I love my principal and all of our faculty and staff they are 100% supportive of us and very appreciative of the job we do.

Coming to this website and hearing all the horror stories made me realize how blessed we really are with our school and all of the staff.

I am sure that most schools have good experiences as opossed to the ones that have bad situations.
The people with the bad situations need to vent and need advice so that is why you see posts like that often. It's like the news at night, you get 20 horror stories and one nice piece of news (if your lucky!)

But I am a firm believer that in any school it starts at the top. The principal is the one who sets the mood and the attitude of the school. He or she sets the standard and the rest of the staff act accordingly.

I will tell you that I may not care for our current principal, but I know of several who are awesome. They always hop right in to help and constantly support their parent groups as well as get out there to know the students and parents. My husband is constantly telling me we should send our kids to one of these schools. Maybe that's what keeps me at this school. The parent group was being run by staff who were chasing the parents off and the principal tells us one thing and says something else once the meeting is over. I understand how important positive posts are but keep in mind, lots of people come here because they are having problems or concerns and that's what's so cool about it, we can come with our good and our bad and be supported or support.

I'm up for the positive response! The principal at our school supports pretty much every program we do, he attends every meeting and lets us have the run of the copy machines, rizzos and to utilize the teacher's lounge. He is simply wonderful! (the staff is phenomenal too!!)

I've got more though. Since I am a council Pres, I have access to the feedback from many of the PTA President's in my council. I won't name names though, in the interest of privacy.

At one school, recently I was contacted about a teacher that was terrorizing the PTA board. She had planned, without permission, to run a fundraiser during a PTA non-fundraising family event. She did not try to contact the board, she was asked to attend the meeting to present it but rather tried to bully her way in. Their principal pulled this teacher aside and told her that she backed up the PTA 100% and that this teacher would not treat these "volunteers" this way. That they were an asset to the school and that she would back up whatever decision they made. (this Principal was the VP at our old school and truly supports PTA in every way)

There are several schools in my council where the boards have expressed that they "love their principal" and how "lucky they are to be supported by" them.

I feel it's time for a positive posting on principal/parent group relationship. If I had read the many postings on this site about principal/PTO relationships before becoming involved with the PTA, I probably wouldn’t have become the PTA president of my children’s elementary school. I am amazed at the energy that is expended in maintaining hostile relationships. PLEASE POST YOUR POSITIVE EXPERIENCES ABOUT YOUR PRINCIPAL. Here’s mine:

I was the treasurer of the PTA for 2 years before becoming the president. In all the time that I have been involved with the executive board, I have never seen nor heard of a conflict with the principal. Our principal truly believes in parental involvement and in the participation of the PTA in the life of the school. As a matter of fact, when the principal was interviewing prospects for the vice principal position, the PTA was at the interview table. The principal wanted to send a clear message, when you work in this school, you work with the parents. I wasn’t able to attend the interviews, but some of the other board members were there, and I was told that one of the prospects said they had already heard about the parental involvement at our school. Not only does our principal support parental involvement in the school, but so does the Regional Office and the County Board of Education.

Over the summer, our principal meets with the executive board to plan the activities for the school year. The principal has the home phone numbers of the PTA Board, and we have her home number. The principal and the PTA board exchange emails during the day and the evening. I, as the PTA president, have a standing 7:30 a.m. Monday morning appointment with the principal. We strategize, update each other, determine who will do what, and most of all, we laugh.

We just had a concert on Saturday night at the local high school, which was sponsored by the PTA. The principal was a vital team member in the planning and execution of this fundraiser. She was the first person to hug me after the showing of a slide presentation I created highlighting our school. Throughout that slide show, you saw parents at the school and PTA functions, and you also saw our principal. I never realized how blessed we were to have the type of school we have until I created that slide show from the many photos that were taken over the past year.

The principal has an open door policy for the parents and the PTA. Her embracement of the PTA trickles down to the school staff. The concession stand at the concert was organized by some of our teachers and manned by teacher and parent volunteers. One of the cafeteria staff volunteered at the Fall Harvest Dance that was sponsored by the PTA. Over the summer, one of the building staff maintained the flowers that were planted by teachers, parents and students. At our spring carnival the teachers volunteer along with the parents.

One of our teachers left another school that had a terrible principal/parent group relationship to come to ours. On the last day of the school year, the teacher stopped by our school and asked if there were any open positions. The teacher’s spouse is so impressed with the relationship between the principal and the parents that the spouse is volunteering at some of the PTA events.

I am trying not to brag, but this is what happens when there is mutual respect and a common goal, the children. Our school lives by the philosophy of James P. Comer and his model for child-centered schools, and I highly recommend reading up on it. It establishes a good starting point for building the vital principal/parent relationship.

Our PTA doesn’t have a lot of money. In the last few years we ended the school year at the same place we started the school year, with less than $2,000 in the checking account. During the school year we hold a large concert, a few dances, monthly Friday family nights and a spring carnival/silent auction. We used the money to buy books, provide small teacher grants, support some of the school activities like Pumpkin Day and International Day, given each departing 6th grader a yearbook as a gift from the PTA, sponsored the teacher appreciation luncheon, etc. I would love to have $30,000 to spend on PTA activities, but it seems our focus is on getting the parents, teachers, and children together, not on major fundraising.

Before moving to this neighborhood, my children attended a school where 100+ parents attended the PTA meetings and parents were throughout the school during the day. I am sure that school started from scratch and built up to the outstanding level of parent involvement it has. I see our school on that path.

We wish more parents and teachers attended the monthly PTA meetings, and we wish more would volunteer, but we recognized a long time ago that 80% of the work will be done by 20% of the people and enjoyed by all connected to the school and we accept that. We know we have support when we need it. And I see that support growing everyday.