Hi there. See what you are saying about needing the funding at the start of the year. One other idea: Hold over a few hundred dollars from the previous school year. Could help if you continue to hear concerns from parents about dues.
I am finding that unless people get something for their dues they don't understand what that money goes to. We have started explaining that to our parents and it has made a difference. Basically we view it more like a donation instead of dues. But, that donation it has perks, we give them a discount at our events and parents that volunteer their time can earn PTO bucks that go towards our events. So far its been helpful to us to get donuts with dad paid for up front at the first of the school year, we don't have a big fundraiser until the 3rd month of school so those donations/dues really are needed.
We offer as part of the membership dues a PTO directory that includes everyone in the school system and our dues is $10.00 we have about 45% membership but the dues goes to the directory cost and our central PTO so if you have kids in different schools in the district you only pay once! We never check membership lists and do not have cards we invite everyone who is willing to help to do so!
JHB is correct. We are a small rural school and we do include grandparents, aunts, and uncles. Many of children live with these people or are very close to these people. We also go to these people to volunteer (we have lots of grandma's helping with reading!!)
But I also think we are successful because we communicate!!! We (the officers) tell the parents what we need, why we need it and keep everything very transparent. Our teachers also push membership and involvement.
Maybe it's just the south because I know that in this area, we are not unique.
We use our 100% membership just as a gauge of how much money we bring in. If you attend a meeting, you can vote on any business going on at that meeting, paid or not! Our real gauge is the hours of volunteering we get!
This whole discussion has struck a sensitive chord with me and caused me to really think about our membership. We're a K-5 school of about 650. We charge $1 for a family membership. We only have about 120 households that join each year. We serve them anyway and what I have noticed is that they willingly and enthusiastically serve us too! These non-member families still attend events, volunteer to help, participate in fundraisers and contribute when asked in a number of ways. Obviously we've never made 100% membership a huge priority. Our priority is to serve every child by enriching the educational environment. I guess I see membership as a personal choice. It is one way they can advocate for their child, but only one of many.
Having said that, we are going to try 2 new approaches next fall. We will offer a "Boo Hoo Breakfast" on the first day of school. The fee will be $2, $1 to offset the cost of the food and $1 for membership fee. We will also offer "Back To School BBQ" during the 2nd week of school in the evening. We will charge $2 per person or $5 for family groups of 3 or more of which $1 will be the membership fee and the rest of the income will be used to offset food costs. We want to accomplish a couple of things, offer membership one more way to more people and offer opportunities for parents to meet, greet and network. (We'll be plugging the PTO pretty hot and heavy too!)
Sorry, one more point. A very critical statistic in my mind is:
Did the PTO serve 100% of the school families?
Not that every child/family will benefit from every activity. But overall, when the year is done, did we somehow enrich the experience of every child in our school?
