Question: protocol to report mistreatment of volunteers

Our school is part or DODEA, on a military base. What are the steps to report mistreatment of my volunteers by the Principal and the office staff? My PTO has been here to help the school and is doing a fabulous job. We can’t work with all the friction; we do not understand why we are getting treated so badly. It's hard enough getting volunteers and then to have the school work against us is ridiculous. We have tried to talk to the Principal and it has not worked. We are upset and feel like the 400+ hrs we have put in to this school for the children are completely unappreciated. The school secretary yells at my volunteers and throws papers at her...really, what can be done about this????

Asked by Anonymous

Answers:

Advice from PTO Today

Rose H writes:
Sounds like it is time to take a deep breath! There is a lot going on here. How about requesting a meeting between the principal and the board to discuss your concerns? It might be a good idea to figure out how to best work together going forward and not just focus on the negative. That's not always easy and the picture you paint here suggests some heated exchanges. While it would help to get to the root cause of the conflict, it would also be helpful to figure out how to work together and compromise.You might want to check out a few of our articles on working with principals, like this Q&A on principals that zeros in on compromise and meeting each other half way. That may sound impossible right now, but it is a good starting point. Good luck and let us know how it goes.

Community Advice

aeifcr writes:
First I would talk to the principal, if no luck you can always make a every base have a complainant center. They are usually pretty good at checking into complains. Especial at the school.