Community Board​
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The Monarch Community Board's primary objectives are to support the educational activities of Monarch Community School by providing volunteers and raising funds for classroom aides, materials, and enrichment activities; to promote better understanding between parents and children through parent education; as well as to unite parents and educators in their efforts to facilitate the emotional, social, physical, and intellectual growth of the children. Read our by-laws to learn more about how our non-profit works to support the school.s
Donate!
Have you noticed the dedicated teaching assistants in each of the classrooms? Have you seen your child's glowing excitement as they tell you about their Wednesday enrichments in art, music, and parkour?
The monies we raise as a community help us to fund and provide these rich opportunities for our children.
Fundraising is never fun to think about, but when you see your child feeling truly supported and curiously excited about learning, you know it makes a difference for everyone here at our school.
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Communication
The MCB improves communication between educators and families in our school community through the use of Google Groups.
Community Chat is a school wide chat for families to connect and share as well as give and receive help. At Monarch Community School we believe that one of the greatest strengths of a community is its people and their relationships to each other. Through this online community chat platform, adults are able to model for students how they, too, follow Monarch's Bill of Rights in their everyday life. Specifically, they honor everyone's right to 1) a peaceful discussion place, 2) feel safe and secure, 3) be heard and respected, 4) be included, and 5) learn at their own pace.
Announcement Lists are a way for parent-participation volunteers to spread important news and announcements to the Community.
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School wide announcements - community@monarchcommunity.org
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Earth - Teacher Susie earth@monarchcommunity.org
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Tierra - Teacher Pedro tierra@monarchcommunity.org
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Sea - Teacher Zoey sea@monarchcommunity.org
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Ocean - Teacher Laura ocean@monarchcommunity.org
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Sky - Teacher Zack sky@monarchcommunity.org
Dear Community members, if you don't have access to read or post to lists that you think you should please reach out to communication@monarchcommunity.org to resolve.
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Message from the Board President
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This month, the community board met for our annual planning and goal setting meeting. It was a welcome return for this meeting to be held in person, as it had been conducted remotely during the pandemic.
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Representatives from the board, classroom (reps) and our principal, who kindly hosted the meeting, got together for an afternoon to discuss priorities for the school.
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The outcome is a draft set of goals that will be finalized during the next board meeting.
Here is a quick outline of the areas we are focusing on this year (in no particular
order).
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Family education
Increase the amount of Family Education to help support the community become aligned with the teaching principles at Monarch. This includes the standard three parent education sessions; working towards new ideas that will help everyone support students as they work through themes; providing tools for volunteers to feel more comfortable during in-classroom hours.
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Community engagement
A focus on supporting engagement within the school, for our Monarch community – as well as the Santa Cruz community at large. Practically, we want to ensure we are creating more positive experiences for families on campus and working to develop ways the broader Santa Cruz community can engage with Monarch to become familiar with our school and our teaching philosophy.
Fundraising
In order to preserve Monarch’s alternative education for the future, a focus on fundraising will give the Monarch Community the financial means to support and advocate for the school, in the future. We appreciate that not everyone can directly donate, so this will also focus on ways to help indirectly; setting smaller short-term fundraising goals throughout the year; as well as looking at ways to raise money from outside the school.
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To support these goals, we are setting up ways for everyone to contribute ideas, as well as time, through special volunteering projects. For example, you will soon hear about ways you can help promote the school at our local farmers markets to drive awareness and ultimately enrollment for the future.
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Archived Newsletters
2019-2020 Newsletters
2018-2019 Newsletters