LHSGBOPC General Meeting Minutes, September 16, 2024

General Meeting 9-16-2024

Board members in attendance:

Directors: Allen Frank and Bill Lennox

Jacqui Forsch(President), Steph Cramer (VP Student Accounts), Tracy Luisser (VP Volunteers), Becky Sullivan (Treasurer), and Michelle Miller (Secretary)

Board members in absent:

None

Approval of Minutes from 08-13-2024:

Jacqui called the meeting to order and asked for approval on last month’s minutes. Motion to approve was made by Annalisa Kelly-Cavotta. Second by Michael Calagna. Overall approval by the full organization. (Motion passed)

Report from President (Jacqui):

Bingo
Bingo was September 8th. There was a really good turn out. Thank you to everybody for coming out and for supporting the event and thank you to everybody that came out to work the event. Preliminary numbers are about $4300. Official numbers will be at the next meeting.
Springo (Purse Bingo)
Looking to host another bingo in the spring, this time doing a purse bingo. Other schools have made a large profit when doing these. No dates set yet.

Question: Will bingo profits be individual student quota or general funds?
It’s going into a pot for people that are traveling on the trip. Our goal is to raise enough money so that at the end of the year, we’re able to give back a refund to the people that went on the trip. The pot of money will be split with choir, band, and orchestra (music department students that attend the trip). We’ll always announce where the profits will be going for each fundraiser. So far we have the car wash proceeds from June, the Dine and Donates, and Bingo that are going towards the trip.
Campaign Kickoff
We’re going to have a fundraising campaign with sponsorships. Julie Bailey is going to talk more about the kick off later. We’re looking for a person who can help us coordinate the sponsorships to make sure they’re getting the benefits of their sponsorship level.

Report from VP of Volunteers (Tracy):

Volunteering :
We need volunteers for some of the home games coming up:
- Bandstand
- Handing out third quarter snacks
For the Liberty Freedom game (October 26th):
- Set up.
- Hanging senior banners in the stadium
- Help at the luncheon
- Looking for help to allow senior parents to watch and enjoy their child’s final game.
Signups will go out.

Report from VP of Student Accounts (Steph):

Fundraising financial page:
- August 2024 fundraisers
  - Ongoing fundraisers: (Weiss, Giant, ShopRite and Wawa coupons)
    - You can use the grocery gift cards for your groceries each week to add money into your student’s account by buying groceries you are buying anyway.
    - Giant gift cards can be used online when using Giant Direct.
    - A small sliver (approximately 20%) of the profits of each individual fundraiser goes back into general funds.
    - Gertrude Hawk candy bars give a large portion to the student quota.
  - Individual Fundraisers:
    - Mattie’s Pizza had $894.00 go into 24 student accounts that participated.
    - Mum’s had $1700 go into the 47 student accounts that participated.
  - Group Fundraisers:
    - Dine to donate is always on the third Wednesday of each month.
      - September is Clubhouse Grill
      - August Dine to Donate profit was $422.
    - Bingo: The unofficial number is $3,961.
Upcoming fundraisers:
- Lottery Calendars
  - Calendars are due September 27th.
  - Winners will start on October 1st.
  - Winners will be sent a check through the mail to the person that you designated on that calendar.
  - $5 per calendar goes to your student’s account.
  - If you have any unsold calendars, please ask around to see if anyone else wants to sell those last few calendars.
- Apple Dumplings
  Contact: Jacqui Fortsch
  Cost: $7.50 each/ $7.75 (gluten free)
  Quota: $1.75 each
  Orders due: September 22nd
  Pick up: October 9th at 5-6pm in Liberty High School cafeteria
- Strudel, Halupkis, and Kolaches
  Contact: Tracy Luisser
  Cost: $12-$16 (Strudels)
  6 for $12.50 (Halupkis)
  $14 (Kolaches)
  Quota: $3.50 each
  Orders due: September 22nd
  Pick up: October 19th at 10-10:30am in the Science Lot
- Krispy Kreme
  Contact: Bridget Carvajal
  Cost: $12 per box
  Quota: $5.00 per box
  Orders due: October 15th
  Pick up: October 22nd at 5-6pm in Liberty High School cafeteria
- Pocono Cheesecakes needs a chairperson.
  Michael Calagna volunteered to chair.
- Bayou Boys Perogies
  Bridget Carvajal volunteered to chair.
Picking up fundraisers
- Bring payment because you can’t take it if you don’t have the payment. Payment is check or money order. There’s no online payment for the fundraisers. Please do not bring cash to a parking lot. If you have to take cash, contact Steph ahead of time.
- If you can’t be there on the day of pick up, you have to find a responsible adult to come pick up that order for you. Whoever you are sending to pick up your order, please make sure they are clear as to what time, where and they have the payment (check or money order). If they show up without a payment, they will have to be turned away.
- Please do not arrive early for the pickup.
- If you have a significant order, you will most likely get a phone call from Steph or Tracy to come help volunteer to organize and help with the pickup day.
- When you come to the science parking lot, please stay in your car for pick up and form a nice orderly circle around the parking lot. The cars that are in the front will get loaded first. Then they can go and everybody can just keep shuffling forward.
- Question: Can checks be sent in at the time of the order?
  No. Physically hand it to us when you pick them up.
- Mums: We had twice as many mums this year as we’ve ever – 799 plants with only three parent volunteers and five students.
- Winter and spring flower sales also require a ton of people to help out. Steph is estimating at least 15. Students can get community service hours. If we get 15 students to be there and then a handful of parents to help just keep it organized, it will go very smoothly.
Cut Time:
- We keep track of all of the financial stuff for your students. Once you get your cut times account set up, you can see if you owe anything or if you have a balance.
- There are a large number of people who still owe the $150 fair share payment for being in band or band and orchestra or still owe $75 for only orchestra. If you are struggling financially please let Steph know.
- If you have credit available in your child’s account, you can use it for the next trip payment no matter how small. For the October payment, please let Steph know by Friday, September 20th so she can get the payment in the mail early next week and it could get credited to your account.
- Question: For seniors, can we zero out the account or do we need money in there for anything else for the rest of the year? Do we have any upcoming expenses for the rest of the year after the Florida trip in January?
  At the end of the year they do a reconciliation of all the accounts and notify parents about refunds available. If, for example, you write a check for $100 for your student’s account and everything else has been fundraised. At the end you have a balance of $300. We can only legally return the $100 back to you that you paid originally. We cannot legally return fundraiser money. Even after the trip, from January until May, you can continue to fundraise, and as long as it doesn’t exceed what you wrote a check for you can get that money back at the end of the year as a refund.
- Question: Will there be a senior trip?
  No, it’s a trip year.

Report from VP of Treasurer (Becky):

September’s financials (Monthly report 8/1 – 8/31):
- Starting balance:$93,000
- Ending balance: $87,000
- Income: $10,528.51
- Expenses: $16,893.30
- Fundraiser totals are given with a breakdown to show you what’s quota and what’s general funds from those fundraisers for the month.
Additional accounts:
- An additional account will be opened to keep your quota money separate from the general fund. Quota will go in, trip payments will come out. So it’ll keep everything cleaner
- An additional account will also be opened for our GiveButter fundraising efforts so our charitable donations from organizations would not flow immediately into the general fund. It will be applied to where it was designated to be used. This will help keep clean record keeping describing what the donation is.
Question:
- Report didn’t match.
  There are two different reports. One is a monthly report (8/1 – 8/31) the other is year to date. In the future, the monthly will be printed and the year to date will be posted online so both can be viewed.
- How did we make income in the instrument accessory column?
  Henderson had to switch the brand of reeds that we purchased and sent us a refund.

Report Grenadier Giving Campaign (Julie):

Sponsorships:
- We’re doing sponsorships. If you know somebody who would like to donate (or you think would donate), send Julie their name.
- $75,000 is the total goal for this school year.
- Julie showed the different sponsorship levels ($20,000 down to $100)
- The whole package is listed on our website in the section where you make donate. There’s now a sponsorship form there too.
- If you are donating, check with your employer. Your employer might do matching gifts. Some will even give a donation for you volunteering your time.
- Marilyn Kelly volunteered to chair sponsorships.
Thank you cards
- We will continue to send Thank you cards/letters to our donors. The dollar amount has not been determined, but at a specific dollar amount, the student senate will write the thank you card to make it more personal.
Donations to specific students
- If you want to make a donation, you can’t make your gift for a specific student because that’s no longer considered a gift if the payment goes to their account. We just want to stay within the rules for the IRS.
We got $1000 through a connection by two people talking. It was not somebody asking for a donation. There’s a lot of opportunities for us.
We are thinking about entering the LHSGBOPC in the Bethlehem parade to walk behind the band to hand out QR codes (and candy).
Julie’s e-mail: grenadiergiving@lhsgbopc.org
She can give me more information if you have more questions.

Report from Directors:

Mr. Frank
- Upcoming Events:
  - Mr. Frank started by going to upcoming events/away football games including the Celtic Classic parade.
  - We have not been 4-0 since 2007. No dates yet, but plan to maybe have activities after Liberty vs.Freedom (playoffs).
  - We’re already looking ahead to Liberty Freedom.
  - Events added to the schedule:
    - Hellertown parade on October 20th
    - Question: Will the kids get bussed to Hellertown?
      Every other year, the kids met us there. We are not scheduling 5 buses the way we do to travel to football games because it is still considered local. But, we do want to offer at least one bus for those that need it.
  - Liberty Freedom Week:
    - Rehearsal with the middle schools will be during the day. So that eliminates an evening rehearsal (October 22nd).
    - Bonfire is at 6:30 pm on Thursday, October 24th. Senior parents please mark your calendars. This is where we do senior recognition to recognize seniors in band, cheerleading and football.
    - Liberty vs. Freedom is on Saturday
    - Parade on Sunday
  - Orchestra: We have a field trip planned for the orchestra on October 7th to go see the PA Symphony rehearsal at Northeast Middle School.
- Band App
  - Before you ask a question in the group chat, remind yourself that there are 400 other people associated with the group and some questions don’t pertain to everybody and can be asked either to a friend or emailed to the directors separately.
  - What has happened is a lot of kids have turned off the notifications because they don’t want to follow parent conversations. So the directors have created a brand new group for band students (orchestra will stay the same). Parents don’t have to do anything. You will see that your group has been renamed to LHSGB 24-25 PARENTS. We have given the kids their own bandapp group.
  - Every post that the directors make to the parents will also be posted to the kids. There are things that are just posted to the kids that don’t necessarily pertain to the parents.
- Social media posts:
  - Please consider your character and use tact when you’re on socials publicly talking about the program. If you see things, please help us respond by commenting in defense or just let us know so we can. Mr. Frank has no problem talking to somebody to help find a solution to their complaint.
- Pep Band is a volunteer group that is for anybody that wants to show up. Students should look for signups on the directors doors.

Mr. Lennox
- Nothing

New Business:

Tag along trip:
Just a reminder for parents if you want to join the Tagalog trip, make sure you register on MyGateway by September 1st.

A motion to close the meeting was made by Jen Roan. Second by Marilyn Kelly. Overall approval by the full organization.