Are you a member of your school's pta?

[Twiglett]

if not, why not?

grumpy!!!

Blimey, Twiglett! You've nearly scared me into joining a PTA!

Think I'll wait till DS goes to school first though

Well I hope to be but the 1st meeting is on Monday morning at 9am & I work Grrrrrr. I have expressed an interest thought & hopefully I will get a phone call after telling me whats gone on!

OK....deep breath...and here goes with the rant.....

My DD's school's PTA runs a very tight cliche. So tight, in fact, that you can only get onto the PTA by going to the one meeting a year when they vote for members. Usually, the same lot vote each other in again.

If you dare to go along to the meetings during the rest of the year, you are allowed to sit and observe, but not to talk or contribute in any way. Only things of a fundraising nature are discussed. Nothing to do with school policy or parental concerns are to ever be raised there - instead the Head must be contacted and a meeting will be arranged.

We have given up trying to become involved...so please...no comments about lazy parents.

At my dd's school every parent is automatically on the PTA. It's our first meeting in a couple of weeks, so we won't know until then whether it actually works in practice or whether it's only the PTA officers who actually get to have their say.

Yes miss, I'm on the committee.

(keep meaning to say, the t-shirt machine washes brilliantly, thank you!)

Yes, not sure how but I am.

every parent at my ds's school is automatically a member however I requested information about joining the committee last week and was told "We are full" ! How can they be full when there's no upper limit?

DH joined when dd was 1 to make sure he was steering the school in the right direction before she arrived...

Everyone's automatically a member of our PTA.

I went along to a meeting last term after a desperate appeal as it was down to 4 members. Had a meeting last night and now there are 6 of us. This is despite notices on all the gates of the school . The other members were very friendly and certainly no cliquiness. It's a bit of a disgrace in a school with nearly 200 pupils in a fairly well off area IMO. It was also nice to meet dd1's teacher "out of school" as it were.

jampots, that sounds like a difference between the assocation, which will have no limit on numbers, and the committee, which inevitably will. I would just ask them to let you know when the next lot of elections are.

No, PTA are scarily organised women. Also I think having two pre-schoolers exempts me on the basis of not enough hours in the day as it is.

Do my duty by baking vast numbers of cakes for the summer fete and christmas fayre though.

in our school the PTA have no say on school policy etc. It is a fundraising body. Each class has a couple of class reps and there is a Chair, co-chair, treasurer, staff rep, secretary and the Head teacher.

I chaired it for 3 years and now have gone back on the committee as a rep for DD1's Y6 class

Our's sounds very much like Marslady's. Everyone very welcome to all meetings, all ideas voted on by everyone who's there, not just the "important" members. I'm class rep for dd's class and encourage others in the class to help on our year's stalls at fairs, cake sales etc.

I wasn't being grumpy

Its just I've seen a few threads where people (new people to schools .. yes you GDG ) are actively avoiding the PTA and I was wondering why? What am I missing in terms of perception of what the PTA is and does.

I'm perceiving a negative connotation that I hadn't previously seen .. I thought the PTA was just about being an active member of school life and helping where you can but maybe being a member will make me an officious little twerp

Here you go Twig!

Gobble joins the PTA

Message withdrawn

Passionflower - I also have 2 pre-schoolers (plus one in reception) and a work from home freelance career on top. Am I mad?

Our school is quite big - about 500ish I think (oops should know that ) and I thought the meeting would be packed - at least with nosey parents, if not parents wanting to contribute - but no! There were probably about 20 of us there. We've got a new head so it was nice to meet her out of school as well.

Anyway, according to one of the parents our PTA is one of the 'best' in our borough. It's certainly got a lot of cash in the bank anyway!

i,m going to my first meeting on tuesday.

Are youthere Twiggers?

gdg.... what's the point of lots of cash in the bank? lmao Wouldn't it be better spent on the school?

Ha ha!! Yes, it is being spent on the school - we agreed lots of funding requests last night! The PTA just does very well with it's fundraising (and it's not a poor catchment so it's what you'd expect really).