On the Tutoring part of the topic....
We have 6 buildings in our school district. All have tutoring programs but each is very different. Some are paid by Principal's Fund and some are paid by PTO. The amount may vary from year to year and school to school. Essentially PTO at some schools are donating the money to pay teachers to tutor, and those are the ones in question (The other PTOs are using volunteers from churches, high school etc).
We asked: How many kids receive tutoring?
Answer: about 7 or 8 out of every 100, at each building, varies year to year.
We asked: Who decides who gets tutoring?
Answer: Teacher Recommendation or Parent Request. It was not test scores or economic hardship, etc.
So, let me get this straight, I don't have to pay for Sylvan, I can just "request" and then PTO pays a certified teacher to tutor my child for free? Cool! Free after school care with homework help.
We asked ourselves: Is it appropriate to spend 25% to 40% of our PTO budget on less than 10% of the student population? Is the benefit to "everyone" worth that cost (we all know the work required to raise money!)?
At our school, if funding something is not benefitting a large part of the school population, it is pretty hard to justify or get enough members to vote for it. We think "many", "most" or "all" students should benefit from PTO funds so we'd rather fund an Author visit, a school-wide performing arts assembly or pay the bus cost for a field trip for each grade. If we are going to target small groups, then shouldn't we also fund an after school enrichment program just for gifted kids? Aren't we wasting valuables resources by NOT doing that, and encouraging the kids who might be the one who finds the cure for cancer? And then the list starts to go on and on....
If it is really a justifiable need, then aren't our tax dollars (whether district or state) paying for it? Is there not a district fund, state fund, Title I Fund or grant for academically "at risk" kids who truly need tutoring? And transportation, so they can stay after school and get the help they need and still have a way home? It is a Catch 22, that unfunded mandate of "No Child Left Behind", a great theory but no money provided to schools to put it into action.
Districts give principals discretionary funds to spend at their buildings. They don't have to tell the parents how they spend their money, but PTO (a public 501c3 entity) does. Schools have fallen into the habit of "asking PTO first", and if the money is not there, or the member vote approving it is not there, then somehow the schools seem to find the money.
Funding things for the district (that tax money has already really paid for) impacts the amount of fundraising that PTO's have to do. Fundraising is a double-edged sword....it impacts the buildings in that it can be disruptive and use building staff and resources, and impact academic time. But on the other hand, the schools like the money that PTO can give them.
There should be a Board Policy about who funds tutoring (district, state, each school building, a special fund, grants.....or the PTO)? The school district should make sure each school in its district has a balanced amount and not rely on PTO funds. If not, then ask the Board to create a policy. If they came out and said we need PTO to do this for us, then at least set a policy about who receives the benefit, and a per-student amount....otherwise, one school building within a district may have a different demographic (i.e., socio-economic which often reflects who needs tutoring when help is not given as much at home) than another, so the needs at one school within a district can be very different and therefore be crippling to PTO budgets at some schools to provide the same advantage to student academic opportunity via access to tutoring----i.e., the money available to reach a higher percentage of kids needing these services at one school vs another.
