Some thoughts about PTAs
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Anonymous
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As I reach the end of my 8th and last year as a parent of elementary school kids at two different public schools, I find myself reflecting on PTAs, their role in elementaries, and what is good about them and what can be problematic. I say this as someone who has served on two different PTA boards (always in support roles, not president or anything highly visible) and also had years where I merely attended meetings or volunteered but had no formal role. These last two years, I haven't even done that, and instead felt more like an outsider to the PTA. Here are some take aways from those experiences, I am interested in if they match with others or if people have other ideas.
1. PTAs serve two purposes and they should be separate: (1) a communication and funding bridge between the school and parent community, and (2) event sponsor. These seem like the same purpose at first, because the goal of many events is to facilitate the relationship between families and the school. However, after a lot of experience with both purposes, I think it would be better if most PTAs separated them. The problem is that the event sponsorship role has a tendency to overtake PTAs, and it's also easy to lose sight of what, and who, the events are for. But if you separated those functions so you had a PTA whose job was simply to hold meetings, facilitate communication between families and the school, and raise money, I think those jobs would be done better and more efficiently and in a way most parents (and school administrators) would support. And then you have a separate events committee that can obtain funding from the PTA (and for events that are actually fundraisers, which IME tend to be a minority of events, can also send money back to the PTA) but it does none of the other stuff and just plans and executes events. 2. PTAs must become very realistic about the bandwidth of families and the limited resource that is parental volunteer time. IME, the hardest part of being on the PTA board is getting people to volunteer, and the most annoying thing about not being on the volunteer board is constantly being asked to volunteer even when you have already volunteered and have zero bandwidth left to give. And after seeing this at two different schools and for a long time feeling the problem is that people are selfish or they are freeloading, I've actually done a 180. People are doing their best, and PTAs ask too much. Covid was a bit turning point on this for me, and also when the problem of getting volunteers became more critical because people were willing to do less. A lot of the people I worked with on PTAs blame this on everyone being more selfish, and there was a time I would have agreed. It's not true though. These last two years as I've stepped back and volunteered less, I've realized that most families are just making an intelligent choice for themselves and only volunteering as much as they can truly commit without overextending themselves. PTAs need to stop complaining about lack of volunteers, recognize how freaking exhausted everyone is, and adjust schedules and demands accordingly. 3. PTAs are naturally cliquey, it's unavoidable, but it can be mitigated. If the biggest complaint of people on PTAs is lack of volunteers, the biggest complaint *about* PTAs I've heard is that they are cliquey or clubby and people don't feel welcome. The reality is that this is going to happen because being on a PTA requires a ton of work, when you do it you get to know the people you work with and become friends, and that will never not create a bit of a division between the "PTA parents" and everyone else. This is true in any organization, and it's not reasonable to expect PTA parents not to essentially form a friend group based on their shared activity. It's going to happen. However, it can be mitigated via self awareness and the single best thing I've found for avoiding the "clique" accusation? PTA board members should address it directly and talk to each other about how to avoid it. That's it. Just acknowledge "hey it's easy for people to feel this is a little private club, so as a group let's avoid things like standing in front of the school in a clump chatting during drop off which just reinforces this perception at a time when half the school will see it." Just acknowledging it and being self aware makes a huge difference, and you will find you naturally alter your behavior in useful ways and it starts to feel more "open" even if you also still spend a lot of time just with this group of friends at meetings and each others houses. You just tone it down at school. Noticeable shift. I think that's it. Was just reflecting and talking to my DH about this morning (he has a very different attitude about the PTA in general than I do and it's something we've argued about over the years, my perspective has been shaped somewhat by things he has convinced me of over the years but the reverse is also true, we've both learned a lot). Anyway, curious what others think. Maybe I'm just using this to process my big feelings about never being an elementary parent again after the next few weeks, but I thought this might be interesting to others on this board and perhaps prompt a conversation. Have at it! |
Anonymous
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This seems more like a generic post than anything.
I agree its hard to get people to volunteer, we are all busier now than our parents were. However, some parents have an expectation of free events or activities being provided with no effort put in by them. Maybe PTA's should limit the events they host, I guess some do at the schools with no parent participation. |
Anonymous
I think you are reading a balanced approach as "generic" because you only want to read things that confirm your world view. PTAs could also just be more explicit and say "we have to cancel XYZ events this year because for the last three years we've struggled to find volunteers and it's been very hard to put them on. So we're streamlining to 4 annual events instead of 7 because that's what we feel we can do without overextending the actual volunteer availability we have." And then if people complain, oh well. It's very simple -- did you volunteer for events? If not, you can't really complain that they cancelled them. I think what you'd discover is that a lot of parents are actually relieved at fewer events because they are so tired that not only do they not have the energy to volunteer for them, but it's a big burden even to attend these events and they only do it for their kids and then drag themselves home after, exhausted, and wishing they could have spent the evening having a normal night. I know so many parents who view these events as obligations they attend so their kids won't feel left out and would be so relieved to cut back on them. I think this is the majority of parents I know, probably because at this point most of the parents I know are well out of the ECE eager beaver phase. |
Anonymous
| Sometimes standards are held just way too high. If Alpha Mom whose kid has graduated always professionally decorated the Halloween Bash and it looked like a showplace, that’s great. But worker bee mom is the only one volunteering to do it now. So let her do it and maybe it won’t look as Pinterest-worthy. Instead my PTA is rejecting her offer and holding out for a new professional event planner (whoever she may be) to lend her skills because “we have to outdo ourselves.” |
Anonymous
OP here and ITA. Sometimes people fail to correctly level-set in terms of what is even needed. One thing about stuff like decorations or "professional level" contributions is that it generally only impresses the parents. The kids don't care. This kind of becomes my mantra when I was on the PTA and participating in some of the event planning -- how do we get the most bang for our buck for the kids? Often people want to spend large money on something that adults like the idea of (say setting up an elaborate Photo Booth at an event with lots of props and a pro photographer and a photo printer so kids can take their photos home after) but kids would actually *prefer* to run around on the playground, which only requires that the event make sure there are some volunteers to keep an eye on the kids and that the play ends at dark. Otherwise free! I saw a lot of this on the PTA and one of the reasons I started to step away is because I just couldn't understand what the point was of dedicating so much money and energy to certain things when there was often an easier, cheaper way to do it that the kids would like just as much (with the benefit of burdening parents less). |
Anonymous
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In my experience, a good chunk of the PTA volunteer roles are “make work” that don’t noticeably enhance the school experience for our kids or teachers in any way.
Having worked at and sent kids to schools that had massive PTAs, as well as schools where the entire PTA budget for the whole year was under $3000 and consists of 6 moms, most things aren’t necessary. No one really misses Halloween bingo or seasonable bulletin boards if they don’t happen this year. If no one joyfully wants to do it, just don’t—it’s really and truly fine. |
Anonymous
OP here and yes, this is probably my major take away. That's why I think the solution is the separate out the events planning function so that the PTA can focus primarily on the stuff that feels more central and necessary (and actually impacts the day to day experience of kids and teachers) and then the events committee can operate on the side and just plan events as they have resources, including volunteer availability, but no one views that as the reason the PTA exists. One reason this could be good is that it would naturally allow a bit more ebb and flow with events depending on the actual interest of current families. Instead of "well we HAVE to do the fall festival, the spring festival, Halloween Bingo, the winter bake-off, Slip-and-Slide-apalooza, the annual Parents v. Teacher Tennis tourney, and 14 other events -- the PTA always does this stuff!" it's more like the people who want to do events get together in August and decide what they as a group want and have bandwidth to put on, and that's what they do, and it's not just endless obligation. So there may be years with tons of events because the parent population is more extroverted and energetic, and years with fewer events because it's a more reserved or busy group, and that has no impact on the actual work of the PTA which will chug along regardless. The conflation of PTA with events leads to misplaced understanding of what PTAs are for, I think, and thus also resentment ("why am I being constantly asked to volunteer to help run events I don't value?"). |
Anonymous
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As a PTA leader, I often here from other parents about all sorts of events they would like to have at the school. My response is usually: we can do that if you or other parents organize it. Probably 90% of the time, no one volunteers--the suggestion apparently was for the existing PTA volunteers, already stretched thin, take on even more. No thank you.
I do appreciate the 10% of the time when the parent agrees to organize the event and recruit volunteers. That's a great way to expand the work we do. |
Anonymous
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As a teacher, one thing I see is that PTA's plan a lot of things for either "spirit" or "teacher appreciation" whose real purpose is for "PTA moms" to signal that they are "involved", so they can feel superior. I'll also note that I think all homework before third grade, and a lot of homework in third grade and up fits this category.
Parents who are good parents, but aren't hyper focused on their status as "involved" parents end up spending a lot of time on these tasks, and then when they are asked to do something that actually is important to either the kids or the teachers, they are burnt out, and when they say no, they get more judgment. So, I'd vote for simpler "spirit" activities, fewer "teacher appreciation activities", less homework, and then a few nice (but simple) events for families to connect outside of school, like park meetups for incoming Kindergarteners, maybe some kind of reading night, support for the school play, etc . . . |
Anonymous
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Doesn't your PTA have committee chairs for each event, and the other executive board members are in other roles, such as communication and support? This is how our PTAs are structured, and I don't feel that events overshadowed other parts of our mission.
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Anonymous
PTA parent who agrees with you in general. I just want to point out that in the schools my kids attended, spirit activities were initiated by the school, not the PTA. All the PTAs did make a huge deal out of Teacher Appreciation days, which I agree may not be exactly what teachers want. I think teachers should be more involved in PTA decision-making, honestly. Principals came to our PTA board meetings, and teachers don't want to step on the Principals' toes... so parents on the PTA usually don't get direct teacher feedback, so thanks for posting. |
Anonymous
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As a teacher, the things I want help from the pta (or any parents) with aren’t fun or glamorous. I want someone to do lunch duty/hall duty/bathroom duty (even once a week!) so we get our planning time back. I want someone monitoring the kiss and ride line so no one pulls U-turns in the middle of the block creating dangerous situations for kids. I want someone to help act as a crossing guard so our staff doesn’t rotate through to keep kids safe. I want someone else monitoring drop off in the morning so I can talk to the counselors before school starts instead of them opening car doors for kids.
I know it’s not class parties or spirit nights. It isn’t organizing author visits or assemblies. Those things aren’t important though—the day to day sludge is. |
Anonymous
I totally get this, but I think one reason PTAs have shifted away from this kind of volunteering is that fewer parents have availability to volunteer during the school day than used to be the case. When I was a kid many families had a SAHM who could do stuff like recess or hallway duty and so you could fill out entire schedules with these parents and it served a real purpose. These days most families are dual income and it can be really hard for a parent to commit to a 1 hour volunteer shift in the middle of the week, much less to do this 1-2x a month and for enough other parents to also do this to where teachers can be relieved of recess duty or other things that I know do take away from your planning time. Instead what would happen is the 10 parents who have that kind of freedom would basically have to work at the school for free to provide coverage. I also think schools are warier about parents performing roles with a lot of child interaction now, due to safety concerns. Our school no longer permits parents to help in classrooms, for instance, whereas 20 years ago it wasn't that uncommon especially in younger grades where an extra set of hands could be helpful. Same concerns about recess or hall duty because schools have a lot of liability issues around things like how adults interact with students. Unless you put parents through the same sort of training teachers and admin go through to deal with this stuff, the school could expose itself to potential problems if, for instance, a parent hugged or discipline a student in an inappropriate way. I agree PTAs often push parents to spend a lot of time and energy on make work BS that no one really wants and then when the classroom needs something actually useful (like chaperones for a field trip or classroom material donations), parents are burned out and don't contribute. PTAs should be a lot more self-aware about this. |
Anonymous
| With the benefit of hindsight, I’d never get involved today in PTA the way I was when my kids were in elementary. What a waste of time and effort for nothing that really benefits the actual kids or teachers much at all. I’m almost embarrassed at my own behavior from back then. PTA parents are the worst. |
Anonymous
Our PTA sponsors like 20 events throughout the school year, there's no way to have a separate committee chair for each event. It's a huge job to put them on and while there's an events chair, the rest of the PTA board including the president dedicate a lot of man hours to the events. The president has told me that event execution is fully half of her job, maybe more, even though it's the part she likes the least. |