Private School Parent Association

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't quite understand ours. There doesn't seem to be any regular meetings. The DEI committee had one or two meeting that had a speaker/book talk but no regular here's what's going on type meetings. They just emailed out a slate of new officers and voting was by google doc. I have no idea how these people were picked - I don't even remember a call for interested people. I would not have volunteered to be an officer so I guess it’s fine. Our school likes to talk about how great and strong the community is but we haven't really seen it in our 3 years there.

As the process is not transparent reach out to one or two of the officers and ask how they initially became involved.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Our school practically begs people to volunteer. While there is a "nomination" process, it really isn't a nomination. The job of the nomination committee is to get people to volunteer, and literally everyone can volunteer. Are you sure you are being too literally about the term nominate? Did you volunteer and they said no thanks?

I can't imagine turning anyone away, unless there were just too many who wanted to be rep for a given class while other positions were unfilled. In that case you'd want one of the people volunteering for class rep to take one of the other positions instead. You don't really need more than one or two for a class rep.

+1
I agree with this. At our school you are also encouraged to self nominate. They want people to accept positions they are interested in. I love that we have a nominations committee bc it ensures there’s a diverse group of parent reps (eg they try to have half boy moms and half girl moms, geographic diversity, not all kids on the same teams, etc). It’s also somewhat of a formal process bc there are rules re not being a parent rep twice in a row, etc. It keeps people from trying to dominate things. These of course are just for the leadership positions. There are tons of opportunities to volunteer throughout the year

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't quite understand ours. There doesn't seem to be any regular meetings. The DEI committee had one or two meeting that had a speaker/book talk but no regular here's what's going on type meetings. They just emailed out a slate of new officers and voting was by google doc. I have no idea how these people were picked - I don't even remember a call for interested people. I would not have volunteered to be an officer so I guess its fine. Our school likes to talk about how great and strong the community is but we haven't really seen it in our 3 years there.

This screams NCS.

No not at all. We are at NCS and nothing in this description happens at NCS. No voting via email.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't quite understand ours. There doesn't seem to be any regular meetings. The DEI committee had one or two meeting that had a speaker/book talk but no regular here's what's going on type meetings. They just emailed out a slate of new officers and voting was by google doc. I have no idea how these people were picked - I don't even remember a call for interested people. I would not have volunteered to be an officer so I guess its fine. Our school likes to talk about how great and strong the community is but we haven't really seen it in our 3 years there.

This screams NCS.

No not at all. We are at NCS and nothing in this description happens at NCS. No voting via email.

There were meetings held for DEI book club/speakers and there has been voting via forms. Not certain PP was talking about NCS but it’s possible.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How do the PAs at your schools work? My child recently started at a new school in order to be a grade rep or involved in anything you have to be invited. For instance, if you want to be a grade rep, you have to be nominated however people who don't wanna do it are nominated, and elected and pressured into doing it while people who volunteered are passed over.

My past experience was everyone could come to meetings, show up and raise their hand if they want to be a grade rep or involved in the auction everybody was able to do what they thought their talents would be best utilized for.

The result is, there's no parent community at this new school and parents are actively kept out of the Parent Association.

If you feel comfortable mentioning your name, I would appreciate that. Please tell me how the PTA works at your school.

NP here. This reminds me of Beauvoir. I was the PTA president at a DMV school a few years ago and attended a PCW event for the PTA presidents (and president-elects, so 2 people from each school) of participating schools so all the DCUM private schools mentioned on a regular basis were there. We were discussing challenges in volunteer fatigue that most schools reported experiencing, sharing stories, offering suggestions and I will never forget when the president of Beauvoir raised their hand and announced "oh we don't have that problem and we have a very organized system to screen volunteers. For example, our most popular committee is the Book Fair committee. So in order to be on the Book Fair committee, a parent must be nominated to volunteer at two prior book fair events and then after those 2 events they can be ASKED to be on the Book Fair Committee."

I was sitting at a table with the Potomac, St. Andrews and I think Burgundy Farms presidents and all of us were speechless and the Potomac woman started laughing and rolling her eyes. Beauvoir has the book fair once a year apparently, so to be on the committee (at least back then) you had to have already been at the school for 2 years. This school goes to 2nd grade. What?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:How do the PAs at your schools work? My child recently started at a new school in order to be a grade rep or involved in anything you have to be invited. For instance, if you want to be a grade rep, you have to be nominated however people who don't wanna do it are nominated, and elected and pressured into doing it while people who volunteered are passed over.

My past experience was everyone could come to meetings, show up and raise their hand if they want to be a grade rep or involved in the auction everybody was able to do what they thought their talents would be best utilized for.

The result is, there's no parent community at this new school and parents are actively kept out of the Parent Association.

If you feel comfortable mentioning your name, I would appreciate that. Please tell me how the PTA works at your school.

NP here. This reminds me of Beauvoir. I was the PTA president at a DMV school a few years ago and attended a PCW event for the PTA presidents (and president-elects, so 2 people from each school) of participating schools so all the DCUM private schools mentioned on a regular basis were there. We were discussing challenges in volunteer fatigue that most schools reported experiencing, sharing stories, offering suggestions and I will never forget when the president of Beauvoir raised their hand and announced "oh we don't have that problem and we have a very organized system to screen volunteers. For example, our most popular committee is the Book Fair committee. So in order to be on the Book Fair committee, a parent must be nominated to volunteer at two prior book fair events and then after those 2 events they can be ASKED to be on the Book Fair Committee."

I was sitting at a table with the Potomac, St. Andrews and I think Burgundy Farms presidents and all of us were speechless and the Potomac woman started laughing and rolling her eyes. Beauvoir has the book fair once a year apparently, so to be on the committee (at least back then) you had to have already been at the school for 2 years. This school goes to 2nd grade. What?

I meant 3rd but everything else still stands.

[Anonymous]

Appear at the school and volunteer for something on occasion. Many parents are complete unknowns to the school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't quite understand ours. There doesn't seem to be any regular meetings. The DEI committee had one or two meeting that had a speaker/book talk but no regular here's what's going on type meetings. They just emailed out a slate of new officers and voting was by google doc. I have no idea how these people were picked - I don't even remember a call for interested people. I would not have volunteered to be an officer so I guess its fine. Our school likes to talk about how great and strong the community is but we haven't really seen it in our 3 years there.

This screams NCS.

No not at all. We are at NCS and nothing in this description happens at NCS. No voting via email.

There were meetings held for DEI book club/speakers and there has been voting via forms. Not certain PP was talking about NCS but it’s possible.

No she said a slate of new officers was sent by email for voting by parents which is false. Parents do not vote school wide. They just pass the nominated selection of new officers. Just stop.

[Anonymous]

At our school they send out an email asking for volunteers for room parents. I don't know how they go about choosing if multiple people offer, but there is no "nomination" system. Same for leadership roles in the PA. You basically volunteer to run. This year everyone ran unopposed so I think anyone who wants to volunteer can find a way to do so.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't quite understand ours. There doesn't seem to be any regular meetings. The DEI committee had one or two meeting that had a speaker/book talk but no regular here's what's going on type meetings. They just emailed out a slate of new officers and voting was by google doc. I have no idea how these people were picked - I don't even remember a call for interested people. I would not have volunteered to be an officer so I guess its fine. Our school likes to talk about how great and strong the community is but we haven't really seen it in our 3 years there.

This screams NCS.

No not at all. We are at NCS and nothing in this description happens at NCS. No voting via email.

There is no voting but there was a google pool type thing that allowed you to approve the slate already picked.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't quite understand ours. There doesn't seem to be any regular meetings. The DEI committee had one or two meeting that had a speaker/book talk but no regular here's what's going on type meetings. They just emailed out a slate of new officers and voting was by google doc. I have no idea how these people were picked - I don't even remember a call for interested people. I would not have volunteered to be an officer so I guess its fine. Our school likes to talk about how great and strong the community is but we haven't really seen it in our 3 years there.

This screams NCS.

No not at all. We are at NCS and nothing in this description happens at NCS. No voting via email.

There were meetings held for DEI book club/speakers and there has been voting via forms. Not certain PP was talking about NCS but it’s possible.

+1

[Anonymous]

Our school is like this at the elementary level and by middle school, it’s a free for all. I’m sure problem parents aren’t welcome on the committees, but if you are reasonably respectful of what they are trying to do, they will let you on one of you want to be.

[Anonymous]

Our smaller private is always looking for volunteers. Any parent who wants to help with X is certainly allowed to do so — and with gratitude from the PA board. The committee heads usually are chosen from the people who helped with that activity the previous year, simply because they understand roughly what needs to be done AND they actually showed up and helped the prior year.

There are a very small number of parents who make a big show of “joining” and “signing up to help” who then are no-shows for whatever they signed up to help with, which leaves other volunteers holding the bag. Filtering committee chairs by who actually showed up means the PA does not have to worry that a committee chair will go MIA.