Booster Meeting December 8th, 2016

Post date: Jan 15, 2017 4:03:55 PM

In attendance: Kathleen Follett, Kristi Sarchi, Liz Rollins, John Hankinson, Emily Pershing, Laurie Logan, Andrea Murray, Brenda Clark, Bruce Manley, Lisa Gove, Molly Washo, Patti Neuville, Kevin Burnsteel

Treasurer's Report: with a $12,000 start, we've made $2,500, +$930 still to come in.

Compared to the last two shows:

Learned Ladies: $1,650

Into the Woods: $4,300

This is with no Show Stopper sponsor.

Ticket sales were a bit over $7,000 (some of this goes back to the school)

Head Counts:

Thursday 159

Friday 206

Saturday 248

Sunday 188

The house capacity is about 350.

We discussed possible reasons for the small turnout. Most likely reason is that it was a small cast and crew compared to previous years. Also, this was a relatively unknown/outdated show. The show was also less expensive, though, which helped offset the lower ticket sales.

PAC update: Liz reported that the PAC committee has been chosen and there's only one staff member (Kevin Rollins). There's also a student and about a dozen community members.

Carousel Comments

K. Burnsteel:

Strike was a challenge because nobody knew how the set was put together, so nobody knew how to take it apart. We discussed ways to make parents and volunteers feel more needed and welcome. Specifically, recruit people with their own power tools and then assign specific chores (or make it clear that it's ok to just dive in and start taking things apart).

K. Sarchi:

Party was great (kids are great...) but too much pizza and cake! TONS of food left over. There were 6-8 pizzas left uneaten. On average, girls tend to have 1 slice, boys have 2. That can be the new guide for estimating pizza.

L. Logan:

Lots of hassle with the program. It would help to have a process sheet for future transitions so that everyone knows the correct way to do things (no screen shots of ads, etc). Greg Pershing will take care of this (and be in charge of programs for the next show).

L. Rollins:

Happy with the number of students in the pit (8 out of 11 musicians). The plexiglass was great. Some people felt that the music was too loud from some locations, others thought it was fine. It was neat that audience members stood around after the show was over to listen to the pit. Good feedback.

Expressed regret that she didn't get to know the crew better. Many of these students are not coming to meetings. In fact, there's a larger problem of getting the cast and crew to show up in a reliable way. It wasn't that specific students failed to show multiple times, just that there was always someone missing. We brainstormed possible solutions to this problem.

-Schedule at least 1.5 weeks ahead of time for those students who have after-school jobs.

-Communicate with parents (we need those emails!)

-Facebook group for parents?

-Director's notes as part of the routine email

-Blue Sheet contract similar to what is given to athletes? Including medical information--this is really important!

Thanksgiving lunch was great. Kids seemed to like it a lot. New tradition?

Spring show: will be March 23, 24, 25, 26...or possibly just Friday through Sunday? Saturday will be the dessert theater. Sunday show possible at 3:00pm so that everyone can get home for homework, etc.

Auditions will be in late January, early February, and there will be a Booster meeting following that.

We still need a new president. Kathleen, Andrea and Emily will work together to keep things running until a replacement can be found.

Liz would like to have kids attend the One Act Drama Festival in March. Group was enthusiastic about this. Details to come later.

Emily will contact Ray Coyle about spring headshots

Molly will run the Northway Scholarship

Next meeting was not discussed.