Unregistered, clearly the principal has involved you because you are a person who sticks out as having a vested interest in the school and children, a positive influence.

When a situation involves a parent a principal certainly has the right to ask questions of other parents or teachers to try to get to the truth of the matter, to make sure she/he has all the facts before approaching the parent in question.

We had a situation at our school where sharing information proved very beneficial. We have several difficult parents and one in particular has been going around bad mouthing and questioning everything from PTA, homeroom parents, teachers, to even the most beloved one of all, our gym teacher.

Seems after people open up about this parent (shared their horror stories) there is a very long list of offenses. So in her mind she is "exercising her rights" when in reality she is doing so much damage to herself and the school. No one takes her serious any more and she accepts no responsibilty for this attitude towards her. She is a master at the blame game.

Communication is very important, if the principal is avoiding the trouble maker it may be because no matter what the principal says it will not please the trouble maker. There are some people in the world who will simply never be satisfied, they are the ones we try to avoid for peace of mind.

I too am curious how your conflict was resolved. Our conflict is still on going, our trouble maker is like the Energizer bunny, keeps going, and going, and going, and going!

unregistered you say "Of course this got right back to the principal who requested a meeting with me because we have a good relationship." amd "So the administrators and staff are fed up."
sounds like this is purely a matter for admin to handle. i dont see why they use you as intermediary, in particular when not with the presence of the person in question. what resolution do they hope to achieve if they dont (ie head of schol) talk directly to the person they think is causing problems? usually, the direct approach works best in handling personnel or management issues.seems like things are going to get worse before they get better if the head of school uses an intermediary, you , to help resolve issues he/she needs to addrss as it seems its a school wide matter, ie staff involved.

Hey,

I have a woman on our PTO who is very similar. I would say she is also, as you say,

the source of 85% of the poison that's being spread about the PTO.

The problem is, however, now she is also spreading rumors about me, and my "hidden agenda" behind why I am on the PTO now. (I don't know what that is yet, I'll let you know when I find out.)

I recently took on the position as fundraising chairperson for our k-5 school, and for some reason, she has it in for me. This woman, I will admit, does a lot for our school. It is her life.

BUT, everything she says is counteractive to what she does, and I just don't get it.

The hardest thing for me, like you, to get past is that the ones who will suffer are the kids and the teachers/staff. We do this for them.

I never wanted this position, in fact, I was asked three times before I finally said yes. But once I made the decision, I was at peace with it, and I knew I could do it.

The thing is, now that I am finally here, I feel as though it was the wrong choice. I feel as though I am being scrutinized and vilified for everything I have done or plan to do, despite the fact that there is no real glory or glamour in it for me.

I feel your pain. I'm interested to hear what happened at your meeting. I know it was a couple of months ago, but if you read this, let me know. I'd love to find out what she said.

Tell her upfront that what she's been saying about the principal to the staff has gotten back to the principal. Let her know that the staff & teachers told you they feel put off by her and won't participate because of her inappropriate comments and attitude.

I'm curious to know what her response is. My guess is she'll probably quit.

I would talk to her first & tell her that "it has come to my attention that you have misusing (don't know if this is the right word to use) the PTO name & we can not have you using it for your own personal vendetta against the school, teachers.... certain things need to be kept confidential....you need to either get on board or move on. We are a Parent Teacher Org. & we are here for the children. If you have an issue with principal/teacher you need to address them as a parent." something to that affect. Don't be afraid to stand your ground. Your group can vote her out but before you do...talk to her & if she doesn't straighten out in by next meeting then she's gone, put it in writing & tell her she needs to step down because......., then have a vote to have her out of the PTO since she doesn't have the PTO & kids best interests. Good luck!!!!

I'm actually a registered user but I don't want to post this using our school's i.d. We are a new PTO. We're very unstructured in terms of leadership. There is currently a leadership team of 5 people although only 2 of us do the majority of the actual work. We've been having the usual growing pains of difficult members, fundraising, parent participation, etc. The part that we were hoping to change first was the teacher involvement.

I've come to find out that the other woman I work closely with has been bad mouthing the principal to the school staff ... really inappropriate stuff, about how ineffective she feels the principal is and implying that the principal is racist in how she handles issues. She made these statements while in a meeting representing our PTO group. Of course this got right back to the principal who requested a meeting with me because we have a good relationship. Via this meeting, I come to find out that this person who is supposed to be promoting our organization is the reason that we have no teacher participation. She's inappropriate and demeaning to the staff, she's got this weird sense of entitlement at the school for herself and her kids, and she's been indiscreet with confidential information regarding other children that she's come across while working at the school. It appears as though all this time she's been saying one thing to me and we've been "working together" on a common goal, but behind the scenes she's been undoing everything --deliberately or unknowingly, I don't know. So the administrators and staff are fed up. we have no staff participation. Our parent participation is limited to the 10 or so regulars that attend -- 3 or so of whom are difficult at best. I know that once this is addressed, that it will turn into a picking sides thing which is going to just be awful for the school because nothing will get done. But it does need to be addressed asap. The principal and the members of staff who have approached me have no problems with me repeating what I've been told. Their words excactly were "SO and SO is the source of 85% of the poison that's being spread about the PTO". This woman has told me half truths, most of the time half of the story, and in some instances has neglected to tell me anything at all about some very important issues. It's probably worth mentioning that we have NO bylaws -- they are still a work in progress. I can really use some good advice here. This woman was supposed to be a friend but I can let that go. What I'm really sick about is that the school and the children will suffer greatly because of this. I could use all of your words of wisdom. We have a regular PTO meeting tomorrow night and I'd like to have it addressed prior to that. Thanks so much.