None taken, CapeDad.

I agree that it's great to come here for ideas and advice. But the best projects or events at some schools might fail miserably at your own. You really have to know your community. Surveying members is a terrific way to know what they like and don't like. My last group did one and, yes, the number of responses was a lot less than we'd hoped for but we got some great feedback.

CapeDad is right to suggest that you publish the results of the survey. That way, it's easy to see what the majority of the respondents like and shows that you took the feedback seriously.

My last team's survey listed all of the projects, activities and major allocations from the most recent years. Parents and staff were asked to number their favorites from 1 - 10 and to mention if there were some they thought we could let go of. We got a general idea of what they liked the most and what they didn't like so much or at all.

RobinD;129627 wrote: If you ASK for opinions, you may end up getting stuck with doing something you discover isn't the best match for your school, or you run the risk of people bad-mouthing you , by saying " they asked our opinion but didn't do what we wanted.. that PTO is cliquey and does what they want"......... do yourself a favor.. and don't go there!

I really don't buy this for a second.

Survey results are not going to have you getting 'stuck' doing anything. Your survey results are not a mandate.

A survey is a way to get a feel for what your members might be interested in. That's it. When designing one, you should keep in mind what you want to know and phrase things so that answers pertain to your questions.

If 90% of the people surveyed do not like the current major fund raiser, maybe something else could work better. This does not mean that you have to get rid of the major fund raiser, but you really should address this in meetings.

You might find out, like we did, that a lot of people would attend a Movie Night or participate in a Fishing Event. This gives you something to work with besides gossip, guessing, and hoping. We also found out that it doesn't really matter what day or time we have our meetings -- even many people who want to come are overscheduled as it is.

I also believe the full results of the survey should be available to members.

And no offense to the members of this board, but what the people at dlf's or Shawn's or CrewChief's schools would like to do doesn't necessarily reflect what our members will want to do. Of course I'll always look here for advice, but not regarding my local culture, which is what the survey measures.

If the PTO is an airplane, the members should be the engines, not the passengers.

I agree with RobinD's previous answer in regards to the "passengers flying the plane" which is why we only put options on there that will work for the school like strongtikes suggested. It's alot of paper and we put a lot of time into it. We only get about a 20% response but us just asking has impressed the parents. They are just glad to be asked for their thoughts. Whether they share them or not is their option. We made the effort.

Bucksco made a very good point that I neglected to consider. If you do a survey, no one can complain that you didn't give them the opportunity to voiec their opinion- and sometimes THAT ALONE is enough to use a ream of paper!

I know some schools have done races without help of the company, but they have been invaluable to us. You pay a fee to them the first year, but starting the 2nd year they will continue to help you year after year without a fee. The web site is www.racefored.com .

I like the idea of having a survey at the 1st meeting of the year. I will try that come September!

I guess if you were going to do a survey handing it out at the PTO meeting and collecting it afterwards might be the best bet. Then you are asking the involved parents and your more apt to get a better response. Which we did hand them out at our first meeting when you usually get the most parents at and we did get a return back on the surverys.
As for the fundraisers on our survey we only put choices that we had already researched that would be beneifcial to us. (cookie dough, candles, food products, etc.) But as for the survey on the fundraisers I will say we have parents that go 50/50 on the candles. We have been selling them for awhile many of the parents who have a few kids coming through are done with them, others want us to keep it but they still sell good.) So in the end the officers and fundraising committee and talk about and take that all into consideration.

I would be interested to hear how you run the Race for Education that would work well at our school. Can you email me at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. with the info or post it. THanks