Agenda

Agenda

Saint John’s Arboretum Advisory Council Meeting

Monday, May 9, 2005

Room 150 New Science Building, Saint John’s University

                       

12:00 – 1:00    Lunch (optional, meet at office in New Science Building)

 

1:00 – 2:30      Planting trees (We won’t make you plant too many.) 

                        Look at possible site for an EE/ski building

 

2:30 – 5:30      Arboretum Council Meeting (see below for details)

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2:30     Full Council Meeting  (Tom) 

Welcome & Introductions  

 

2:45     FY 06 Budget and Staff Update and Discussion.  See attached budget  (Tom)

 

3:00     Committee Reports: 

Fundraising Committee: 

Update on Solicitation for Environmental Education Endowment  (Larry)

Plant Sale  (Scott)

Grants (Ryan)

            Community Education:

                        Maple Syrup Saturdays and Avon Hills Conference review (Sarah)

                        Coming events and summer programs (Sarah)

                        Homecoming and Collegeville Colors (Tom)

                        Event Advertising (Tom)   

            K-12 Education:

                        Contracts with Schools for FY 06 (Sarah)

                        Programming focus

            Lands:

                        Chapel Repair Funding Commitment (Tom)

Wind Energy towers (Tom)

                        Env. Ed and Ski building (Tom)

            PR/membership.  (Ryan)

            Admin/ Volunteers (Sarah)

 

3:45     Generate the work plan FY 2006, using new strategic plan (Sarah)

 

4:45     Set Schedule for future meetings

 

5:00     Other business

5:30     Meeting closes

Next Arboretum Council meeting is scheduled for Monday, Oct. 3, 2005

Committee Updates – for May 9^th, 2005

K-12 Education 

·         We met with St Cloud ISD 742 administrators in March to discuss how we will continue our partnership to provide environmental education to their students. We discussed how to further integrate the new state standards into the Arboretum curriculum and how to best serve their students. They are very enthusiastic to continue the partnership!

·         Alison Binsfeld and Kari Dombrovski conducted a teacher continuing education evening on March 15^th entitled ‘Bringing Environmental Education into the Classroom’. 16 teachers from area schools participated in the event, which included the Arboretum EE program can be used in the classroom. 

·         Due to recent outreach efforts, we are signing up a number of first-time schools for EE classes this spring. The word is getting out!

 

CSB/SJU Education

·         Two senior students, Luke Ekelund and Erin Lindeke, served as interns in the Arboretum office this spring semester. Their duties included teaching the EE classes and they designed a maple syrup display that can be seen in the main lobby of the Peter Engel building.

·         The Arboretum sponsored a tour of the Saint John’s woodshop for CSB/SJU students and it generated a lot of interest in the students and was well attended.

·         3 CSB seniors from our office will be graduating this spring: Marian Studer (teaching English in Japan), Eli Becker (teaching EE in Ireland), and Marie Ozanne (working in marketing and pr for non-profits). We thank them for their help over the past few years and wish them luck for where ever life takes them next!

 

Community Education

 

·           The annual owl hoot was held on February 23^rd and was attended by 37 people. An indoor power point presentation about MN owls was followed by an outdoor hike where we attempted to call for owls. Despite hearing them the day before, we didn’t hear any owls but luckily had Ron Wienhold present to engage people with his vast knowledge of natural history!

·           The Arboretum co-sponsored the ‘Shaping the Future of Avon Hills’ conference on Saturday, April 9^th. Over 100 people participated in the event, which held sessions during the day about technical and natural history topics and culminated in a roundtable discussion with local officials and representatives.

·           See website for listing of other upcoming events.    http://www.csbsju.edu/arboretum

 

 

Public Relations and Membership Benefits

·         The St. Joseph Newsleader featured our Maple Syrup Festival in a photo feature, shortly after the event.

·         We’ve created a list of over a dozen drop sites to distribute our newsletter on campus.  We hope this will increase the circulation of our primary communication tool.

 

 

Fundraising

·           We launched the Environmental Education Endowment in memory of Fr. Paul  The March, 2005 mailing went to 900 people who had given at least one gift to the Arboretum since 1997.   About 300 were current members.  25 families which have historically given significant gifts to Saint John’s overall will be solicited individually by phone and not by mail.

·           We have applied for grants from the EPA ($10,000), Xcel Energy ($2,500), and the DNR ($4,500), and will submit an application to Gannett Foundation in early May ($3,000).  These are all directed toward bussing funding, traveling trunks, and curriculum research.  The EPA grant is particularly competitive.  We have historically had success with the other three sources.

 

Lands

·           2 Meetings regarding wind energy were held with local officials and with neighbors. 

·           The University and Abbey are forming an initiative to “Save Stumpf Lake” that will involve cleaning up the adjacent coal storage areas, adding a bagging unit to control emissions; removing part of the causeway to Watab Picnic Grounds and replacing the bridge to the picnic grounds.  It would also include the “Eich bridge” at the south end of the lake.  ($$ millions). 

·         The Eich Bridge estimate came in at $17,000 for a very pretty wood bridge.  We would use the campus ROTC to install it.  Thanks to Bill Mock for the estimates. 

·           No funding has been granted for the repair of the Chapel buttresses.  Estimated cost is $15,000.

·           Repair of the Chapel trail will be a priority for our crews this summer. 

·           Steve Plantenberg is the new chair of the Avon Hills Initiative. 

 

Program Administration and Volunteer Management

·         Emily Franklin was hired to be our first office fellow starting in late May. She is a 2004 CSB graduate and came highly recommended from many CSB/SJU professors. Her areas of interest are writing and web design-be looking for great changes in our website soon!

·         The Saint Cloud Area Volunteer Coordinators (an organization we are a member of) held a volunteer appreciation event on Thursday, April 21^st in honor of National Volunteer Week 2005 and all Arboretum volunteers from the past year were invited to participate.