PTA Moms

[Anonymous]

Stop generalizing everyone as the same.
The ones I’ve known have been great and I certainly appreciate the work they do.

[Anonymous]

At our K-8 school they seem fine, though I don’t have a lot of interaction with them. I do volunteer for about 3-4 events per year. And they schedule most events on weekends or early mornings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The PTA at our school feels really cliquish. I tried volunteering for a while but felt very unwelcome. Now I do things for them occasionally out of obligation to the school and because I think it's important to demonstrate what community involvement is to my kid. But I don't jt enjoy it at all because I find the other PTA parents bizarrely unfriendly and I just kind of smile my way through it but when it's over I always tell my husband "remind me not to do this again."

I just don't get their behavior. They constantly ask for volunteers and want more people involved, but they clearly mostly just want people who they already know (because their kids are friends, are in the same activities, or they're neighbors or whatever) and they view me as an outsider. It often feels like they are like "We desperately need volunteers! No, not you." It's feels pretty bad.

Same experience here. I still volunteer. I’ve found a couple of the members are actually neutral to friendly, so that helps.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:They make more work for the rest of us. Hey, let's do an event at 2pm on a Tuesday! Sign up to volunteer -pretend you are a teacher. My parents were very good parents. They never would have come to school in the middle of a workday. They expected the school to respect their busy lives and they respected teachers as professionals.

I haven’t experienced these… what things are happening at 2pm? The only thing I can think of our class parties for Halloween and other holidays.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They make more work for the rest of us. Hey, let's do an event at 2pm on a Tuesday! Sign up to volunteer -pretend you are a teacher. My parents were very good parents. They never would have come to school in the middle of a workday. They expected the school to respect their busy lives and they respected teachers as professionals.

I haven’t experienced these… what things are happening at 2pm? The only thing I can think of our class parties for Halloween and other holidays.

Our PTA doesn't schedule anything at 2pm but I do think they make pointless work for people. They are just disorganized and will plan events that are poorly advertised and executed so when we show up to volunteer, it's often for nothing. Like the event will be severely underattended and they won't need you, or they'll have scheduled volunteers but failed to arrange for the thing they are volunteering for. It's just annoying. It would be better to do fewer events but execute them well.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They make more work for the rest of us. Hey, let's do an event at 2pm on a Tuesday! Sign up to volunteer -pretend you are a teacher. My parents were very good parents. They never would have come to school in the middle of a workday. They expected the school to respect their busy lives and they respected teachers as professionals.

I haven’t experienced these… what things are happening at 2pm? The only thing I can think of our class parties for Halloween and other holidays.

Our PTA doesn't schedule anything at 2pm but I do think they make pointless work for people. They are just disorganized and will plan events that are poorly advertised and executed so when we show up to volunteer, it's often for nothing. Like the event will be severely underattended and they won't need you, or they'll have scheduled volunteers but failed to arrange for the thing they are volunteering for. It's just annoying. It would be better to do fewer events but execute them well.

I agree with that for my school. Everything is poorly run and often the events are unpleasant and a cluster. I’ve been to events in other districts (Used to be a teacher) and our events are embarrassingly bad compared to others. But our school and PTA will call it a success and do nothing differently next time. Very frustrating to volunteer for events that you know will be bad. Others don’t seem to feel that way, so maybe I have high expectations. Or maybe everyone is just pretending.

[Anonymous]

The PTA moms (and Dads) at our school rock (shout out Shepherd Elementary if you're on here)!

Every single interaction I've had with has been genuine and pleasant, and from what I can tell, most of them are volunteering on top of being high-level performers in their own careers.

I don't have half the organizational skills or capacity to do what they get done and I'm so appreciative that they're willing to put in the hours & the work.

[Anonymous]

Some are great, but then there are the ones that do it because they want to be able to control everything/socially engineer things for their kids. They pretend to want help, but really they enjoy acting like martyrs who are superior because they sacrifice their time (when it’s actually motivated by self serving intentions).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:They make more work for the rest of us. Hey, let's do an event at 2pm on a Tuesday! Sign up to volunteer -pretend you are a teacher. My parents were very good parents. They never would have come to school in the middle of a workday. They expected the school to respect their busy lives and they respected teachers as professionals.

I haven’t experienced these… what things are happening at 2pm? The only thing I can think of our class parties for Halloween and other holidays.

Our PTA doesn't schedule anything at 2pm but I do think they make pointless work for people. They are just disorganized and will plan events that are poorly advertised and executed so when we show up to volunteer, it's often for nothing. Like the event will be severely underattended and they won't need you, or they'll have scheduled volunteers but failed to arrange for the thing they are volunteering for. It's just annoying. It would be better to do fewer events but execute them well.

I agree with that for my school. Everything is poorly run and often the events are unpleasant and a cluster. I’ve been to events in other districts (Used to be a teacher) and our events are embarrassingly bad compared to others. But our school and PTA will call it a success and do nothing differently next time. Very frustrating to volunteer for events that you know will be bad. Others don’t seem to feel that way, so maybe I have high expectations. Or maybe everyone is just pretending.

Our pta in McLean is very well run and well organized. I used to be more active but now I mostly attend events with my youngest and donate items when they ask like for staff appreciation.

[Anonymous]

PTA Moms suck.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Some are great, but then there are the ones that do it because they want to be able to control everything/socially engineer things for their kids. They pretend to want help, but really they enjoy acting like martyrs who are superior because they sacrifice their time (when it’s actually motivated by self serving intentions).

I'm a former PTA mom and agree that some are like the description above. Not all, though! I'll add there are definitely women (maybe men) who were lawyers, had MBAs, etc and are staying home and they go overboard with the planning and execution.

I was on the board for three years (standard commitment) and have some tales to tell!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I am a PTA mom Hopefully folks don't hate me. I try very hard to have fun events at school and be welcoming to parents and families. In fact, that is pretty much all we focus on (how to provide a fun and welcome environment for families).

I would say our PTA organizes stuff but is not welcoming. I have only met one welcoming mom from the main clique.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:You mean the volunteers who organize and staff all the fun things at your kids school?

There are great PTA parents and there are the exclusive, snooty ones who treat this like their job and other volunteers like their employees. I will never volunteer for my child's PTA again after the way some woman tried to micromanage me like I was her employee! Sorry lady, I already have one of those in my actual job. I'm doing this to help the children at my kids school for free. You don't get to treat me like crap. Nope, make your own damn sign up genius this year.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:You mean the volunteers who organize and staff all the fun things at your kids school?

There are great PTA parents and there are the exclusive, snooty ones who treat this like their job and other volunteers like their employees. I will never volunteer for my child's PTA again after the way some woman tried to micromanage me like I was her employee! Sorry lady, I already have one of those in my actual job. I'm doing this to help the children at my kids school for free. You don't get to treat me like crap. Nope, make your own damn sign up genius this year.

This. You can't generalize about PTA parents anymore than you can generalize about "coworkers" or "neighbors." A few are amazing, most are okay, some are horrible. Unfortunately, because of the way you interact with them (thrown together due to your kid attending that school), if you happen upon a horrible one, it can really negatively impact your life. Just like a totally miserable coworker or a really obnoxious neighbor.

Anyway, I've had a bad experience with our PTA, though mostly due to two specific members who are extremely clique-y and rude. Everyone else is fine or even great, but I minimize how much stuff I do with the PTA in order to avoid these two women. They both have kids in my kid's grade, too. It sucks! I wish they could be more chill and slightly less unpleasant, but this is the path they've chosen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Stop generalizing everyone as the same.
The ones I’ve known have been great and I certainly appreciate the work they do.

OP here. I wasn't generalizing. In fact, I was surprised that someone like this actually exists because it hasn't been my experience to date. It was kind of shocking that this person exactly fit the stereotype.