In past years, we have had Open House about 2 weeks into the school year. It consisted of a pizza dinner, bake sale, brief PTO meeting, and tables set up for our Spirit Booth, membership, Box Tops for Education, penny collections. After dinner, the principal welcomed the families, and then they went down to the classrooms to talk to the teachers.
This year, administration decided to have a "Meet the teacher night" on the Friday before school starts, from 5:00-7:00. Since it is before school actually starts, I wasn't sure we could pull together all the volunteers and planning needed, so we will only have our membership table on that night. We decided to have a "Family/Community Night" on Sept. 1, which will have all the other things we used to do at Open House, but no going down to classrooms to talk with teachers. In addition, we decided to invite all the youth-related organizations in the area to have information or sign-up tables. Parents and kids can then see what all is available to do, including sports, after-school groups, lessons, and volunteer opportunities. We'll see how it goes.

Last year, our back to school bbq was HO-HUM. An open house has always been held a few weeks into the school year. Our pricipal has decided that thie year the two will be combined and our PTA is going to put up the funds for something exciting that will draw in as many families as possible. We're thinking maybe the inflatables. My suggestion for this is to still feed everyone hot dogs and chips and at some point, all of the teachers will take their students to the classroom to explore and perhaps have a story. This will leave the parents for an info session: principal explains what is expected of parents (i.e. we have a HUGE communications problem and the same volunteers for everything). If she can tell them..."Physically check your child's backpack every day", "If you have a problem or a question, call me, e-mail me, come into the school, etc...", and "voluntering is SO important".
Maybe hearing it first hand like this instead of through papers and newsletters that they never seem to read, we can get more involvement. My fingers are crossed!
Our president will also give a short spiel outlining the "Three for Me" program and benefits of joining the PTA. We will have info and sign ups that night also.
I do like the idea of having Boy/Cub Scout and Girl Scout reps there also.
Good Luck!

Hi all!

I take over as PTA president for our school in June. We will be deciding what to do this next school year for Open House which is held Sept. 1, the first Th. of our first week of school. I'd like to know what all of you have done at your open houses that were successful. We typically do hot dogs, chips, drinks, PTA membership drive, a short presentation from our principal and the PTA president then the families go to the classrooms for a brief overview of thier expectations and such. I'm thinking I'd like to do an ice cream social instead of hot dogs and I'd like to have our Boys' & Girls' Club as well as Boy & Girl Scouts have a table there for informational purposes for the parents. I also think it would be nice to have our Steel Drum band (one of only 5 in all of Las Vegas Valley!) perform.

I'd really appreciate hearing what some of you all do for your open house.

Thanks so much!
Holly
McCaw PTA
Henderson, NV