Please let me know how this movie night worked out. We as an entire group
have been trying to increase attendance for our local PTO. It seems that everyone is so busy all the time. I suppose after working all day and running your kids here and there all afternoon a meeting is the last thing you have on your mind. I have been in touch with a friend of mine whos children attend a School District in Northern Arkansas. She says that the movie night is popular at there as is a bingo night. We are dealing with 7th-12th graders and those children are trying to venture out on their own. It seems that so are those parents. So, If you can think of anything at all please let me know.
I will tell you a couple of things we have done that has worked for our younger children . 1) Community Fair Night this consist of teachers doing booths to show off the students work. Local organizations as in Phoenix Youth and Family Services, our local Drug & Alcohol Coalition County Health Dept. Any new business that has opened in town. Etc. set up booths, door prizes were donated by local merchants and individuals. Parents seemed to come out for the night, It was great.
Another big thing we do is the Spring Fair. we set up games the children buy tickets and play games in return they get small prizes. Parents showed up to work this so it brought fresh ideas to the table.
For older children the only thing i can remember working was a dance.
If your parent guardian aunt or uncle showed up for the meeting the month before the dance and the night of the dance then you recieved a free ticket into the dance. our attendance actually rose from 10 members to 30 on those nights.
Parish, I saw your idea about the forum just for your school.
I decided against this personally after thinking about participation rates of this forum compared to the audience is had to draw from. This forum has the ability to draw from the entire nation (and more). Therefore it is able to be successful very easily.
Me fear for a single school forum would be lack of participation in a forum may be perceived to be lack of success of the PTO. I didn't want to risk the two being tied together.
Good luck with your idea. I hope it will work for you, but my recommendation is to also focus on one on one interactions. They can pay great dividends.
I am in a similar situation. We are trying to get more organized. We are working on getting a formal set of Bylaws for starters, a mission statement so people KNOW why we are here, A web site for news and information, a Discussion forum like this one but for out school only. I have just started this week on the forum and the website. I feel like the others that communication is paramount in obtaining active participants. We are also kicking around the idea of doing some of our communications in both english and spanish. I know that can be a sticky subject for some but i feel we really need to reach to all segments of our schools population.
Thank you all so very much! I got some really good ideas from all of you! I will take note of all and put in my folder of hopefuls and ideas and utilize some of them when appropiate.I am looking forward to getting some new ideas laid out at meetings but i will hede the advice to be careful. I am aready working secretly outside on people i know to get more involved i expect a better turn out at the next PTO meeting in Jan. My eldest is graduating this year and my youngest is in third grade and i will tell you all this, I have not in the 13 years of my sons schooling seen ANY CHANGES at all. i have seen a tremendous amount of decreases in activities and no increases, so on that note i feel all your info is going to be extremely helpful THANK YOU!
I absolutely agree with all the folks that say communication is the key. You also have to create an inviting atmosphere and put yourself out there a lot. Don't be afraid to walk up to folks and extend your hand - introduce yourself and get their email to send them information. Memberships will come later. Don't worry about meeting attendance. I don't think that is as strong an indicator as event attendance and rarely do we throw a party that has less than 300 folks attend. We do TONS of events so that allows folks to pick and choose and I literally stuff information down their throats using PTO emails, websites and newsletters. I have to say though the emails are the things that keep folks coming back for more. I keep them light and fun and very human. I told everyone that it took my kindergartener 13 days to go to the principals office. Was I proud of that -- no--but it is the reality of raising small children and I'm very proud of my boys and not afraid to be human around folks. That one email brought me 6 different notes back thanking me for being real about parenting. I keep our newsletters informational and not desparate sounding and last year when we had our volunteer breakfast we sent out over 150 invitations to active volunteers in the school. It hasn't always been this way (we're only 4 years old) but if you can communicate your goals as a group, let everyone get buy in as to where the money is going and what is happening then most folks are happy to pitch in and get involved in some small way. I just sent out an email asking for someone to be the point of contact for the year book and within 2 hours had 12 emails back with folks volunteering.
It takes a long time to get to this point...and my energy is a bit gone from working it so hard--but now I can turn over a healthy group that is willing to enjoy their school as an extension of their community.
I always say if you build it they will come. That image of cars lining the road from the movie Fields of Dreams is what I see every time we hold an event....
Now--don't get me wrong. I had a parent say the other day "I don't support PTO fundraisers"...okay I got it and I'm not going to reach that person--but there are plenty more out there just looking for the ball game.
Be careful! Too much change at once can be disasterous too! Believe me! I took over the presidency mid year last year and the #1 thing I wanted to do was get more people involved! When I started attending meetings it was board only and they looked at me like an alien when I walked into the room! I kept coming and didn't let the clique-ishness of the group throw me off. Now that I'm president we wear name tags at meetings, I put in the newsletter each month what we are doing or just did and what the money is/was spent on. I try to be inviting and learn people's names so I can address them as such when I see them. I make it a point to get to know something about them so they can see that I'm interested in their being a part of our PTO.
The one thing that I've found is that while a select few are happy to see change there are a whole other set of people who are not happy to see change. This year I wanted to change up our fundraisers and carnival and try new things and afterwards I sent out an email containing an anonymous survey to see what they did or did not like. It was pretty equal in the "we love the new ideas" and the "we like the old way better" replies. I've decided the better way to have handled it would have been to start slow and change things up a little at a time. The people happy to see change would have been happy to see some progress and those who are stuck to the old ways wouldn't have felt so threatened.
