For good, starting out family events, I would suggest:
Movie night (easy to do, movie and popcorn and Capri Sun/water) People bring blankets, bean bags, or sit on lawn chairs in the back, you don't even have to set up chairs.
Muffins with Moms/Donuts with Dads. We have to do on two consecutive mornings due to capacity in the cafeteria, but fairly easy.
We had a scarecrow night, where we supplied the hay and the families made scarecrows out on the playground. Have a set Rain date. We serve popcorn, Capri Sun and water and cider.

Our first grade teachers organized an art night, which wasn't PTO except we paid for the cookies, coffee, Capri Sun, etc. They had the hallways filled with the beautiful art work. The music teacher had the kids sing some songs, which were hilarious. The PE teacher had the classes go through a demonstration of some of their movement and cardiac workouts. It was hilarious. The kids were doing jump jacks all different ways, somersaults, crab walks, spins on their backs. One child tripped and scrapped his knee, the PE teacher walks calmly over the small freezer in the gym, retrieves an ice cloth, and says, "Well, now you've seen a demonstration of how we handle our injuries.". It was pretty funny.

It is better to start out small and do it well, then to be too ambitious and not do it well. Also, keep in mind that a lot of parents will make suggestions, but then won't help.

I forgot one other item. An adjoining school district had a big scandal about the principal being given money for the Christmas program for needy kids. Anyways, the opinion of the state attorney general's office (this is in Ohio) is that once any money from the PTO/PTA or any other source goes to any member of staff, that money then becomes "school money" and thus must be handled per school policy.

Our PTO pays for things directly to the vendor or supplier OR we reimburse for items. No receipt or invoice, then no payment or reimbursement. This even includes the $50 that the teachers get, they have to submit receipts.

This is in Ohio, so for the poster who had the principal who wanted to control all the money, you might want to check into this because he or she may not want to take on this problem.

Our elementary school has children from a variety of economic backgrounds, so our principal does not want a lot of fundraising events. We have two, a catalog sale in the fall and candle sale in the spring. We sell other things, but make little money on it. For example, we sell school tshirts but at just above cost. If our cost was $7.59 a shirt, we sell it for $8. We have a school supply sale, but it is as a convenience for parents, once again, if our cost was $ 22.68 a kit, then we sell it for 23 bucks. our PTO also pays for the school supplies for kids that cannot afford it. This year we got lucky because two churches agreed to reimburse us for it as it was nearly $450.
We do not take the Book Fair money, but we use the book credits for each student to get a book at Christmas and at the end of the year.

Our fundraisers pay for our Muffins with Moms, Donuts with Dads, Ice cream social for grandparents. We sponsor around 25 kids at our school for Christmas, we also buy around 20 winter coats each year. We also buy some sweat pants, sweat shirts, underwear and socks for the school office for kids that have "accidents" at school.
We give each teacher $50 at the beginning of the year for their classroom. The parents are asked to contribute $5 at the beginning of the year to contribute to the four classroom parties, but then the PTO supplements 8-10 dollars per student to cover the classroom parties.

We also cover the entire expense of field trips for the kids. The third grade has the most expensive field trip (overnight at the zoo) so they have to do a fundraiser for that. Some members of the PTO officers and many parents do not understand this, but once you remind them how hard it is for kids to not be able to go on field trips and participate, then they get it.

Our PTO also pays for school events, our physical education teacher does an event each year and this just helps cover for materials and water and popscicles for the kids. The music teacher may ask for money for an artist to come to the school. Last year, we had a musician for the entire week and it was wonderful. The librarian has an author come to our school each year. We have bought materials for the guidance counselor on bullying curriculum, reading and math tutors, we have a Multi Handicapped classroom now, so we bought some playground equipment that is more accessible. We bought tshirts for the fourth graders upon their graduation. (our school is K-4)

We have bought some Ellison equipment and we are saving to buy a school sign.


We do a welcome back treat bag for the staff, veggie trays and cookies throughout the year, we bought the popcorn machine and popcorn which everyone is free to use. We buy a small gift for staff and the busdrivers the first week of May. WE did breakfast for the busdrivers and lunch for the school staff. Their gift was a nice insulated lunch bag or six pack cooler.

We buy small items for the kids ahead of the achievement test time.

So we let the parents know, that without their participation in fund-raisers, they would have to pay for a lot of events individually through out the year.

Sorry this is so long, but we try to mix it all up to benefit everyone. No one really should be carrying a lot of money from year to year. We feel strongly that the children who are currently at the school should benefit from the money they raised, so we only carry over $3 to $4 over to the next year, so that we can pay for our Fall Festival.

Our main emphasis in previous years has been on getting materials and supplies for our school. We've had our spring carnival for a long time but that was about the only family event we did. This year we added two additional simple family nights and the people loved it. Our goal for next school year is to increase the number of family nights we have and I have a plan I'm working on for a reading program that will involve the WHOLE family.

this is great...keep it coming, it is nice to hear so many different things

It's amazing how different every group is. I think our budget this year was a bit skewed because our group had been controlled by the school's admin in the past and not voted on by the parents or teachers-that is a whole other story. This is what I've come up with regarding how we spend our money in percentages of our budget. About 25% is discretionary funds, 20% school events and includes $4 per student for each teacher for class activities, 20% is spent on family activities, 10% is spent on school improvement, 7% is spent on teacher appreciation throughout the year, 5% is used for PTO supplies including copies, fliers for events, childcare for meeting and such, 3% (or $1 per student) is given to both the music and PE departments, 3% is alloted for school performances, 2% is used on volunteer appreciation which includes a reception, and 2% is used for the media/tech center for new books or computer programs or movies for the school. I think that's about 100%. Our discretionary allotment formula is being revamped for next year. We spent much less this year than we had in previous years because a budget was put in place and stuck to. It also helped that the treasurer was accountable. I hope this information helps.