"If you still have volunteers for the events, don't sweat the meetings so much. People are busy."
That's how I feel. I'd like to see more than the usual 10 people that volunteer at our events.
We have a monthly PTO meeting. The board (except for rare circumstance) does not meet aside from or apart from parents etc... Our attendence is usually around 15-20 (which includes officers of which we have 8). I really don't care how many show up at these meetings as long as we have a majority of the officers (5). We do have to have a quorum for expenditures over $500 but this rarely happens and when it does by the next meeting we have our majority of officers plus 10 other people.
Our other problems besides getting volunteers to help is getting people to chair. We are in the midst of sending out surveys to parents to find out if we can get more parents involved in some way.
Maybe you need some controversy! Just kidding! sort of...at our board meeting yesterday we were talking about our poor attendance - only 9 people at our Jan. meeting last year - and how the one thing that brings people out is if there is something controversial going on. Something earth shattering like how the homeroom parents are picked or how a committee might favor the chairpeoples children. oh my!
Seriously though, we usually have a quorom which is 15 people. Our school has about 300 kids. We put out the agenda the Friday prior to the Wednesday (monthly) meeting so people will see if there's something on it that interests them and we also list active committees so those chairpeole will attend or send in a report.
If you still have volunteers for the events, don't sweat the meetings so much. People are busy. It's not just pta/pto's it's scouts, church groups, service organizations, etc. Or maybe they're not really busy, they're just hoping that someone else will take care of it.....
We actually have only 3 meetings a year. (We have tried more but people don't show...even if we offer daycare.) We have also tried a new idea called PTO Boosters. A 1 hour long "gathering" to share ideas and take care of some of our busy work like bundling boxtops. Attendance there is usually 2 or 3 parents. As far as board meetings go, we have co VP's this year and most of our communication is done via phone or e-mail. I know everybody is busy, but it is frustrating that nobody shows to give input.
Are you trying to hold general meetings every month? We gave them up years ago -- before my kids were in the school.
The board meets monthly, and from what I hear we had amazing attendance at our board meetings. There were never more than maybe three non-board members at the meeting, but they were well advertised (and billed as a "PTA meeting", not as a "PTA Board meeting" to stress inclusiveness).
For general meetings, we only had four; truth be told, we could have eliminated one of those if necessary. Those were scheduled for nights that parents were going to be at the school anyway -- Back To School night, Open House, choir & band programs.
I am a co-pres of a 524 student k-3 PTO. We have very poor attendance at any meeting we hold, no matter the time. 5 parents would be huge!(excluding the open house meeting at the start of the school year.) Thus most, if not all of the planning and organization of events and expenditures is done by my partner and myself. My dilemma is what to discuss at a meeting. We have in the past given updates on upcoming activities, goals, and expenditures. There have not usually been any items for debate, and not anyone to debate it with anyway. I feel meetings are an important part of the communication process but I don't want them to be a wast of time. Any comments or suggestions? :confused:
