AGM MINUTES
Held in the Computer Suite, in Eyemouth Community Centre, Monday 5th November 2018
Present: Jayne Gibbs (Chairperson), Katie Murray (Vice Chairperson) Danielle Laing, Donna Black, Georgina Short, Nicola Hutchinson, Nicola Burgon (Trustee), Andrew Lee, Joanne Butler, Katy Simm, Sarah Ponton, Leevi Brown, Miriam Lindsay (Nursery Manager), Julie Windram (Office Manager)
Apologies: Amy Meek
1. Introduction
ML opened the meeting by welcoming everyone and thanking everyone for coming, she told everyone that it was really appreciated that they had given up their time to attend as she understands that we all have busy lives, and that she was overwhelmed by the number of attendees at this years AGM.
ML introduced herself to the group in her role as Nursery Manager, JW as Office Manager, JG as Chairperson and KM as Vice Chairperson and explained that due to children moving onto the school and personal circumstances, both JG and KM were no longer able to assist the nursery in their appointed roles, and thanked them for all their help over the last year.
2. Staffing
Gemma Tones, Abigail Emblen and Roxanne Charles have now successfully completed their Level 3 childcare training – well done girls!!!
ML informed the group of the staff changes;
Pups Room (2 year old room)
Staffed by Lynsey Finnie, Abigail Emblen & Roxanne Charles
AE & LF are both on full time hours, RC is part time and lunch cover.
JW works Monday, Wednesday & Friday mornings usually, but has been working extra recently to cover staff:child ratios and provide lunch cover.
ML is working full time splitting her time between the office and the playroom.
Seals Room (3-5 year old room)
Staffed by Lisa Slicer, Jane Richardson with ML, KM and JW covering in the interim
Gemma Tones should be in the Seals room but is unfortunately on long term sickness at the moment and will continue to be for the foreseeable future, however, she has been coming into the nursery whenever she feels up to it to see the children, who have all loved seeing her too.
ML informed the meeting that we have employed a new member of staff who is due to start working with us at the end of November, she is a fully trained Level 3 Nursery Practitioner – we look forward to welcoming her to the team!
3. Progress Report
We have been successful in signing a 3 year lease on a room in the community centre which is now what we call the Pups Room for our 2 year olds.
This decision was made because of our option to offer 3-5 year old funded children the full 1140 hours on offer from Scottish Borders Council, we have to occupy the main nursery room all day. This would mean that we would no longer be in a position to offer a service to our 2 year olds.
We have been inspected by the Care Inspectorate, and are allowed to have a maximum of 28 children in the Seals Room, and 10 in the Pups room at the one time.
The Pups Room has been decorated and we are really happy with the result, it has proven to be a really calm environment. Our goal is to be in the financial position to be able to do the same with the Seals Room.
It has been working really well running the 2 rooms, we now offer breakfast club and provide lunch from The Tavern. It has taken a little time to see how it works at lunch time and to get used to new routines but we feel that we are now running lunch club well.
Having the majority of children in all day means that a lot of the children are quite tired in the afternoon. Our new routine in the Seals Room is that in the morning we are very busy, being creative, doing PE etc and in the afternoon it is more laidback. We do songs and dancing in the afternoon, and will be introducing yoga soon.
ML asked for feedback regarding the lunch from the Tavern, and informed the group that we had made a couple of tweaks to the menu once it had been trialled, we found that some things were not popular, or were too difficult for the children to eat by themselves (e.g. baked potato).
· NB found that it was helping her girls to eat better at home, and were more willing to try new foods.
· DB thought it was fab, she loves it! Her daughter doesn’t tend to snack as much in the afternoon now.
· KM said her son loves them.
· JB said her daughter loves it and eats everything on the menu. ML and JW agreed that her daughter was a brilliant eater at lunch time.
Snack – we open a rolling snack in the morning, where children are offered a variety of foods which include fruit, dry foods i.e. crackers/ breadsticks, cheese, ham, yoghurts, cereal to name a few. In the afternoon we tend to have snack and a drink during story time, giving the children some lovely relaxing down time.
Inspections – we have had 2 inspections recently, from the Care Inspectorate and a Scottish Borders Council on the spot inspection. Both inspections went really well, nothing negative was brought up, all feedback received was positive and shows that we are moving in the right direction. ML said that she had been very open and honest with the inspectors, and had built good relationships with Scottish Borders Council.
Seashells are assigned an Early Years Teacher from Scottish Borders Council who supports the nursery and staff, called Charlotte Teather. Charlotte has been in the nursery a lot more in recent weeks as ML is pushing the learning of the nursery forward, and she has been on hand to support the staff with this.
We also invited environmental health in to inspect the Pups room before it opened. They requested that we install handwashing facilities, another toilet (due to the increase in the number of children we can take) and provide a way to give the children a little more respect and privacy in the nappy changing area. We have purchased a mobile handwashing station which is situated in the pups room which has proven to be very useful so far! We also contacted a local joiner who built a wall in the toilet area, where we have put a changing unit, meaning that whilst the children are being changed, they are given privacy. We have 4 cubicles in the toilet area – 2 were used as a children’s toilet, 1 as a staff toilet and the other cubicle was used as a storage cupboard. On emptying the 4th cupboard we discovered a toilet and sink, which after being inspected by a plumber, was found to be in fully working order! So we are now able to offer the children the use of 3 toilets and an additional staff toilet which can be opened up to be used by the children during busy times.
ML spoke to the group about the break in, which happened to our brand new Pups room, just 2 weeks after it was opened. She found this very upsetting, due to the amount of time and work which had gone into making the room as beautiful as it was. She said how proud she was of everyone pulling together after the break in, that the community had been fantastic donating new furnishings, (a lot of brand new items had to be thrown out due to blood contamination) toys, books, teddies etc. Some people donated money to help the nursery get back on their feet so to speak, and we are extremely grateful for this!
From the donated money we have purchased new rugs, cushions, blankets. We have also purchased a splash-suit for all 2 year olds to use, and a sensory wall which was due to be fitted the next day, a flat bubble wall.
4. Finance Report
JW presented a copy of the 2017-18 Accounts to the meeting, which includes a breakdown of our income and expenditure for the year. She explained that the original accounts and documents were at the Accountants but was hoping for them to be returned soon.
The following points were highlighted;
Income – the nursery raised an amazing £891.50 over the year, which is great – ML thanks for the support with this! The fundraising events were tickets for our nativity, and a raffle afterwards, and a bag pack at B&M.
This money has been put towards our ongoing goal of painting the nursery and covering the pipework/ radiators as well as helping with our running costs.
Expenditure – there has been additional spend on wages this year, due to a greater number of children meaning we require additional staff to allow us to continue to provide the high standard of care and learning we have set ourselves.
JW presented the meeting with comparison figures that she has been working on, which details the income and expenditure trends of the nursery over the past 6 years. The main points to note were that the funding that we receive from SBC has maintained at about the same level, meaning that we are maintaining the high number of children as previous years. JW also highlighted the fact that the level of fees that we are earning has increased again, this time by £7.5k, the previous year it increased by £8k which is great news for the nursery, the chart showing that is has almost doubled since she started collating the information for the 2012-13 financial year!
Overall, it has been another successful year for Seashells!
ML informed the group that in order to try to keep paper costs down, she wondered if parents would prefer to receive information, and newsletters by Email rather than paper copy? Yes – everyone agreed that they would prefer that. **JW to print a list of current Email addresses held on file, parents to check that we have the correct Email address. ML will put a post on Facebook to inform parents that there has been a communication issued by Email.
AM was unable to attend the AGM but had held discussions with ML previously, and had requested that a fortnightly report be sent by Email, to inform the parents what their child has been learning, ML agreed that this was a good idea. **ML to look into this and prepare a report.
5. Fees
ML told the group that since it was agreed that the session price would increase slightly at last years AGM, there would be no increase this year.
The price to cover snack and craft for the funded children is currently £2 per week, and has not been increased for a number of years. JG proposed that the price be increased to £2.50 per week, all agreed. ML informed the group that due to Eyemouth being classed as being a deprived area, the weekly price for snack and craft would never exceed £2.50. This increase will be effective from January 2019.
NB asked why we were not increasing the fees, because her accountant always advises her to increase her prices annually due to the cost of living increasing every year etc, as a business it makes sense. ML replied that due to the local area being classed as a deprived area, Seashells wants to be an affordable service to as many people as possible, we did not wish to increase the fee’s to a level which would make some families struggle financially.
JW told the group that due to personal circumstances she had to work from home the previous Friday, when she calculates the fee’s, and had sent the weekly bills out to parents through Facebook Message as she did not have access to a printer, she found that it had worked well and more fee’s had been paid this way, rather than printing a paper bill. Everyone agreed that they felt it worked better this way. Parents who are on Facebook please ensure that you have sent the Seashells Facebook page a message (even if it is an empty message) because the page is a business page, we are unable to contact individuals who have not messaged us before! Parent’s who are not on Facebook, can receive an Email instead, or a paper bill will be issued still. Please let JW know if you would like the bill Emailed.
6. Going forward 2018-19
ML talked about the Improvement Report for Seashells.
She provided the group with one of the Learning Journey Folders, which is child is given. She showed the individual sections of the folder, Health & Wellbeing, Numeracy, Literacy and the tracking sheets used by staff to assess the individual child’s learning.
ML told the group that no matter where their child attends a nursery within the Scottish Borders, all nurseries are tracking children and tracking their learning in the same way. They are pushing the children’s learning all the time. In the Pups room we refer to the documents Birth to Three and Building the Ambition, and in the Seals room the Curriculum of Excellence. In the Pups room, the focus is mainly on fine and gross motor skills.
ML informed the group that work was due to start on the outdoor fence soon, having used some of the fundraising and donations following the break in, it was decided to make the outdoor play area more secure by making the fence higher. A local company has agreed to do this work and we are negotiating a start date.
We still plan to have the whole nursery decorated by next summer and this is our main goal. The walls are currently yellow, which is not a good colour for children with additional needs. ML would like the front entrance, Seals Room and bathrooms all painted the same as the Pups room - a lovely, natural calm neutral colour. To be able to do this we need to raise a substancial amount of money and we asked if the parents present at the AGM would consider forming a Fundraising Team to help us to do this. NB, DB, LB, SP, DL, KS all agreed to be part of this. If other parents/ carers would like to be involved in this please let us know, we welcome all offers of help!!
ML said she would work hard to ensure that she applies for grants when they become available.
Suggestions from the group for fundraising were a music night? Something in the Tavern? A quiz night?? All will be considered and any other suggestions are welcome!
ML/JW will make a target board to be displayed in the foyer to show the fundraising balance, ML to make a mood board to show what our goal is.
We have a Christmas Craft Fair on the 24th November 10-2, ML asked if she could have a couple of volunteers to help out on the day.
AM volunteered 10-2, DL, DB, LB all agreed to help out and were flexible as to the times.
7. Election of Committee
ML explained that due to children moving onto the school and personal circumstances, both JG and KM were no longer able to assist the nursery in their appointed roles, and thanked them for their help during the year. She asked JG and KM to give a brief example of the things that they had done in their roles, which they did.
ML asked that after hearing the examples, whether anyone would be interested in the role of Chairperson? DL volounteered to be Chairperson. NB proposed that DL become Chairperson, NH agreed. ML welcomed DL to the team! She then asked if anyone would consider becoming Vice Chairperson. KS volounteered to do this role. NH proposed that KS take on the role of Vice Chairperson, DB agreed. JW asked NB if she was still happy to be Trustee, NB agreed that she was.
New appointed roles Chairperson Danielle Laing
Vice Chairperson Katy Simm
Trustee Nicola Burgon
JW informed DL and KS that the Chairperson and Vice Chairperson usually become signatories for the bank account, and asked if DL and KS were happy to become a signatory as we require 2 to sign cheques, DL and KS agreed to become signatories.
JW to provide Disclosure Scotland forms and RBS forms for completion.