What is MKS?
What is a foundation? Why is this separate from PTA? These are questions we get constantly.
MKS, which stands for Make Keppel Special is your school's foundation. A foundation is a group that can fund-raise for a school without being directly part of the school, the way PTA is.
PTA is an organization who's purposes are basically to promote the welfare of all children, help secure laws for care and protection of all children, bring the relationship of school, parents and teachers closer and more (see your Keppel Kable for the exact wording). Fund raising for Keppel is not what they are about. When PTA does fund raise, it's for their working budget and to bring Keppel such things for the care and protection of your children (emergency supplies, shade, health-related murals). PTA also contributes $5,000.00 each year to help pay for the arts programs listed below. PTA is limited by PTA by-laws to only have two fund raisers a year. This is so PTA keeps their focus at things like community building, relations with parents, teachers and children, and so on.
This is where MKS comes in. In 1991, a group of motivated (and very smart!) parents decided to start a foundation for Keppel. They filed all the right papers, wrote by-laws, had meetings and started fund raising. Pam Ellis (recently retired as president of Glendale's School Board) was one of these dedicated parents. She will be at our first meeting of this school year to give the detailed history of MKS on September 18th. Since 1991, MKS has grown and grown.
What has MKS done?
Each year we raise enough money to help pay for:
Kindergarten through 2nd Grade Music
3rd Grade Recorder Program
4th through 6th Grade Visual Arts Program
In addition to the above we have recently
bought a stove for the teachers to use with the children,
we have repaired the kiln so the children can make things with clay again,
we purchased plants, seeds, tools to get the Unity Garden underway,
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we bought the “Reading Rocks” for the grassy area so the children have a place
to read during recesses in the shade and much more.
What is coming up for MKS?
We are now working hard to get our drama and music stage at a place where we can do some simple productions. Larger productions are still going to be done at the Toll Auditorium -- thank you Toll for sharing! The process of refurbishing Keppel's stage has been a long one, but we are determined to finish it this year. We have met at Arts Focus meetings for more than a year to make decisions like fixing up the stage. Our principal, Mary Mason, is dedicated to this process of inviting parents and teachers to make these decisions together. I feel very fortunate as a parent to be allowed a voice in such decisions for our school. I encourage you all to participate in these meetings (and MKS meetings!) when you can.
Another part of MKS acting as an “umbrella” account for various other groups that make Keppel so special. We do the booking for Drill Team, 5th and 6th Grade Committees, Musical Theatre, and we keep separate accounts for each teacher at Keppel for the annual Read-a-Thon.
Thank goodness we have such smart parents who are able to do our accounting because it is a time consuming, tedious job. This year Joanne Pingry has stepped up to do this job and she is amazing. I feel very lucky to have her working with me. She will be writing for us each month to up-date you on how much our fund raisers are bringing in. If you want all the accounting details, she provides us those at our MKS meetings.
I hope this article helps you all to understand MKS better. I hope you now understand why we do all the fund raising we do and why it is so important to help, either by
volunteering to help with an event if you can, or
financially participate by purchasing something at our various fund raisers or
by giving a flat-out donation.
Every penny helps!
If you have any questions or want to contact me to volunteer you can email me at: MKS_news@yahoo.com or leave me a phone message at Keppel - 818-244-2113. Please bookmark this web site and come back -- we'll update it as often as we can.
Thank you all for you support!
Joan Zierhut
MKS Chairperson
