I am a spec ed parent of two boys and oen of CO VP for our PTO. At our district the PTO is for everyone. We do however have a Spec. ED Forum in which we invite parents, special ed director and monthly speakers to speak to our group. Often times we have speakers that educate the parents on special ed laws, IEP's, rules and regualtions. It sounds like you need to work with your special ed director in building a Forum or monthly meetings for the special ed parents. You then in return disolve the Special ed PTO and become members of the regular PTO. It's to hard to do seperate fundraisers when parents like us can do so much for our teachers and students belonging to a larger PTO. Parents like us can advocate for special classroom supplies for the special ed rooms and use the money available through your bigger PTO. If you need help please email at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. Good Luck.

LSchouten...thanks for explaning, it sounds like a nice group for the special need parents. It reminded me how different each group and school can be, once I read about the needs, advocacy, etc i can see that sort of stuff is left for our site base team. Our PTO main purpose is getting more family involvment and family oriented events. We seem to be really focused on those areas, very seldom do we have any "real Issue" come before us, guess it is because we aren't known for that. OUr prinicpal attended all of our meetings and if something came up she woudl openly discuss the situation and then often talk to the parent one on one afterwards. Nice thing your district has going on!

One thing I am going to try this year in order to link the PTOs and community is to have a PTIC (Parent-Teacher Involvement Committee). I would like to see at least 1 teacher and 1 parent from each of our 6 PTOs to meet and discuss how we can better involvement and exchange ideas on various things.

As far as being "shady," you have to start somewhere. You are calling people you know and they are calling people they know. Just be sure you are able to send out election info in plenty of time before your meeting. You have to start somewhere.

We are making our bylaws also. Our school has students from two elementaries coming to it. I wanted to kind of merge their bylaws into one. In your case you want to make sure you have a copy of PL 94-142 and other recent laws that you may can incorperate into your bylaws.

I think it is great your special ed has its own group. In my state I feel like special ed is greatly overlooked. I am the parent rep on our KCMP. What that really boils down to is I set there and look pretty so the district can say they have a parent rep and this committee doesn't really address alot of the issues that our spec ed depts face.

I get the NCPIE newsletter, it often addresses disablitly and spec ed issue. You can go to www.ncpie.org to find out more. There may be something there that can help you.

I think the reason for SEPTO's creation in the first place is because Spec Ed parents have issues specific to them and needed more of a support group atmosphere, and a forum for speakers pertaining to Spec Ed issues, ie. advocacy, specific disability info, etc.
Parents are certainly allowed to be a part of both PTO's. The problem is 2-fold, it is disheartening for parents of more severely disabled children to help plan events with the Gen Ed PTO where their children problably aren't going to be a part of, and second, there is a large population of children with less severe disabilites, where the parents don't attend SEPTO. Currently Septo is mainly attended by the parents of the more severely disabled kids.
We do not do any fundraising events of our own. The PTO's do an amazing amount of fundraising, there is always on going events, they make in the high ten's of thousands each year. Our Septo pres has never had the man power to do any kind of fundraising, and we don't want to compete with a PTO fundraiser. So she has asked each of the building PTOs for donations, most give between $250-$400 each, we have 8 buildings in the district.
I'm not saying this is an ideal situation. I definately want to create a more inclusive environement. That is a big issue of Septo is to try an get the schools and community to be more accepting of our children.
We have a large district , and a large population of children with disabilites, approx 1700. We have a wide range of classroom options, 6-1-1, 8-1-1, 12-1-1, Collaborative (2 teachers co-teaching, one gen ed, one spec ed, kids are a mix of both), Resource room, etc.
This is a great point, How do I get the PTO's to be better linked?

Is this a district request, that there be a differet pto for special eduaction students? I guess I am just wondering the purpose of this and how many schools do it. Two years ago our school became a 12-1-1 school and it was very important that we treated them as equal as the other students. Our principal talked with me about ways to ammend some things so that all children can take part. Our school is big on inclusion and mainstreaming, I am just wondering if a second group sends a unwelcoming message. Are parents of special need students allowe dto participate in the regular pto? Do you do special events for them and that is why there are two groups? If the meetings are becoming complaing sessions maybe the parents of the special needs children need the support of the regular needs parents. I could see where this would not work, sounds like they need some communication and feel they arent getting it from the pto. Will you please explain how long there have been seperate groups and if any one else out there does this as well please help me understand it? Thanks

We have a PTO for each of our 8 schools in our district. We also have a SEPTO, Special Education PTO, which is district-wide.
Situation: Current President has been the self appointed person for past 6 years. She wants to step down in Sept and hand the job to me, because that is how it was given to her. I want the job, but I want to follow bi-laws and create structure to our organization. For the past 3 years I've attended meetings, there has been no elections, no agenda, an occasional speaker, and generally turns into a complaining session. This atmosphere has become a place where parents stop coming and teachers fear coming. I want to change the atmosphere to welcome group team work. I've met with the Spec Ed Director and another involved parent and we've come up with some great ideas to create positive change.
PROBLEM: This other parent has done a lot of work this year to facilitate change, but she wants to force an election by calling whoever we know and scheduling an election in August so we can have a board in place by our Sept meeting - which we have big plans to introduce a new Spec Ed Director, create a brochure to invite teachers, chairpersons, administrators to be a part of our "New" Organization.. But I fear that it will be viewed as "shady" because we can only call those we know, there isn't any way to reach everyone during the summer. The way the current Pres. wants to do it, is to have me serve as interim president for the summer (ie. go ahead with the planning and inviting to our first meeting) and then at the first meeting she will say that she recommends me, if anyone wants to run against me, we will have a vote.
We don't have any bi-laws that I can find. I am about to get a copy of one of the building PTO's bi-laws and see if this can be copied by us. But what are your suggestions of how I should handle this situation? The best thing for all is to get this current pres out asap, so we can begin the first meeting with a fresh outlook. Once she starts, she doesn't be quiet and I don't want to be rude, I would appreciate any advice on what I should do.
Second question is in regards to fundraising: Does any of your schools have seperate PTO's for gen ed and spec ed like we do. How are fundraisers done and monies shared? Currently, we do none of our own fundraisers, we have to ask the other building PTO's for money from theirs and most share a small amount ($250-$400) for the entire year.
How do other schools handle this?
Thank you for your input.