Taking a quick break from vacation stories to post a bit about what's been going on with my quest for a functional PTO at the boys' school
After months of trying to get things started, I was finally asked to join a work group of parents who are going to try to bring our completely defunct PTO back from the dead at school. By way of history, when the school opened, coming up on three years ago, a PTO presidency was elected...and then nothing happened. Apparently, they did organize one charity fundraising even last year in the spring, but I was here from January on and never heard anything about it. Besides that, nada. So with the new administration put in this year, I have been harping and harping on this topic to whomever would listen (and several people who really didn't want to listen) and was finally asked to help. At our first meeting with the director of the school, we decided we needed a set of bylaws or operating procedures and we needed the input of the two principals we have currently. Before our next meeting, the director sent us a draft "constitution" document based on that of a PTO at one of our sister schools and asked us to look it over and make suggestions for revisions or changes.
You know me: he said look it over, I heard "edit, edit, EDIT!" And believe me, this document was a mess. Clearly, parts of it were transliterated from Arabic to English with no one checking to make sure the translation made sense: my favorite sentence was "Channels of command should all be through the proper channels and through the Director." Wait, what now? Delete! It was riddled with inconsistencies: for example, the governing committee of the PTO was variously referred to as the executive board, the executive committee, the parent board, and the governing team at different points throughout the document. It contradicted itself frequently. It made reference to people and positions that didn't exist at our school. It was missing important sections like "Nominations and Elections" and "Duties of Elected Positions." And worst of all, it directed the PTO to meet, wait for it, once a year. ONCE A YEAR?! Why even bother??
So I arrived at our next meeting with a sheet of questions and my edited copy of the draft that was riddled with green pen marks (I chose green so as not to freak anyone out with red!). Thankfully, we were able to get all my/our questions answered satisfactorily and all the changes were agreed to, so after our break, I typed up the newly revised constitution and am eagerly awaiting our next meeting, at which I hope we set up a time for all the parents to meet together for new elections and an agenda for the coming year. I could feel myself slipping into teacher/editor mode during the meeting and it must have showed; one of the principals emailed me afterwards to say he had "learnt something of your skills!" Yes, I do in fact have skills I would love to put to good use at this struggling little school if I could just be given the chance to do so! I hope we can keep the ball rolling and other parents get involved so we can make up for lost time and really enhance the kids' experiences at the school. Fingers crossed!
After months of trying to get things started, I was finally asked to join a work group of parents who are going to try to bring our completely defunct PTO back from the dead at school. By way of history, when the school opened, coming up on three years ago, a PTO presidency was elected...and then nothing happened. Apparently, they did organize one charity fundraising even last year in the spring, but I was here from January on and never heard anything about it. Besides that, nada. So with the new administration put in this year, I have been harping and harping on this topic to whomever would listen (and several people who really didn't want to listen) and was finally asked to help. At our first meeting with the director of the school, we decided we needed a set of bylaws or operating procedures and we needed the input of the two principals we have currently. Before our next meeting, the director sent us a draft "constitution" document based on that of a PTO at one of our sister schools and asked us to look it over and make suggestions for revisions or changes.
You know me: he said look it over, I heard "edit, edit, EDIT!" And believe me, this document was a mess. Clearly, parts of it were transliterated from Arabic to English with no one checking to make sure the translation made sense: my favorite sentence was "Channels of command should all be through the proper channels and through the Director." Wait, what now? Delete! It was riddled with inconsistencies: for example, the governing committee of the PTO was variously referred to as the executive board, the executive committee, the parent board, and the governing team at different points throughout the document. It contradicted itself frequently. It made reference to people and positions that didn't exist at our school. It was missing important sections like "Nominations and Elections" and "Duties of Elected Positions." And worst of all, it directed the PTO to meet, wait for it, once a year. ONCE A YEAR?! Why even bother??
So I arrived at our next meeting with a sheet of questions and my edited copy of the draft that was riddled with green pen marks (I chose green so as not to freak anyone out with red!). Thankfully, we were able to get all my/our questions answered satisfactorily and all the changes were agreed to, so after our break, I typed up the newly revised constitution and am eagerly awaiting our next meeting, at which I hope we set up a time for all the parents to meet together for new elections and an agenda for the coming year. I could feel myself slipping into teacher/editor mode during the meeting and it must have showed; one of the principals emailed me afterwards to say he had "learnt something of your skills!" Yes, I do in fact have skills I would love to put to good use at this struggling little school if I could just be given the chance to do so! I hope we can keep the ball rolling and other parents get involved so we can make up for lost time and really enhance the kids' experiences at the school. Fingers crossed!
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