Robert's rules purpose is to establish order when there is a large group of people with a variety of opposing interests and the rules themselves allow for a relaxation in the rigid requirements when you need it or if it will be appropriate.
Your group can agree to follow relaxed rules.
Many of our PTAs operate under the relaxed rules. Presidents can make motions and vote on all matters, speak on any matter, motions don't need to be seconded, discussion can be informal without a motion being made, if a proposal is clear a motion doesn't need to be voted on etc.
reference www.constitution.org/rror/rror-08.htm#48
So by following the rules, you don't have to follow the rules! [img]smile.gif[/img]
I don't know if I am much help, but as a new Pres, and old member, I know what it is like to have the same 6 people at each meeting and they are sooo boring!! I plan next year to do bi-monthly meetings with snacks and a movie in the gym with a teenage babysitter for the younger kids. I hope if every meeting has some "meat" to it, I might get more parents at the next meeting and with babysitter and snacks maybe that will help too. HIGH HOPES!!! I also plan on having the new PTO members talking personally to parents in their kids grade level. Maybe if they know more about us, they will want to be a part of what is going on also.
C - We have 9 General meetings and 11 Executive meetings (one before school starts in aug and one in june after school is over).
I do prepare agendas for each meeting (following robert rules) and they seem to be very similar. The only two areas that seem to have room for discussion are Ways and Means (always something going on) and Hospitality. Both of these are basically updates on status though, as we predermine the fundraisers, family events and budgets (inflow and outflow) by the Sept meeting. I also encourage the committee chairs to keep things moving so they tend to keep things already inline by the time the meetings are here.
I did increase the amount of people involved this year, making each committee chair 3 people (the past 23 years they were 1 person each). I am hoping that this will take some pressure of each chair person as well as make more people feel involved. Enough background...
You are right, I spend a lot of time saying Anyone? and trying to solicit feedback.
Is part of the problem that we make all the decisions so early in the year, it does not give people the opportunity to have input, just help exectute?
Our pres this year decided not to use Robert's Rules or any other kind of organization. The members looked like this :confused: and the board looked like this :eek: . No one ever knew what was going on. It was horrid.
You say you take care of most of your business the first meeting. So how many meetings do you have? Taking the advise of a vetran teacher I cut down the meetings we went from 10 meetings to 6. This helped greatly.
I often felt like Ferris Bueller's teacher; "Any one? Any one?". Perhaps you can point someone out to start a discussion, one that you know will not mind. You could say "Miss Jane what do you think about this?" to get the ball rolling if they just sit there like knots on a log. We have one dad I knew I could always call on. He was always glad to give his opinion but usually waited to be asked. Keep expressing how you value people's input and how important everyone's opinions are in making these decisions. Some people think what they think or say does not matter, when in fact that could spur a mountian of ideas. Do you hand out agendas? These help me at meetings. I am the type that really needs to process things and seeing what is going to be talked about helps me do that.
How do you best run your meetings? I understand we are to follow Roberts Rules, but that makes the meetings very boring. We have been trying to get people to come to the meetings, and if I was not the pres, I probably would not come either. We vote on most everything for the year in the first general meeting, so the others are just updates of where things are.
I peronsally like the two-way dialog and discussions, but we don't seem to have them. I'm not sure how to change/make them more exciting/involved for people.
It's very possible that we are not running them right or utilizing them as a resouce for the membership as well.
