cooke and Cathy Bernhard will look into whether it should be his/her or their for personal pronouns in the Constitution.
- Jackie Cooke and Cathy Bernhard will present a Chicago Style book
- Molly needs board approval for changes to Constitution to put them up for a vote.
- Discussion about Article VI Section 1 the use of the phrase Executive Board implies that there is not a non-executive board. Is there an Executive Board? Much discussion occurred and it was decided to leave it alone.
- Major changes to Constitution are online voting and changing the budget. Please see the Constitutional changes document for specific changes.
A motion was made by Charlotte Ogle, with a second by Lois Costine, was made to accept the changes to the Constitution and put them into TOMT for voting by the membership. The motion passed with one dissenter.
- Please take some time before the next meeting to think about these items.
- The role of the Vice President
- Mileage rate – huge travel reimbursement
- Obtaining a credit card with frequent flyer miles for Pres
- NWMC in Victoria – who’s going, table responsibilities, sign up sheet
- Philosophy regarding spending and budgets
- Questions on final page of guiding beliefs document.
· BREAK 10:52 am - 11:05 am
· Winnie made some adjustments to the agenda
- Winnie Miller handed out the Mission Statement revisions (on green paper) for board to read.
· Membership Action Plan Jennifer Cox
- No report
- Conditional acceptance to the MET grant from NCTM for Professional Development. When are we going to start this grant? Send information to Nancy Rogers
- The following dates were set for this school year’s OCTM Board Meetings.
- October 14th at La Grande
- January 20th V-Tel more to come
- May 19th at Redmond
· PDC – Professional Development Cadre Mike Gould
- We began by looking at tasks. Mike handed out a packet from Oregon Mathematics Leadership Institute and had everyone do the first two problems.
- Small group discussion on how kids would solve the problems.
- Mike asked – How were these two problems different? Discussion.
- Next we looked at page 3 – Mathematics Tasks Framework, individually and then in small groups.
- Think about – What could you have done to increase the levels of the first two tasks and/or decrease tasks?
- On page 4, in small groups, come up with a working definition for each category: memorization, procedures without connections, procedures with connections and doing mathematics. Discussion followed about the definitions for each category.
- Page 5 of the packet has the definitions for the categories. These came from the book:
- Implementing Standards Based Mathematics Instruction: A Casebook for Professional Development by Mary Kay Stein, Margaret Schwan Smith, Marjorie A. Henningsen and Edward A. Silver. Discussion about the definitions.
- Final Thoughts – as you look at curriculum look at how you can increase the level of the tasks.
- Guiding Beliefs for budget proposal was handed out.
- Winnie shared the three-year budget.
- Professional Development money supports the PDC.
- The money for scholarships is not included in the multiyear budget.
- The software that Ross will be buying will be able to detail each line item.
- We would like to purchase a laptop for OCTM to be used by Jennifer Cox at meetings to take minutes and for Ross Eells to use to do his Treasurer’s job.
- Cathy Brown suggested that Ross adds a fourth column to show the actual year’s budget.
- Molly Smith suggest creating a philosophy regarding the spending habits of OCTM
- Patty Sandoz asked if we adopt this budget could we later make changes to the budget after the fact. The answer was yes we could make changes, as this is a proposed budget.
- The Board would like clarification about rates on CD’s from Ross.
- According to Ralph Schubothe the reason for the discrepancy between the ending 2005-2006 budget and the proposed beginning balance of the 2006-2007 budget is due to the actual amount listed in the checking account at the bank.
· A motion was made by Cathy Bernhard, with a second by Tari Querin , to approve the three year budget as created by the Treasurer and finance committee. The motion passed with one dissenter.
· Mission Statement
- During lunch it was realized that we needed to approve the new mission statement
A motion by Vicky Rook with a second by Elizabeth Warren was made to approve the mission statement. The motion passed.
· Laptop Issue Winnie Miller
- Winnie would like to purchase a laptop for use by Ross Eells, Jennifer Cox and others as needed for OCTM. Discussion followed regarding the pros and cons of this purchase.
-
A motion by Jackie Cooke with a second by Elizabeth Warren was made to purchase a laptop computer for use by OCTM Treasurer. The motion approved with one dissenter.
· Affiliates Leadership Retreat Trudy Mitchell
- Trudy Mitchell, Winnie Miller, Giny Christensen, Ross Eells, Jackie Cooke, and Molly Smith attended the Affiliate’s Leadership Retreat in July.
- The focus book from the conference was NOW; Discover your Strengths by Marcus Buckingham and Donald O. Clifton Ph.D.
- Trudy shared the big ideas from the conference. Please see attached power point from Trudy and handout from Winnie regarding the 34 descriptors.
- NCTM is being recognized as a resource to Congress.
- NCTM has made recommendations about Learning Expectations
o Each grade will have identified major goals or focal points. The reason is to help teachers be more focused on what is expected. The focal points will be available on the NCTM website, accessible to everyone in September for grades K-8.
- Winnie asked everyone to write down the following names Ross, Molly, Giny, Trudy, Winnie and Jackie. Then we looked at 6 slides on each slide it listed the 5 characteristics that defined one of these people. Our task was to decide which slide fit which person.
- Slide 1 Trudy, Slide 2 Jackie, Slide 3 Winnie, Slide 4 Giny, Slide 5 Ross, Slide 6 Molly.
- Ann McMahon presented Trudy Mitchell with a gift and thank you for all her work on the Board. Trudy is contributing $10,000 to create a scholarship for early career teachers to attend the NW conference. There will be a condition that the scholarship recipient will volunteer at the next Oregon NW conference and be an OCTM member for 3 years. This will be called the Sunrise Scholarship after Trudy’s Dad who lived in Sunrise, Wyoming. Also because this is the sunrise of their career.
· President Winnie Miller
- Congratulations to Jolene Latz who received an award as a top Philomath educator. See the attached article to find out more about all her great contributions. Jolene has been a middle school teacher for 15 years, a leader at district and state levels, served as an area rep and is currently a huge contributor to the OML team.
- Watch for “News around the State” (or something like that) that can be found on a link off of the President’s page. This creates an ideal place to post highlights from area rep reports in a more timely fashion.
- You’ll be hearing me talk all year about the focus of this year’s NCTM Affiliates
- Conference, NOW, Discover Your Strengths, by Marcus Buckingham & Donald Clifton.
- Determining what our individual strengths are and then building on that is quite a different concept from determining what our weaknesses are and then work on trying to fix them. Even more important is to know how to work with others based on their strengths. There are thirty-four themes; I’ll attach a brief explanation of each of these.
- Highlight the five themes that you think best represent your strengths. Since we are all leaders, it’s well worth the money to purchase this book. Gradually, we will all post our strengths bios on the OCTM web page. Thank you to Giny, Molly, Ross and Jackie for taking precious time away from family and vacation time to attend this conference with Trudy and I. Where else can we have breakfast with Jim Rubillo sketching numbers out on the tablecloth in pursuit of finding the % of even numbers in Pascal’s Triangle? When else can we network with other affiliates and then do some pretty intense strategizing?
- I’m definitely looking forward to an exciting year filled with lots of new ideas, risk taking and challenges.
“Thank you to Mike Gould for starting the PDC movement and everything he does. He will receive an OCTM vest
Thank you to Patty Sandoz for being secretary. She received a book and thank you card
Thank you to Cathy Brown for all her help. She received the L3 – Lollipops, Lifesavers and Lunch.
I will be attending the OMLI banquet on Thursday to receive the memberships of the teachers.
Speaker system is still being looked into.”
· President-Elect Patty Sandoz
- About 30 teachers from different content areas have been invited to the August 24th retreat for the State Board of Education. The teachers will provide feedback on diploma requirements including the high school math requirement to the Board members. Our own Nancy Swarat will be one of three math teachers to sit on the panel. I might go along to represent Oregon Council of Teachers of Mathematics although that is still to be worked out. Jon Wiens can provide more information.
- September 13 and 14 six people from Oregon, split between math and science, will attend the Council of Chief State School Officers' (CCSSO) Conference on Designing and Implementing High Quality Professional Development for Teachers of Mathematics and Science in Greensboro, North Carolina. This is a follow up to a two day conference held in February 2006 in Washington DC called "Bridging the Gap between Research and Practice in Professional Development. The February conference focused on how state leaders could apply research findings on effective professional development to the task of designing programs and setting state standards for high quality teacher professional development in math and science. The September conference will focus on supporting state leaders in disseminating and applying the research of professional development design and implementation statewide. I'm not sure if I was invited because of being President Elect or some other reason but I'm honored and excited to attend as it falls in line with my interest in and work for OCTM's Math Professional Development Cadre. Again, Jon Wiens can provide more information.
- At our Board meeting I'd like to share a fundraising idea . . .
“I will be an observer at the State Board Retreat on August 24
September 13-14 for PD workshop in North Carolina
Fundraiser idea – yo-yo’s Molly’s dad had an idea that OCTM should sell yo-yo’s and while it did not lose any money it was not a huge seller.”
· Vice President Molly Smith
We are starting a membership drive and contest. The Area Representatives have a lot on their plates, but I believe that membership is the responsibility of all OCTM Board Members. The Area Representatives will be doing the majority of the work, but let’s all help them out. The contest is to see which Area can increase their membership by the largest percentage. The second contest is to get at least one membership in every school in each Area. This will take a bit more work, but is within reach.
Here are the membership numbers by Area as of August 1, 2006:
1 - 17
2 - 69
3 - 70
4 - 82
5 - 47
6 - 47
7 - 37
8 - 48
9 - 25
10 - 23
11 - 13
12 - 17
13 - 29
14 - 48
15 - 196 (out-of-state)
The winners of the contest will have one of two prizes: one prize is a weekend at Winnie’s home in Eagle Crest. The weekend is November 8th. Thank you Winnie! The other prize is hopefully a jet boat trip down the Snake River out of Halfway, Oregon and a stay at the Bed and Breakfast in Halfway.
I am still working with our computer technician at my school to get on-line voting in place. She has a couple of computer classes that like special projects. We will not be able to have our upcoming election on-line, as we have to wait until our constitution has been changed to allow for that.
During the weekend of July 7th, I attended an NCTM Leadership Class in Reno, Nevada with Winnie, Giny, Ross, and Jackie. I was interested to learn what other Vice Presidents do in their own affiliations. I did learn that our Vice President was the only V.P. that did not roll into the President Elect position. I also learned that the people that sat at the President-Elect/V.P. table had smaller Boards than ours. They ranged from 10-15 people on their Boards. However, they were all very excited about what Oregon is doing and has done. The most exciting part of the weekend, (besides watching Giny lose a whopping $5 in less than 5 minutes, ) was working on an Action Plan with our team. I see an Action Plan as a very beneficial piece of our organization. I think my name got added to many parts of the Action Plan, so I will be asking for assistance.
Our Eastern Oregon group is working very hard at getting our flyer ready for our upcoming M3 + S2 Conference. We have a few of our Board members speaking at the conference, and we are hoping that the conference is a huge success.
“October 13th is the Math and Science Symposium in La Grande. Cost is $50. Please pass out the brochures. Patty’s address was left off the flyer.
We will again have a membership drive contest again this year. The prizes are Winnie’s house and jet boat trip on Snake. There are two categories. 1. The largest increase in percentage. 2. One OCTM membership in every school in your area. Cut-off for Contest is October 13; winners will be announced on October 14.
As board members retire would they want to have minutes and agendas still sent to them? Winnie will put these things on the list serve. Ask retiring members if they want to have the minutes sent to them.”
· Recording Secretary Patty Sandoz
- I have mixed emotions about leaving the position of Recording Secretary, a position that has afforded me the opportunity to get to know many more educators around the state and to be inspired by them to grow professionally. But I am very pleased to bequeath the position to Jennifer Cox, a person who has already demonstrated high quality work for OCTM. As an added bonus, she's young. . . . . -er than me! ;-) However, I will continue to be professionally challenged as I learn all I can about becoming President. To Winnie, Giny, and Jackie, I am a willing tutee to your tuting!
- I have bequeathed to Jennifer Cox all of the OCTM Recording Secretary's notebooks and documents, making for what I hope will be a seamless transition. We chatted and transitioned over a tacos lunch with Nancy Swarat as the hostess with the mostest.
- The OCTM Constitution has been updated to reflect the recent voter approval for an amendment. Article VI, Section 7 now reads: "Appointed officers shall serve for a period of two years except Area Representatives who shall serve for three years."
- One of my challenges was to update the Recording Secretary's portion of the Procedures Manual. This has also been shared with the Webmistress so that it can be changed on the OCTM webpage.
- Another challenge was to fine tune the Policies document that was created a couple years ago. I simplified the category classifications and then attempted to classify each entry with a primary and a secondary classification. Most of the categories are self-explanatory and are as follows: Money; Materials / Equipment; Travel; Scholarships; Board / Membership (anything to do with the Board or its Membership such as people, Hall of Fame, political involvement, our history, workshops, miscellaneous). I was motivated to do this to make it easier for folks to search our past, not to dictate our future, but instead to guide our future decision-making.
- What should happen to the dinosaur known as laptoptocomputaurus? This particular computaurus specie comes from the Jurassic era and has been carbon dated to November 1996. It is known to have a small brain and did not have the skeletal structure, much less the sociological development, to support herd communication for long-term evolution.
- As I worked my way through all the minutes from 1991 to the present, especially the entries concerning scholarships, I was awed once again by the fact that we stand on the shoulders of giants. Giants such as Don Fineran, Mildred Bennett, Oscar Schaaf, Scott McFadden, Ron Nicholson, and many more who had a vision and a tireless work ethic for math education in Oregon, for Oregon Council of Teachers of Mathematics, and for Oregon Math Leaders.
“I wanted to clarify a couple of issues that came up at a discussion that took place during committees in May. First during a discussion about area reps someone had mentioned a SCAM account that had moneys in it for area reps to use. Unfortunately this is in fact not the case.
Another discussion was where the money for the Writers Retreat originally came from. The money originally came from OCEPT and as that money evaporated OCTM took over funding. OCTM currently funds Writers Retreat.
I took some time to clarify the 5-6 categories that OCTM uses for motions and policies. They are listed in my written report.”
· Treasurer Ross Eells
- Treasurer’s report as of August 1, 2006
- In October I will not have any sons graduating, and all summer activities will be over, so you can expect to see me back then.
- On July 19 Winnie and I transferred our accounts from MAPS in Salem to OnPoint (formerly Portland Teacher’s Credit Union.) This will make banking much easier for me since there is a branch down the street from my school, and it is where I do my personal banking. I wasn’t very comfortable when I had over $102,000 in checks and cash from the NW Conference, and I couldn’t immediately drive to Salem to make a deposit.
- When the transfers were made these were the balances in our various accounts:
Account Balance
Checking $1091.72
Savings(Fineran) $1208.62
Savings(Schaaf/McFadden) $1765.12
Savings(Money Market) $90,031.20
- For those of you who are new, the Fineran and Schaaf/McFadden accounts are the money from interest we earn from investments which I will explain below. The money from these accounts is used to pay for scholarships. The other savings account is where all other income is deposited, including the NW Conference. That’s why it looks so healthy now. The M.A.T.H. Scholarship is also paid from this account.
- We have three investments with the Financial West Group. Here is the breakdown:
Account Investments Value as of 5/31/06 Int. Rate
Fineran Puget Sound Energy $36,593.97 7.02
New York Telephone 6.5
Schaaf/McFadden Ohio Power $25,482.91 6.375
Alabama Gas 5.7
Oklahoma Gas & Electric 6.5
New York Telephone 6.5
OCTM Hilton Hotels $54,000 7.5
(Thank you Paris)
- I have purchased a version of QuickBooks software to assist in the bookkeeping and tax records chores. This software will allow me to print checks at the Board meetings and will keep track of all income and expenditures electronically. QuickBooks also allows me to generate reports for Board meetings and will make tax statement preparation much simpler. I have also researched a wireless laptop computer to be used by the Treasurer and Recording Secretary, and for multimedia presentations at Board meetings. A printer might be a good idea too. This expense would require Board approval.
- The changes in the format of the budget will make it much easier for me to keep track of expenditures, and specifies more clearly for you how we get money and where our money goes.
- In previous budgets, income has been at the bottom. You will now find this at the top, so let’s begin there. Because this is not a Northwest Conference year, income will be considerably less. You will notice that interest on Savings is much lower. The interest from the Financial West investments will not be included as savings income since it is used as a scholarship fund. The proposed interest is from our various accounts at OnPoint. Presidential income is a new line item. When we have expenditures for the Presidential Awards, we are reimbursed by NSF. This reimbursement will be recorded as income. We receive many contributions from various organizations and individuals such as OEA. When the contribution is not designated for a specific account, such as the Fineran scholarship fund, it will be recorded here. Any further changes in TOMT line items can be more efficiently explained by Cathy and Jackie at the Board meeting.
- We do not require an audit of our finances this year, so the bookkeeping line item requires less money. Changes in Conferences, Contests and Workshops will be explained in more detail by Winnie. Remember that Presidential expenditures will be reimbursed as income.
- Our three investment funds will now reflect a more complete picture of those accounts, showing balances, how much has been paid out for scholarships, contributions, as well as a beginning and ending balance of interest income at OnPoint.
- My hope is that the new look of the budget will provide a clearer and more complete picture of our finances for you.
Respectfully submitted,
Ross Eells, OCTM Treasurer
· Membership Secretary Ralph Schubothe
“We currently have 765 members which is the lowest in 8 years. Last year at this time we had 965 members. After the NW conference we had 1763 members. This is because we gave all NW attendees without an affiliate a membership to OCTM. We should be at about 960 when we send out first TOMT. I am getting lots of returns from teachers who have retired, so we need to work on getting younger teachers. One idea is to attend the new teacher district inservice and hand out TOMT’s and memberships.
If you change your email address let me know so I can update list serve. My email is having issues, so be persistent, email me 2-3 times and I will get it eventually.
The financial committee is thinking about raising OCTM dues to $25 for one year, $45 for two and $30 for international. Flyer will be sent to people who have not renewed their memberships after the September TOMT has been sent out asking them if they missed their TOMT.
NCTM shared with me the list of NCTM members that live in Oregon and are not OCTM members. There are 495 Oregon NCTM members, 215 members are not OCTM members; so I will send them a flyer also.”
· NCTM Representative Giny Christensen
“NCTM in Atlanta is March 20-24. This is about a month earlier than usual. Please make note. NCTM has set the following locations for the next three annual conferences:
2008-Salt Lake City, 2009 -Washington DC, 2010 -San Diego
The Affiliates Leadership retreat helps the OCTM organization get ready for the upcoming year.
Molly Smith, Tammy Rasmussen, and Steve Fisher are the Presidential Nominees for Oregon.
Starting next month High School teachers can begin applying for the next Presidential
34 Presidential nominees in Oregon”
· NWMC Representative Phil Bartsch
No Report
· PDC Coordinator Giny Christensen
“Yesterday 24 people met to look at applications from school districts who are interested in a year long professional development with OCTM and the PDC.
Ann McMahon, Jackie Cooke, Patty Sandoz, Winnie Miller, Cathy Brown and Lynn Bosner will go to Hermiston and Estacada to interview the administration and teachers about doing a year long professional development. The interview will decide which place the PDC will be consulting with.
There will be a team selected to do this training, once a decision has been made.
Also we will be looking for more grants.”
· Publicity Ann McMahon & Francie Bostwick
“Please come to the awards dinner at 6 and awards are at 7. Presidential posters will be on display at registration and then hung in Walker for the remainder of OML.”
OML Representative Leslie Graham, Marge Burak,& Jill Sumerlin
From Cheri and Jolene “We need a list of who is staying for OML will be back at noon with registration for OCTM members. Thank you to everyone for using email, it worked really well. We got more responses from people because we used email. They would like suggestions and comments from the board on how email registration worked for us. Apologies for not sending the list of area attendees to area reps. People wanted confirmation that OML had received their check because of an email reminder.”
We had a discussion about how to do confirmation.
“Lists of area attendees will be given to area reps at noon. Everyone will also have the OML database on a CD in PDF and excel.
From Leslie “During this year’s OML, we will be doing lots of math. Thank you to Cheri, Jolene, Becky, Jill and everyone else for all their hard work. “
This question was asked of the area reps “Was it a big hassle to hand out books?” The answer was NO.
· Contests Laura Lethe
- Portland State University hosted this year’s Oregon Invitation Mathematics Tournament for High School Students on Saturday, May 13, 2006 under the direction of Joe Ediger.
- In addition to the written exam, students had the opportunity to participate in a team problem-solving event after lunch.
- For the team event, a limited number of groups of 3-4 students were assigned on a first come, first served basis and no two students from the same school were assigned to the same group. Each group was given a specific, open-ended problem to work on for about
- 2 hours. The Geometry/Algebra II problem centered around solving a Tri-Met bus problem and the Pre-calculus/Calculus problem focused on creating a dartboard. Each group was responsible for creating a stand-alone poster to present their methods and solutions. All posters were on display after the event for other teams to review while the judges assigned a score.
- In July, a small group of people met at Jackie Nissen’s house to revise/edit questions for
- Pentagames 2007. Francie Boswick has agreed to look over the relay and rewrite some questions to more closely align with NCTM and state standards.
“High school math contest had problem solving event that was good. Diane Kinney reported that she had parents commenting on how great the contest was. “
· Historian Judy Johnson
“I am impressed with the degree of interest in history.”
· Scholarship Brent Freeman
“Sherry Cessnun and Bonnie Swanberg from Phoenix-Talent School District were awarded scholarships to attend the NW math conference in Victoria. Also there will be a trial run of offering scholarships for OML.”
· ODE – Assessment & Curriculum Cathy Brown
“I will send out her information about talking with parents about Math. Encourage people in your area who are interested in reviewing items and standards to send me an email.
The content standards, according to Jon’s timeline, are scheduled to be adopted in May 2007. Math textbooks will be adopted in 2008 not 2009.”
· TOMT Cathy Bernhard & Jackie Cooke
- The September issue is in the final stages of proofing and should arrive in your mailboxes the first week of school.
- The Writers' Retreat is scheduled for August 9 and has nine participants. We should get some really superb articles for TOMT out of this event.
- We have already used some of the Teacher Tips that we got at the last Board meeting as fillers and we encourage you to think of others that you might like to share.
- As always, we encourage all of you to become writers - share your great ideas with other teachers around the state and nation. Writing for a professional magazine is a great professional growth activity (and publication looks great on a resume!) Lots of editing help is available if you want it. Jackie and Cathy are very willing to work with you individually to help you put those great ideas on paper (or a disk.)
Submitted by Cathy Bernhard
- There will be something about joining the listserv in each issue
- We've received permission from NCTM to continue to review Navigations articles for this year
- There will be articles in upcoming issues from PSU's Lessons for Meeting Oregon’s Math Standards: 5th Grade to CIM
- We've started including Teacher Tips with the Sept issue
- I purchased Creative Suites2 and am waiting for it to come. This is the software we are now using to do the TOMT layout and graphic work. This will allow me to make an electronic version of the magazine, keep an archived copy in case Joe's computer goes down like it did this year, and make copies of articles to send out to folks when requested.
- We are now working on the idea of sending back issues on CDs to cut down on mailing and printing expenses. There was some discussion about whether we should automatically do this or give folks a choice.
- I've been working on creating a timeline of TOMT history to include with the rest of the history Cathy Brown and Tari Quarin started last spring. Did you know that the birth of TOMT is attributed to Jay Greenwood? While Jay served as president of OCTM from 1975 to 1977 he recommended consolidating Oregon’s three OCTM publications into one TOMT. The first issue was published in September, 1975. It had 40 pages in it and it starts by say" TOMT IS HERE!! The three OCTM publications have been combined into a brand new and bigger and better publication, The Oregon Mathematics Teacher (TOMT). Many of the features which were found in the OCTM News, the Monograph, and the Math Enthusiast are a part of the new periodical which will be published eight times a year as a magazine." Michael Dalton was Editor, Penny Slingerland, Monograph Editor and Judy Johnson, Elementary Editor. Longest term as editor was served by Ann Mcenerny-Ogle. She started in the 1991-'92 school year and completed her last TOMT in May of 2001. Joe Spooner has been doing the artwork for TOMT since the 1984-85 school years.
- We are working on creating a new contest for students sponsored by OCTM. The winning student projects will be published in TOMT. This year we are talking about it being something like "Pretend you are the graphic artist for TOMT magazine. Design a cover that would fit within a mathematical theme of your creation and that somehow integrates math with art." We've talked about possibly printing the winning art onto a T-shirt, poster, or the TOMT centerfold. The idea is to set it up to be run this year possibly in the new year or early spring for recognition at next year's OML. We could possibly have 2 elementary winners, 2 middle school winners, 2 high school winners if we printed one in each issue next year. Some of the prize ideas discussed were a T-shirt printed with the top winning design for Leaders? All finalist art work could be blown up to poster size and displayed at Leaders (perhaps sold as another OCTM product like the problem box books?). Invite families and teacher to the Awards Banquet and hand out certificates as part of our awards ceremony? MLC or TI could also be contacted for possible prizes. Washington State does a contest like this. They say it increased membership especially at the elementary level. Plus it encourages folks to go to the web page because the application form and description of the project were posted there. Next year it could be some other kind of mathematical project that gets printed in TOMT (e.g. Explain how math is used in some type of machine). We would like to include Laura as Contest Coordinator to be a part of the planning and judging.
Submitted by Jackie Cooke
“Please write for TOMT, Jackie and Cathy Bernhard will help with editing as needed.
Tips from teachers at board meeting will be included in TOMT, please continue to send tips.”
· OMEC
· TOTOM Martha VanCleave
· Webmaster Jackie Cooke
- Joe and I have switched to using Creative Suites2 for TOMT production. As a part of that bundled software, we are now using Adobe GoLive for our web editing program. We have spent quite a bit of time learning how to use this new software.
- Ralph and I have been working on revising the membership brochure. One is intended to highlight possible student members and the other one highlights the new teacher free membership. Once everyone takes a look and gives their two cents worth at the board meeting, I will upload the different brochures to the web page so our membership can print out whichever version they need.
- I’m looking at the possibility of creating little electronic resumes that will pop up for each member of our board. It could tell a little about that person’s history or if folks are interested and want to purchase the Strength-finder book or do the online survey we could say on our homepage that we are strengths based organization and list info about board member’s strengths.
- Joe and I have been doing research on the question of adding a counter to the web page. We are still in process but hope to have some idea of the best way to do this soon. There are lots of free counters that can be downloaded out there but they would ad an advertising banner to our page. The other possibility is for us to write the html script for ourselves. That's the part we are researching right now.
- Molly is working with someone to set up the web to handle voting online. Once she does that I am assuming there will be some kind of a password system set up for members to get online and vote. Once that is in place then we could look at the possibility of offering e-memberships online as a choice.
- It has been suggested that the board could cut expenses by eliminating the web master position and have a high school take it on as a project. I do think this is an excellent resource to tap when we are attempting a one shot type pf project like setting up the electronic voting. However, I’m concerned about giving over our control of what the web page will look like to high school students and question how responsive they would be to updating after each board meeting, issue of TOMT, etc.
- I've been working on all the usual updating of board reports, internet bookmarks, math links etc. I had to delete quite a few broken links on the Math Links page and have added
“Procedures manuals cannot be corrected by Jackie; it is on Martha’s computer. Jackie has asked for it.”
· Mailing Clerk Lois Constine
“All the mailings have gone out. High School awards will be in September issue.”
· Area 1
· Area 2 Tari Querin and Vickie Rooks
· Teachers have had summer training opportunities provided by the Portland School District. High School teachers learned about the new math adoptions in the fall for high school . Many Portland teachers change grade levels at the elementary level, so summer classes were provided to help these teachers learn the Investigation Units taught at their new level.
· Area 2 rep Vickie Rooks facilitated the 5th Annual Pi Day celebration at Lane Middle School. Included as part of this event was a fund raiser for the Oregon Food Bank. Lane Middle School has 70% low income families. The addition of the fund raiser to Pi Day was a big success.
· Area 3 Shawna Dehler
Hillsboro School District
1. Development of Math Power Standards to be shared with the entire math teachers in the district during In-service Week.
2. Summer Credit Recovery Algebra was offered for the first time. Exciting results.
3. 8th grade summer enrichment program boosted 20 students math skills in Algebra so they can start Algebra I this fall. Students will be followed to see how they do in future math courses.
NW Regional ESD
1. Our entire region is working with Center for Performance Assessment to develop Power Standards.
2. Hosted the ESEA Title IIB math grant institute this summer.
3. Grade 5-8 teachers (20) from Hillsboro, Bands and Forest Grove received two weeks of math content instruction in statistics and probability from 5 professors from Linfield College and Pacific University. Those teachers will implement the Lesson Study this fall and post lessons on “tapped in” electronically.
4. Several Beaverton teachers were involved the Oregon Mathematics Leader Institute in Corvallis.
· Area 4 Stephanie Legard & Nancy Anderson
Laura Lethe
· 7 Salem teachers attended a 3-day College Preparatory Math Leadership training in Seattle at the end of June. It was great and there were several things I want to use with other Salem teachers.
· On August 22 I'll be facilitating a mini leadership training in Salem for teachers who will be leading support sessions for Connected Mathematics and College Prep math. The topics will include adult learners and agendas for the sessions.
· On August 24 is Salem's Summer Academy for Teaching and Learning, with sessions for K-2; 3-5; and secondary math (as well as offerings in other subject areas). This is free for Salem teachers, along with a free graduate credit for those interested.
Nancy Anderson
· I will be doing a Bridges training for the Cascade Schools teachers K-2 from
· August 21 to 23.
· Area 5 Gail Gerdemann & Kristin Lavy
· Area 6 Inga Perham
· Bethel School District's Bond Measure did not pass. The bond included a focus for improving instruction in mathematics. They have decided to put the bond on the November election. The University of Oregon continues with a Quality Teaching Grant that uses ideas from lesson study and combines preservice teachers with veteran teachers. There are groups working in different subject areas including mathematics. Marna will submit any other news from our area.
· Area 7 Kim Clary & Diane Kinney
· This summer many of our schools are continuing their participation in OMLI. A P3 is planned for sometime in October (probably the 16th).
· Submitted by Kim Cleary
· The math happenings have been especially quiet during the spring and summer here on the south coast.
· The Regional Math competition that qualifies students for the Annual Invitational Math Competition was held at Southwestern Oregon Community College in Coos-Bay. In the past years that have been held during their Skills-Day, so that travel expenses could be minimized by combing events with the computer and art competitions. There is ongoing discussion about splitting the events again.
· Several Family Math Nights were held in the spring. The high school students have been taking a very active role in the planning and facilitating of the Brookings' Family Math Nights. This has been very successful.
· Submitted by Diane Kinney
· Area 8 DJ Muller & Sheryl Beverly
· Area 9 Kathi Eisenbeis & Georgia Boethin
· No Report
· Area 10 Cheri Clausen & Dana Marlia
· Area 11 Nancy Swarat
· Area 12 Jane Osborne
· No Report
· Area 13 Carli Halligan & Debbie Lindow
· Area 14 Jennifer Bell & Elizabeth Warren
· Area 14 is planning two Pizza, Pop, and Problems events for November. One will be in Clackamas and the other in West Linn.