To think that the PTA is voluntary?

[malificent7]

I used to help the pta as and when i could with the Christmas fare etc.

Then i got more work so i had to stop. I will nog forget one of the PTA have a moan at me in the playground that some mhms were not pulling their wieght as they were not in the PTA. When i said id love to help but couldnt she said "we are all in the same boat" She didnt work.

Aibu to think that if you volunteer you shouldnt moan about people not volunteering for whatever reason!?

Voluntary means just that!

It gets to the stage where it's the same few people the whole time and believe it or not it's hard work organising everything.
They're human they get tired and they have personal chores to do too so they can be vbusy.
Sometimes they feel they have to or a function won't go ahead and disappoint the children so the push through and get it done.
It's not just for their kids it's for all the kids and they're human so a moan isn't unforgivable and understandable sometimes.

YANBU. Yes she can have a moan, but 'we're all in the same boat' is a load of bollocks if she doesn't work when her DC is/are at school.

Tbh it just does get frustrating when literally hundreds of parents tell you they are too busy to volunteer. Yes obviously some just are but when everyone expects events to go ahead but wouldn't actually volunteer an hour or so of their time to help it grates.

YANBU, everyone has different commitment, priorities and motivation. PTA is voluntary.
However, as sunnyshowers said, its often just a few who actually volunteer, and its natural if they feel a bit miffed at how much effort and time is falling to them.

I'm sure they do feel miffed but not everyone is around to serve coffee at school daytime events or help run the disco. So long as you support their fundraising where you can, no one has a right to complain though!

And there is a difference too regarding spare time between having a local job in school hours and being out 12-13 hours a day.

YANBU. I don't like the expression 'I don't have time', tbh, and I try not to use it, because we all have 168 hours per week. Every single one of us. But I have 3 children, one with SN, I work, I'm doing a work-based qualification, I'm a chair of governors at a school, I'm in a church homegroup, I have a dog, a cat and 3 chickens who all need attention....I am using as much of my 168 hours as I feel I can. I don't want to use any remaining hours on this volunteering opportunity.

If people begrudge doing it...don't do it. If that means the event doesn't go ahead, so be it. But don't moan at other people that you're so exhausted doing all the work. Either do it with good grace or don't do it.

I am an eager (possibly somewhat obsessive) parkrunner and parkruns, for those of you who aren't aware, are regular 5k runs that take place across the UK (and some other countries) and completely rely on volunteers.

So some people get very annoyed if people run but don't volunteer. But they may be volunteering in other ways. For example, they might volunteer with their local PTA - or be a scout leader or whatever. Or they may run because it's the only time in the week they can get childcare or whatever. We all choose our causes - whether we donate our time or money and we all have demands on our time whether childcare, elderly care, work, etc.

You may not agree with my priorities and I might not agree with yours. It's life.

I do find however, that you get more hassle if you volunteer and stop volunteering, than if you never volunteered before.

The attendance rate for our high school pta is pitiful. Last nights meeting had something like 6 parents which is atrocious given the 300 odd pupils that attend the school. The other parents are probably the ones that complain about the school and say they don't know what's going on!

Agreed 'Jelly. However I was bloody miffed on Sunday when, after the Christmas Bazaar, parents were asked to take a box of stock to the lock up next to the exit gates on their way out. Every single bloody adult there ignored the request and sauntered out leaving it for 'someone else' to do.

I went to a PTA meeting earlier this term. They rejected the suggestions of new fundraising activities (not just my ideas but the other new member too) out of hand, the chair blanked both of us and neither of us got emailed, despite them taking our email addresses.

TBH, it didn't particularly make me feel like they wanted me there.

People might have commitments they don't want to discuss.

Our PTA meetings fall into two categories -
A) The ones that are to plan the running of an an event
B) General meeting, ideas brainstorming

A are only attended by a very small number who are prepared to help,
B are better attended and there are lots of ideas and lots and lots of moaning about why don't we do this etc. We could do a lot more if the people who moaned at meeting B turned up to help. It's always left to a very small minority and gets very frustrating. At the halloween disco only one parent actually helped on the night and stayed behind to clear up!!!! If I sound bitter it's because I am, Christmas fair next week and it will be the same, me and a few teachers............and this is a school where a very high percentage of pupils have a stay at home parent.

The PTA is something that parents seem to expect others to run for the benefit of their children.

I'd of told her I'd join but The PTA is mind-numbingly boring. Could imagine the look on her face. :D :P

Its hard work organising these events and frustrating when so few people volunteer but yet are happy for their kids to benefit from whatever equipment or activity is financed as a result of someone elese hard work.

Of course it is, but I'd just say it to wind her up :D. I think it would be better for people to volunteer for say ... the Christmas fair etc. I wouldn't be able to do every single event but I would volunteer for a few or to help out on a stall or something.

The thing is you need
a) a few people with time & skills to organise stuff
b) a lot of people to give an hour at an event

What is frustrating is to organise a juniors disco, attended by 50 kids, and have to rope your teenage daughter in to help supervise because no parents offer to stay to help.

Or to have a summer fair attended by hundreds almost entirely manned by y6 staff and PTA committee family members because no one else will offer / commit.

I know that some people can't help. That some people are working, or have 4 kids under 7 to look after single handed etc. But just a few more doing a little bit more would help tremendously. And if you are at the event anyway for 2 hours, maybe 30mins on a stall wouldn't be so bad ...

I volunteered at DD's school fete for the first time (she is in Reception). I genuinely wanted to help out, although as a working mum I couldn't commit to joining the PTA. Anyway come the day of the fete they gave me just about the shittiest job they could find, while the PTA crew floated around with clip boards, laughing a joking with all their mates. I won't be volunteering again - I am no ones fool.

I expect it can get very frustrating if you're one of a very small number of volunteers out of a large number of parents.

But I agree that moaning to non-volunteers about the situation isn't helpful and just gets people's backs up. Especially when there's genuine other commitments that limit how much spare time you have for volunteering.

It's the same at work. If there's some charity event going on, I can pretty much tell you, in a building of around 1000 people, who will organise it and who will offer to take part.

There will always be some people who just won'the take part. ("No one ever did anything for me, why should I do anything?" said one colleague when I asked.) There will be those who do just not have time - caring responsibilities at home, a second job or whatever else. There will be those who prefer to volunteer outside of work, and are very involved with Brownies or a football club or stray cats already.

I don't believe that there's really only about 1% of the people in the building who are capable of making the time. But it's the same everywhere, and if I knew the trick of engaging more people who might be interested but just need a little push, I'd probably be a millionaire.

Assuming that mhms is mums and not a new acronym I've missed, I'm afraid I'd have been straight on her asking why she wasn't moaning about dads not pulling their weight? Presumably because there's an automatic assumption that mums have the time whereas dads are too busy because they're still seen as the breadwinner. Well the reality often is now that both parents work full-time and are breadwinners and too busy to volunteer. Which understandably sucks if you're on the PTA and over-stretched, and feel free to have a moan, but don't be making it yet another thing to guilt-trip busy mums about. Equal ops moaning at the very least! Rant over...

I don't know, part of the issue I have with PTAs ( and I've been on both sides of the equation as a parent and a former teacher) is the desire for martyrdom to make things unnecessarily complicated usually in the name of it being "for the children."

For example, one year the PTA raised a dismal amount of funding through a craft fair type thing that took 100s of hours of planning and organising, and requiring parents to buy tickets and then purchase lots of homemade tat to even generate a profit . Roll on a year later and new leadership brought in a simple raffle which could be organised by a handful of keen parents and profited 10-fold that the craft fair brought in.

If they'd streamline some of the fundraising they might feel like it's less of time commitment and would draw in more parents.

One of the problems is that either no-one does anything - and then we all have a shit school. Or a few people try to make it better for everyone. It doesn't have to be like that.

At my kids' primary the school was failing. The parents were determined to give the best for ALL the kids. We had a new Headteacher who had been brought in to turn the school around. Together we did just that!!

There were craft clubs and athletic clubs and dance clubs and a chess club. The sports team was well supported. There were loads of trips, there were food fairs and talks and Christmas/Easter/Summer events. We repainted the buildings and did the garden/play area at weekends. It was fabulous! We raised money and everyone gave something, time, money, advice, resources.

If you are work get your employer to donate or sponsor. If you have a Nanny or an au-pair involve her. If you have money, give generously. If you are not free during the day offer to do admin in the evening. (It just has to be once a term!).

Whatever your circumstances there is always something you can do. The attitude that the PTA is a group of non-working up-themselves middle class mothers is simply not true!! (Unless you want it to be)

The school became one of the best. It was happy and the kids did so well. Then as it went up the league tables it attracted people who just wanted to get in because it was good. No local connection. No sense of the school being a community school - it was something they had "bought" if you like, ( although it was State)

The attitude was "Why should we?" and it became the same few. And the kids got less. The trips can't go ahead if there are not enough helpers. The clubs can't run unless the teacher gets at least two adults to be present - etc etc.

It's a shame really - but it is the way of the world. You get people who give and people who take.

An unpopular view maybe - sorry.

Probably too few offering help and she was just having a moan. I used to be on the PTAS at primary and it was so hard to get any one to do anything yet they wanted their kids to benefit. We raised over. Eleven thousand to put two extensions onto the school! The LA thought we couldn't raise the £3,000 needed to get them to agree to the first extension. We did it in 18 mths. The next time they doubled the figure and although it was more difficult and took longer( we had 3 yrs each time) we did it in 2 1/2 yrs. we only had 45 kids the first time and about 60 the second. I still feel proud when I walk past to think we did that!
Could you offer to do one fundraiser a year or at least support one by doing some of the work? If everyone offered to do one it would help.
By the way I was a SAHM, then a fulltime student, then a working mum and I managed it.
Yes, it is voluntary but could you not volunteer for one occasion.
PS . Don't moan about lack of reading books as where do you think most of them come from...yes PTAS provide the bulk of them!

it gets to the stage where it's the same few people the whole time and believe it or not it's hard work organising everything.

This is what happens in almost every school I think. We have 375 kids in our primary school and it's a hard core of 5 or 6 people who do the lot - most of us work too. We have found a successful strategy is asking for people to do a specific task rather than to volunteer in general - so we'll ask for someone to put together a flyer, or organise a certain event.

In my experience as well people are perfectly happy to bitch and gripe about PTA, but also perfectly happy to send their kids to the school discos which we organise and take advantage of the workshops which we pay for.