The principal plays a very important role with any parent group, maybe there is history and that is why some parent groups have their principals on their accounts. Another common reason is that the group falls under the school's "walls", they are not a separate 501c. When ever a piece of equipment is "gifted" from the pto it should be actually added to school district inventory, given an id number, meaning that the school board acknowledges that the computer was gifted...at least that is how it works here in my district. something to check in to! It becomes school property!

don't understand why so many PTO/ PTA organizations have the Principals on the bank account. The school has it's money, we have ours. In the past when we have given Principals an "allowance" they have done stuff like buy themselves a laptop two weeks before they resigned, and taken it with them. Sad but true- we no longer give Teachers or the Principal money- they request stuff and we approve or deny the requests in an open meeting. At our school only the PTO president and the PTO Treasurer can write checks or access the funds. The bank statements are printed out and at every meeting, anyone who wants a copy can have one. When it was suggested by the bank that we get a debit card for the account, no one wanted that liability. No one here is eager to have access to PTO money since they are worried about finger pointing in the event of any inconsistencies