Perhaps you can seek some help at your School Board Meetings that are ususally held quaterly and during their meetings there's a session where Parents voices can be heard. Don't sit back. The PTA is for the parents, they don't control all votes. Be heard!
If your PTO appears to be stepping beyond the usual mission of a parent-teacher organization into a group that appears to be taking the authority to change school policies and procedures, approach the principal or (barring success doing that) the district superintendent with your concerns.
Our PTO moved board meetings to mornings so that less would attend and votes would go through smoother by recommendation on the council prez a few years ago. Times have not changed so it must have worked well.
Parents are invited to those meetings...but most of our parents work and have no chance to go.
General meetings go in this order. PTO reports, budget posted on wall, and then a performance from the students. Sometimes it's just one grade or a few grades performing...and ONLY those parents show up. They are coming for the performance...that's it! We get ONE question proposed to the members once a year and that is do you vote ye or nay for the slate of officers. The members are never asked their opinions on decisions the board makes. The board recently made a policy that affected the parents without a vote or survey or any chance to say no...then when members asked why can't we have a say...it was told to us the the policy is in effect and will be going into the by-laws. Don't we get to vote on that? Don't we get to vote on anything? The board makes all of the decisions and tells us what they decided.
Should a PTO board have that kind of authority? If a policy changes...shouldn't the members be asked to vote on it or at the very least if they are in agreement with it? Should the meetings be open for any questions or concerns from the floor at a general meeting so that members actually feel a part of the process? Our members are ganging up and not buying in next year because it seems to them that they have it under control and don't need the members for a thing!
