We have been a long time PTA group. We are a Middle school and change faces alot. When I came to the school, I was informed that we had lost money on the previous years membership because we didn't realize there was a raise in the State membership. I came from a PTO school and couldn't understand how we could lose money on membership - isn't membership a fundraiser ??? So I ran for office, put it on the ballot. Had the PTA come to our meetings and tell everyone what PTA is. And proceded with a disbandment vote. I wanted everyone to see the benefits for both and choose so we decided not to made a board recomendation and let everyone vote. A long time PTAer came to the meeting and raised a stink about that technicality. Said the disband portion of the bylaws said we had to have a board recommendation. I said we recommend everyone decide on their own. We weren't allowed to vote.
Now we have to wait another year. Bring the PTA in again, educate the new members about the differences and make a vote before school lets out so we can start next year off PTO or PTA whichever is decided without collecting membership money and switching and all that.
The PTA definately doesn't let go once it has you. They tell you that you have to forfeit your money to them, follow all these procedures, etc. And make you feel like you're in big trouble if you leave.
They make it so hard to leave, you feel it's easier to avoid it altogether and continue paying them for services you never use.
I talked to so many of our members who said they didn't wait to disband because it seems so hard. I asked "Do you give money to the phone company if you don't use the phone, too?"
Hopefully, I can work it out this year and our members will realize that the $1000's of dollars we give the PTA is better used on our kids.
Whether you want to go on the technicality or not, you shouldn't have to feel like you're somehow now "owned" or "deep in" with the PTA, unless your group wants to be. If you haven't had your bylaws approved, and you haven't sent any membership dollars in and you haven't been distributing cards -- call the PTA office and tell them thanks for the interest, but you guys have decided against the PTA option. You guys are adults doing good work. You're allowed to change your mind.
If PTA office doesn't like that, well, the fact is that you haven't sent membership dollars in and you haven't been using cards, etc. So it's kind of a done deal anyway.
At the end of the day, it should be what your group wants. If you guys don't want to be a PTA, don't be. If anything, it should be easier for you guys to make that call than it might be for a long-time PTA. I can never quite understand why the PTA folks would want to force/pressure a group to stay PTA, if that group doesn't want to be PTA.
We were re-reading the old by-laws today trying to see if we can use them or the PTA revised by-laws. But because the PTA by-laws haven't been approved, we had to revert to the old by-laws.
Well while reading them I came across the Disbandment section and it states clearly that when we originally voted we had to have 2/3 of the members in favor of PTA - well the vote was 12 to 20 which make 32 and 2/3 of 32 is 21.66666.I checked my math 3 times!
So technically they mis-counted the ballots!!!!
Don't you agree!!!! I think that calls for a mistrial in my book!
We are going through the same thing. We haven't collected any memberships either. What our state rep. told us is that the memberships themselves expire 9-30-02. So that means everyone from last year can vote within 30 days of the expiration date- that would bring you to 10-30-02. As far as the bylaws, I don't know you may want to call the state rep. Ours have actually expired so we're going off the old bylaws. I believe you would still be considered a PTA because of the expiration dates. But we've also paid our $25.00 dues and if we switch to a PTO we're just out that amount. Also the state rep. told us we could sell cards to the new parents so they can have a vote as well but we would just need to send that money to the state. I don't know if any of this helps. Are you going to file for a non-profit status (501c3) if you're going PTO? Just curious on the length of time it takes to be approved.
Thanks and good luck!
We have been wondering how deep into PTA are we? We have paid our $25.00 yearly dues, but we have not had our by-laws approved nor have we had our membership meeting held or sent in any cards.
Are we actually PTA yet? We are not sure what by-laws we would have to follow because we haven't had ours approved.
We would like to switch to PTO before we are in too deep. Anybody out there have any ideas on this?
Thanks for all the GREAT info I've been reading the past couple of weeks. My house is a mess, but I'm getting more informed for sure!
