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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]The PTA does so much for our school. It's a few volunteers taking on the burden of time, money, and effort for everyone else. God bless them. If that leads to them acting like a click or someone insular, who cares.

Walk in their shoes and then you'll get it. I started to get involved in the PTA before my health took a turn. I didn't get a chance to do much. But I did help out with picture day. And calling parents and trying to get issues resolved, I was treated so rudely, as if I was working for the photo company and I get a commission or something. It's ridiculous. So many thankless tasks.

My friend ran a program where they collect used instruments, get them refurbished by a music school in town, and the kids write an essay to have a chance to win the instrument. One of the winners families complained that the (totally functional clarinet) was not good enough and the PTA should buy them a brand new one, which they can't afford. The list goes on.

My friend is such a sweet person and worked so hard, there were so many steps to this process and for someone to be nasty to her at the end, which this parent was... It's just awful.[/quote]

What in the world?  PTA should  have anything to do with organizing instrument rentals and picture day.  Stay in your lane.  This is a case of too many hands that want to be in the pot [/quote]

DP. Of course they organize picture day. They also organize book fairs, back to school events, after school clubs, yearbooks, multicultural fairs, steam fairs, spelling bees, read a thons, school stores, school directories, student supply kits, staff appreciation days, various fundraising events/spirit days and much much more.  If they didn’t, these events would not happen in most schools. [/quote]

Some people would prefer that some of these events NOT happen. Like fundraising that is linked to actual school funding -- yes. But a lot of parents dislike the million spirit days and seasonal fairs. Elementary schools do not need yearbooks, and by the time kids are ready for yearbooks, they are old enough to do it themselves. They also don't need "school directories", assuming you are referring to a directory of families -- you can just do class lists. If you're referring to staff directories, of course the school can do that themselves (though some would likely prefer not too!).

Our school does sponsor its own picture days, all academic fairs, and spelling bees, as well as readathons and other academically-focused events. Those work much better when they are tied to curriculum and classroom activities anyway -- a PTA-run spelling bee sounds like a bad idea, in all honesty. The school also organizes Back to School night, and most after school clubs are organized by teachers or staff -- sometimes parents volunteer to help with them (often actually) but the clubs have to have teacher/staff sponsors for legal reasons, so this is organized through the school and not the PTA. The PTA doesn't have to do anything except sometimes say "Ms. Smith is looking for parent volunteers to help with Lego Club, if anyone would like to volunteer please contact Ms. Smith."

I would be perfectly happy with a PTA that just organized fundraising events, maybe one per trimester and any ongoing virtual fundraising (like selling school branded gear online). At the elementary level, I truly do not need the other stuff and neither does my kid. A lot of it is busywork that doesn't add much to the school experience for kids and can cause a lot of headaches and stress for parents.[/quote]

Ms. Smith is tired and doesn’t really want to run Lego club.  Instead she wants to spend this time grading papers before going home to her own family.

[/quote]

Well then they have to cancel Lego club because the school legally cannot sponsor a club without a staff sponsor because of rules about who is allowed to supervise kids on school grounds.[/quote]

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