Get parents involved! Check out www.three4me.com. You have to give them a "real good reason" to be involved. With Three for Me, they are asked to sign a promise card to volunteer only 3 hours for the ENTIRE school year. This opens the door in a very non-threatening way to hundreds of parents at every school. Why don't parents volunteer? They are busy, they aren't asked (personally) and they don't have support to complete the task they are given. That's what we heard when we asked! We started Three for Me and had more than 500 parents sign promise cards last year. Every parent that signed a card, kept their promise last year. Three hours is easy and they reach the goal before they know it. The exciting thing about it was that most of those 3 hour promise card signers did far more than 3 hours of volunteerism. When they actually did something and saw the benefits of it to the children and school, had fun and met new people, they kept coming back. Two years ago, we had 12-15 of us doing everything, last year, we had more than 500 of us doing everything. This year, so far we have nearly 550 promise card signers. A huge impact was made by hundreds of dads signing promise cards at our school last year. Our principal even challenged the teachers to sign promise cards this year, to volunteer and help our parent group. Every one of them signed a card! You really have to be organized to coordinate volunteers, make sure that every one of them gets a phone call or email. And, it's so important to make sure you offer to send home things for parents to do from home, especially if they work long hours. Making those connections with working parents was key to our success last year. It's a simple idea and really worked for us!!! This year, we have 40 committees and every committee is staffed; we even have 6 dads chairing committees this year.
Preschool: welcome to the world of school-age children. You have a wonderful journey ahead of you.
That said, I wouldn't expect too much from your preschool's PTO. It was my experience that most preschool moms are so glad just to have a couple of hours to themselves, that there's very little time left to devote to a volunteer group. Many moms of preschoolers have even littler ones at home which limits discretionary time even further. Don't beat yourself or your comrades up over a low-activity parent group. Just wait til you get to elementary school!
Our preschool's parent group focuses on two events a year: a VIP dinner in November and an Ice Cream Social in the spring. The VIP dinner is a spaghetti dinner where the student gets to bring one Very Special (adult) Person. Tickets must be purchased. The Ice Cream Social is a family event (again, admission is by ticket) with ice cream, simple games, and a family photo opp. It is not a big deal, just a chance to bring the families together for a fun, easy kids night out.
The parent group at our preschool is more like a club, just an extension of the school - not an independent organization like most elementary PTOs. The group does one simple fundraiser per year (cookie dough). There's plenty of volunteering down the road...don't burn out too soon.
This is my first year as a member of the PTO..we have only had one meeting so far this year and it wasn't successful. We have a small school which is a daycare for 6 wks to 2yrs, and a preschool program for ages up to 5. Parent involvement is very low...I would love some ideas on parent involvement for preschool children and even the daycare parents...Anything would be appreciated..since we are a preschool we can't celebrate holidays but we can talk a little about them that is what makes this the hardest when planning activities and so on.
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This is my first year as a member of the PTO..we have only had one meeting so far this year and it wasn't successful. We have a small school which is a daycare for 6 wks to 2yrs, and a preschool program for ages up to 5. Parent involvement is very low...I would love some ideas on parent involvement for preschool children and even the daycare parents...Anything would be appreciated..since we are a preschool we can't celebrate holidays but we can talk a little about them that is what makes this the hardest when planning activities and so on.
All my hard work(and pending divorce, just joking, my hubby thinks I am obsessed with PTO) and butt busting is paying off. Last year we got maybe 8 volunteer slips for our Halloween Party, this year we got back 48 so far!!! I wanted to jump up and down. We used to get the 4 board members and the principal and maybe 1 parent at the meetings, last week we had 14 parents/board members, 2 teachers and the principal. I am not so worried about the meetings though, I'd rather have help with school events/functions than at the meetings. Was excited to share that.
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I am so glad to find these posts! I have been involved with our PTO for the last 5 years since my daughter started there. All of our offices are up for election & I am running for pres. We have a very small school and again, the same ones volunteering and even membership. I am hoping that a change in officers will help. I am already starting to get some information on things to hopefully bring the families out together to the school. We are MAJORLY lacking in the family functions department. Hopefully I will be able to show everyone where the money & time goes & THAT will make them become more involved...all I can do is HOPE & do what I can to make it more interesting & appealing. Good luck to all of you! [img]smile.gif[/img]
