WE 515 KIDS IN OUR SCHOOL. OUR LAST PTO MEETING WE HAD OVER 300 PARENTS THERE. IT WAS GREAT WE WHERE REALLY EXCITED ABOUT IT, THAT WAS BIGGEST WE HAVE EVER HAD. WE PUT ON A FASHION SPONSERD BY GOODY'S. WHEN WE HAVE OUR NEXT MEETING WE ARE GOING TO HAVE OUR TALENT SHOW. WE HAVE LEARNED THAT WHEN INVOLVED THE STUDENTS IN THE PARENTS IN EVERYTHING WE DO. THEY SHOW UP [img]smile.gif[/img]
Sometimes you get more accomplished with a smaller group.Less arguing & getting off track. I'd rather have less pto attendance & more volunteers when needed.
Personally I don't sweat the meeting attendance. I'm the president of a non profit and I don't want to be there!
I think if you have a crew, no matter how small, just work with that and have as good a time as you can. You can sit around and b!tch how bad everyone else sucks (as they do with my unit), or you can sincerely have fun and do good and be happy with your contribution to society. Once people see you enjoying yourself, being friendly and making contributions to the school and their kids they'll come around.
Our school has about 800 kids and we only get about 20 parents to come to the meetings, and it's always the same parents. We are trying to increase Teacher participation this year, so we will be doing raffle drawings for them to win prizes and the MUST be present to win. We have publicized our meetings in every newsletter, on the door when you come into the school, and in our school announcements, but it's still only the die hard parents that show. We, too, are looking to increase participation, but so far no luck.
It's funny that when I ran my first PTO meeting in 2002(January-5 people) all I wanted was to have 15 people at the last(June) meeting of the year. I had a bunch of staff members come to fill the numbers. It was all i worried about reaching that goal and you know what here it is in 2005 and we are doubling that 15(we have approx 250 families) but the sad part is no matter how many parents you may get it really doesn't matter if you aren't reaching the ones that the kids can benifit the most from. I always tell parents that their help at an event is more important than at the table during a meeting...think about it! I learned from experience.
[ 11-15-2005, 06:50 AM: Message edited by: pals ]
"When you stop learning you stop growing."
We had a really good attendance at our last PTO meeting. We started serving refreshments and did door prizes. The Kindergarten children sang some songs for us and it was a really good meeting.
Tonight is our next meeting and every thing that could go wrong has!! We were able to get the announcement in the newspaper and on the radio. But thats it.... letters didn't go home to the parents. None of the parents want to help with the refreshments. And all the secretary stuff is gone missing. I almost hope not many parents show up.
