October 13th, 2022 In Person PSFA Meeting
1.) Call to Order/Pledge of Allegiance & Welcome: Current PFSA officers in attendance:
Kristen Cichon (2023) Colleen Stemetzski (2025), Debbie Rau (2023), Mary Ann Doyle (2023), Janice Karp (2023).
2.) Principal Gleason’s Report: Mr. Gleason– Good evening everyone, Charlie spoke about everything that I needed to talk about, great job Charlie. Thank you to the PSFA, I think I mentioned it last meeting but wanted to recognize the fact that the PSFA helped pay for the bus trip for the Freshman Orientation trip to Thompson Park. Thank you for all the fundraising that goes on and also making sure we had the buses for the kids to go on that trip. There has been a lot of testing going on, and it is a total disruption of the educational process quite honestly, over the last two weeks. The PSAT’s were held which are important, we were able to get that done yesterday. I am thanking my guidance counselors for getting everything scheduled and getting the testing done. Spirit week is coming up and that is great. By the time we see you again it will be the end of the marking period. We will have two hour exams and for freshman parents and their students, it can be a little stressful. They can do it, pat them on the back. Encourage them to believe in themselves- they’ll be fine. There will be a dance on November 4th, so a fun time sponsored by SkillsUSA- it is a fundraiser for them to help defer costs of all of their competitions and dues. Look for it on the calendar. In anticipation of any questions regarding the email that went out last week- there is little that I can say other than it was handled quickly and it is an on-going investigation. We handled it with all of the seriousness it required and we will move forward and the process will move forward. I can’t really talk about it. As information came to light, there just happened to be a Sheriff in my office, circumstances dictated what happened. The student in question is not currently at the school and we will follow the process required. The lunch POS system is still in the works – it is on order and will be installed as soon as it is available. Getting it up and running is between the cafeteria service and our tech group and as soon as it’s available we will update you.
3.) Student Government– Lucy Batista- President, Charlie Raynor-Vice President. Charlie presenting: Welcome, we have fall spirit week coming. We hold Spirit week two times a year and have themed days. Each class gets points for their participation. Students have fun going all out with their costumes and participation. It will take place from October 24-28th. We are meeting with all the class councils. We have two more information sessions for the 2027 prospective classes: October 29th and November 7th. The Back to School Dance by the senior class was fun- we had a great DJ and a photobooth. The Ink Blot has print ads available contact Charlie for more information. The Breast Cancer Walk is in 3 days at 10 am. Register one and all, open to students, parents, and friends. There will be a ‘pink out’ tomorrow to show support for Breast Cancer Survivors, their families and research. We will be making a donation with the proceeds from the walk. Also on December 17th we will be helping at Fairview Cemetery in Middletown to honor veterans as part of Wreaths Across America. This event is schoolwide and we would also very much appreciate donations so we can reach our goal of 100 wreaths. For every two we purchase a third will be donated. A small ceremony will be held prior to the laying of the wreaths and we hope that we will get as many families involved as possible. The National Honor Societies Induction Ceremony for juniors is on November 7th. If you have any questions you can reach out to the SGA or myself. Thank you.
4.) Co-President’s Report: Kristen Cichon (2023), Colleen Stametzki (2025). Kristen leading: We had the Meet and Greet at Allaire Park and had a great turn out- we had about 300 people show up, we had perfect weather for it. The ice cream truck was a huge hit- thank you so much Kathy (Seeto) for arranging that. The other thing we had going on is Driver’s Ed which was an eight session course that was completed October 3rd. We have the SAT/ACT course which just started this past Tuesday and that will continue on for seven more weeks. The directories all went out as of today, there was a delay because of the PSAT tests that were taking place so not everyone made it to their appropriate homeroom to collect them. If you have not seen it yet, please check with your student. There are more events coming up in November and December and we will notify you about them as soon as the plans are finalized. We do have a general website that you can reach out to the PSFA www.chs-psfa.org if you have any questions, comments or concerns. Everything that we do to raise money is all for the kids. It goes for competitions that they compete in, transportation to events, and school events. Everything that you give and do goes back to the students. The meeting minutes are on the website and if anyone would like to see them they are under the PSFA tab.
5.) Corresponding Secretary Report: Janet Schneider (2025): (not in attendance) Kristen presiding: The Communique did not get emailed directly to the parents. Part of the process is we are incorporating all of the names from the new directory, so we are purging and entering all of the current email addresses. It is available on our website, under the PSFA tab, if you’d like to see the October Communique. Sorry for any inconvenience. As far as any questions that you’re unsure of who to ask-you may send them in to the chs.pfsa@gmail.com email and we will find out who you should contact and let you know, or get you the answer ourselves. Feel free to reach out with any questions.
6.) Committee Reports:
- Fundraising
i.Gift Auction – Debbie Rau(2023) – Hi everyone, I am the chair of the Gift Auction I have a senior daughter who is graduating in June. So we are looking for several people to help out again. I have a nice committee so far and just looking for some extra people to join us. It is a traditional Gift Basket Auction with a sit down dinner; a fifty/fifty; birthday board games; cigar box shuffle and different games. It will be on March 11th, 2023. It is a group effort. If you receive any gits that you are not interested in keeping you can donate to the gift auction; we will be sending out an email ‘wish list’ full of ideas; take advantage of any black friday sales. We are looking for any new kind of gadget that someone would like to win in a gift basket. The big thing for this year is that since my daughter is graduating we will need someone to help out and possibly chair the event. You could shadow what we are doing this year to get used to how we organize it, see what it takes to run the event. There is a nice sized committee in place so you are not alone- many hands make light work. We need people to help with gift wrapping when it gets closer; people to do some soliciting of restaurants and stores in your town, anywhere that you like to shop they can donate a physical item or a gift card. We have Donation Letters with information and our tax ID that can be given to the various businesses for their records. There are sign up sheets by the table where you walked in. One is to help with the committee, and the other is if you’re willing to donate any gift cards.
- Merchandise – Lina Esposito(2023) (not available this evening) Kristen presiding: Hi there, Charlie touched on Spirit Week coming up. What we did last year is we held a Spirit Wear Competition the Friday before Spirit Week. So we gave the kids the opportunity to wear their spirit wear and we awarded cash prizes to first, second and third place which went to their class fundraising bank, and we will be doing that again this year. So we will have Spirit Wear available for purchase at lunchtime during the week to give the kids a chance to purchase if they wish. The spirit wear is also available on the website as well. You can place and order and it will be available for your student to pick up from the front office.
iii. Donation Drive – This is an annual donation drive that can also be found on the website, but something will be mailed to your home. Any donation that you make to this is a tax write off you will get a receipt and an email will be sent to you with the information you need to use it as a tax write off.
iiii. Membership – Teresita Weiss(2023) Krista Kingsly (2025) – Kristen: Teresita has painstakingly spent a lot of time on these directories and I think they came out amazing. Teresita: It really is a group effort between Krista and myself and Mark Allen and the executive board. As was mentioned it should have been distributed yesterday and today. Have your child check with their homeroom. They are personalized so they each have a student name on them. We have gone through to make sure that everything is spelled correctly based on the forms that you had sent in, but certainly if you become aware of an error please let us know and we will send out a revision with an amended page. As far as membership goes in years previous to Covid the membership rate was in the 80’s percentage range and we are trying to attain that rate again. So if you know of a family that has not joined please reach out to them and see if they know about the PSFA and to consider joining. If you have ideas of things to do within the PSFA please reach out.
Public Relations– We are working on getting more information out to the parents. We are working on gathering more information, even if it is not PSFA related and having a space to post it so people can find out about most things happening at CHS. CHS Facebook page and Instagram – We are looking for someone to help chair PR and publish any news that is noteworthy- please submit your name to chs.psfa@gmail.com. Please submit events and activities that your students are involved in and we will post to celebrate events in your student’s life, send to pr@chs-psfa.org.
- Enrichment Education: i. Driver’s Education – Janice Karp(2023) – We did have an eight session course for Driver’s Ed that was successfully run and just ended last week. As far as I know we will be running the longer 30 hour course in the spring- which depending on your insurance company may make you eligible for a discount for your new driver. The instructor is a certified NJ teacher and will bring your student up to speed on all aspects of driving to prepare them for the written test and their behind the wheel course. ii. The SAT/ACT- Kristen Cichon (2023) The prep course started on Tuesday and we ended up with 14 students. We did it a little earlier this year than we did last year which I think is beneficial to the students as it is right before all of the tests begin. iii Book Club -Patti Riddle (2026) (not available tonight) Kristen presiding: The book club has not met as of yet as she received an overwhelming response from parents and students and is sorting through to find a place to hold it. As soon as she gets the details worked out she will update everyone, as to location and book choice(s).
- Parent Chat– Marlaina Loushine (2024) – Tonight the parent chat was all of the Honor Societies; the NHS, NTHS and the NAHS and they each told us about their programs, how they work and how to apply. For November it will be Krista Johnson, the School Psychologist/Counselor from the Monmouth County School district to talk about recognizing and managing stress and anxiety in teenagers. She will provide information on helping your student to manage and be successful. Next month it will start at 6pm and will be held in the lunchroom as we will need a screen. We do these chats before every meeting and try to find topics that appeal to parents of HS students. Definitely open to ideas if you have any that you would like to hear about or talk about please reach out to me at the general email.
- Hospitality-Lisa Lippincott (2025), Kathy Seeto (2025)- We do anything that has to do with food and we would love to have people help out by signing up on sign up genius. You can help by sending in paper goods, snacks and food for all different events- such as the Meet and Greet at Allaire Park. We help with bagel breakfasts, and many social events at the school.
6.) Treasurer’s Report: MaryAnn Doyle(2023):The P&L is available on the table. We paid for the Meet and Greet Social, and helped with the cost of the bus for the freshman orientation. We paid for a bus for the Dodge Poetry Festival where 20 students participated. We added a line item for the Color Wars’ t-shirts, so going forward we are helping to pay for all of the students to have their t-shirts on Color Wars Day. We also do Amazon smile so if you choose us as your charity we will raise money that way.
7.) New Business: i. We did get a grant request for a teacher grant and it was transportation to the Dodge Poetry Festival. That was for twenty students and run by Ms. Vandervelde. Transportation was provided by the PSFA. ii. We added a budget line item for the Color Wars t-shirts so that each student is receiving a color wars t-shirt as well as the faculty and volunteers. We decided to do that so that the SGA is not using all of their funds on the t-shirt. iii. Look for news coming about the CHS Club Crawl. It’s an opportunity for parents to come and see what the clubs are doing.
Motion to adjourn: Diane Macon, Marlaina Loushine 2nd.
Next PSFA Meeting is November 3rd, 2022 in person