From what I gather, any days teachers were at school for long hours or for inservice or any other time, the last PTO, of which the school secretary was the Treasurer, would ask one other exec member to sign off on having somethign delivered. I went back into last year's books and found over $600 spent one time to have something catered in and this type of stuff was done 11 times last year. I understand why the teachers are expecting more. To add to it, when we sent up the budget this year, the principal said she didn't think we needed to do this anymore and none of the teachers present spoke up, but then they have the school's secretary call me to ask what we are doing for conference day. AAAAHHHHH! I don't mind feeding people and I love the idea of all the teachers helping each other get the new systen learned, but no one feeds me when I stay from 8-8 counting fundraisers.

Oh boy, this is sort of a timely topic for me. One of the parents, who is also a member of our school board, mentioned to a group of teachers that maybe our Parents' Club would underwrite or contribute to their Christmas party they have every year. They hold it at a private club and charge to come to it (maybe $15 or $20 a head). We have nothing to do with it. Well, this parent tells some teachers and before you know it, the middle school head calls me to tell me how nice that would be if we wanted to do that!! I said, whoa, wait a minute. We haven't even discussed it! Between you and me, when you start doing this, it becomes an ANNUAL event and you can NEVER get out of it without looking terrible. Then eventually the teachers just EXPECT it. I told this parent that if we could find some parents who would let us hold it at their (very large) home and could get volunteers to work at it and possible donate food then that's fine. I even asked this parent if she'd like to chair this event!! (Of course, no)

We give a teacher back-to-school luncheon in August and do a fabulous teacher appreciation luncheon in the spring. If you get wrapped up in all these free dinner, they become permanent fixtures so watch out!
Shelly

The reason they're asking is because you've done it before. If you can't afford it, you just need to let them know. If the teachers are aware of your budget, that should not be a problem. It would probably help if at the beginning of the year the budget was sent out to all teachers with line items highlighted that concern them. For instance if you had a budget for $200 for teacher meals, they would quickly realize that they were done for the year before Christmas. But, if you don't have a budget, they must think that you've done it once, maybe you'll do it a lot more times.

We provide food only in the form of donations. On our parent volunteer form that we send home at the beginning of the year we have a box to check if you would like to send in food donations in the form of baked goods, soups, potluck dishes, etc. We have so many parents sign up for that we can always get all the food we need. We can often get people to bring in paper plates and napkins and things too.

I don't know about this?!...we do not feed our teachers- we take care of getting them classroom items and grant requests but providing food? - :eek: Definitely Nadda. The money is for the benefit of the students not feeding the teachers... my two cents worth

We provide lunch quite often but more like potlucks. We have even lucked out and recieved a donation from a Sub shop in our neighborhood to provide two 6 foot sandwiches for the staff.

Pizza doesn't seem like that much until you get the bill! Talk to your membership to see how everyone can share the load.

Regarding teacher turn over, we average 10-12 a year, our school tends to hire teachers coming outta college (two colleges close by) and they stay a year, maybe two and goon to better and greener jobs. It happens.