Wow, I'm impressed by a few of these! Our school this last year had about 825 students. Our regular "core" group is 7.
We send monthly newsletters, we hosted several events- and we sent out lots of information.
Response is not very high- we have to actually make phone calls to find help.
We keep reminding eachother when we get frustrated that we are doing this for all of the kids, and every time we hear them raving about how much fun they had at an event, or how wonderful something was that we helped make happen- all of the time, energy, and hard work is well worth it! These are days they will remember and cherish when they grow up.

Relieved to hear the activity level of parent outweighs the meeting attendance. We have a great group of chair people and most will come to the meeting prior to the event to announce what is going on.

97% of our chairs run their programs without any help from the executive board and go off without problems. We have had at least 2 programs that almost didn't happen but got salvaged at the last minute.

Thank you sooo much for all the advise and tips. Yesterday we sent out a flyer asking for ideas or our spring picnic and for volunteers so we'll see how that turns out.

We did do a survey to parents and out of 200 families, only 42 were sent back but the interesting part of that was the ones who sent back, were one's who have never volunteered for ANYTHING this past year. Many made comments that the PTO has made some great changes and they want to help more next year so I guess we're looking like we're a fun/well organized group LOL

National PTA developed the National Standards for Parent/Family involvement programs several years ago. (In fact, using it as a model, several schools districts and states have developed plans like this. Ours included)
It addresses the issue of getting parents to volunteer but also so much more. No where does it address meeting attendance. It's getting parents involved that really matters. I was told that by our state President in years past and I continue to parrot the fact to my own units. (You see, like you, I thought it was important for parents to attend the meetings. I attended them!) But as I was told, and I've come to see myself, it just isn't the case.
Even those successful PTAs where the activities are abundant- still have low meeting attendance but VOLUNTEERS for the events...There are often so many, they don't know what to do with them all. They also utilized the bulletin boards, e-mail and every other thing they could think of to keep people informed. Establishing your programs prior to the beginning of the school year and getting volunteers by sign ups early in the year is also VERY helpful.
Our school district is currently working on the idea of setting up a parent's e-mail account access, so that not only the PTA/PTO can get information out to those who don't have e-mail for whatever reason but also so that teachers can as well.
Our local libraries have computers that you can use for free and there are umpteen amounts of sites that will give you a free e-mail account and even if you have a small number of parents with one, that is still more parents you can personally get information to.

Wow, a listener. Nice to have you hear, insanemom (and love the name!).

Just to elaborate a bit, I definitely did say that the meeting attendance measuring is way, way less important than the attendance at family events and involvement evenings, etc.

A frequent response to that is something like: "Yeah, but how can we put on events if we can't get anyone at meetings to help us plan events?"

To that, I respond that the event (one event, two events, however many your current core team can handle well) done really well is the stepping stone to meeting attendance.

Folks (most folks, average moms and dads) don't come to meetings. Folks hate meetings. Meetings are fairly boring. But folks (at least a lot more folks than would come to a meeting) willl come to a well-planned, attractive event. Think: Family Game Night or Fun & Games Night or Family Arts & Craft Night ( www.schoolfamilynights.com ).

And -- because your current core group of volunteers does such a great job making people feel welcome at those events and making sure the events are tons of fun and making sure even the volunteers look like they're having a good time -- some of your attendees will start to think that the group must be a pretty decent group to be around, and eventually some of those attendees will attend a meeting or two and maybe even volunteer for something. And some of those volunteers will eventually become crazy people (the affectionate definition of crazy) like you and help lead the group.

I've always said that no amount of bribery or raffle tickets or babysitting can put a shine on a really boring event or make a less-than-exciting group seem exciting. Those things (the raffle, the babysitting, switching up meeting times, etc.) are great tools, as long as your group is fun and engaging and doing great work and making great use of volunteer's talents, yadda, yadda.

In sum: yes, groups do better with more meeting attenders and more volunteers helping to organize things. But I think more meeting attendance comes as a result of great events and improvements. Not vice versa.

Tim

I just attended the PTO conf. What Tim strongly stated is that IT DOES NOT matter how many people come to the meetings, but how many families get involved with the activites that you have at the school. I am know going to do the best I can to increase the number of families we have for any school function. then work on inviting them personnal to the PTO meetings. Just my 2 cents