Should PTA pay for staff training and not be told what the training will be?

[soweneo]

There was a really difficult PTA meeting for our local primary this week. The primary is headed by a very unpopular head and pupil and staff numbers have dropped by about a third in 5 years. Add this in to general decreasing budgets and the school must be very strapped.

The school have now asked the PTA for funding for 'essential staff training' and when some of the PTA asked for clarification the school admin assistant (the only member of staff who came to the meeting) said they can't clarify.

They have also asked for stationary costs, and when a member of the PTA asked if parents could do an amazon or similar wish list instead the school have said that they want a 'pot of money' for stationery instead.

The parents who have been in the PTA for a longer time and used to fundraise for enrichment projects and school trips, science weeks etc feel these requests go against the PTA's aims as listed on the website.

Some of the younger parents, new to fundraising, feel more comfortable about it.

I feel this is more of a leadership issue that needs addressing, but perhaps I am wrong? Whatever it is, the PTA is split down the middle.
The school had already asked for a £10 donation at the beginning of the school year for stationery.

Hmmm I smell Mermaids or Stonewall being the ‘training’ providers here, and the head and shouty parent being converts to the new Creed. That’s why it has to be cloaked in secrecy.

It would also be a No from me (previously Treasurer to the PTA). The school pays first and send the invoice so we k ow exactly what it is for.

But some Heads need reminding (like ours did) that the money raised isn't for spending at their personal discretion, but that the constitution sets out what the money raised is spent on.

Shouty mum is wrong and sounds batshit.

That really would be worrying. But I don't see anything leading this way. Rather a HT who likes to do their own thing and doesn't want any help / interference from anyone else.

So you have a Head who refuses to have anything to do with or support the PTA but demands funds from them without giving a reason? Despite you needing a reason legally for accounting purposes? Time to disband until that Head leaves, especially with how else they are behaving to everyone else. I believe the phrase is "drop the rope".

Make sure you do a big blowout for all the kids when you disband. Maybe tons of personalised stationary, or book bags, or books for the school library?

I think maybe it might be worth suggesting that the PTA are the first item on the next Governors’ Meeting agenda, and the PTA attend to set this all out. They are the level above the Headteacher.

I doubt it. If it was that they’d be open about it so that any disagreement could be attacked as transphobic.

The PTA and the governing body have no link
The GB could not and should not discuss the PTA.

Although I in some ways agree, I do think that asking for money for 'training' seems reflective of governance of the school.
Therefore I think a PTA could reasonably ask why the governing board isn't helping the HT manage the budgets such that the HT doesn't need to request/demand PTA money to cover shortfalls.

It could all get very messy/stressy. Not sure if any of it is worth it.

My recommendation:
Extraordinary General meeting.
Committee explain issue and why they don't think it is correct to release the money.
HT/Pushy parents explain why they think it is right.
Parents vote.
If it goes against current committee they resign immediately and start process for nominations for new committee, let new committee be elected and sort it out.

Training would be delegated to a Head and the GB would not have any direct involvement.

The GB do not manage the school. This amount would fall when within any financial delegation as would arranging CPD for staff.

So would the GB have no interest at all that the HT is apparently unable to fund training from their budgets?

@ChipsforMe the chair of governors went to the meeting to put the case for the school having the training money. Which just seems so not right. I would argue there has been very little of scrutiny of head by top tier of governors which had led to a situation with unpopular head and so many parents taking their children out.

@TeenDivided the chair of governors is very close to head. Not sure the relationship is a ‘friend who asks the difficult questions’ more ‘a friend’!

I suspect the governors would be very interested in the head not being able to find essential training and basic school stationery from the budget.

Because governance of things like the budget in order to meet the kinds of basic requirements that are covered by essential training is definitely something the governing body should be providing. And they need to know if there’s a problem.

If I was on that committee I’d be calling an EGM and resigning. It sounds like a clusterfuck of issues that are going to continue getting worse.

I’d probably join the swathes removing their children - a toxic Head absolutely kills a school.

Hopefully this won't be a problem much longer: you mentioned on your previous thread that the head is leaving in December, is that still happening?

The more you post, the worse it sounds.

I’d go with the EGM, go over the constitution and funding requests and why it’s not appropriate under the constitution, or not without much greater clarity from the head, then do the vote. Then committee resigns if needed.

I’d try once more to get clarity from the Head prior to the EGM.

the chair of governors went to the meeting to put the case for the school having the training money

And what was the case they put?

That this was training that fitted normal PTA aims (such as for enrichment activities)

Or that they are ratcheting up the pressure to use the PTA's entirely separate and independent funds to pay for normal training because the school's budget is currently broken?

@meditrina spot on about the governors. That the teachers shouldn’t suffer because budgets are so tight (I totally agree teachers shouldn’t suffer with lack of training etc but would suggest it is the leadership that is letting them down.)
alarm bells about the leadership have been raised by parents who have left in droves and parents who have stayed because it is their local school and they feel their children are settled.
Yet somehow the head and chair of governors make us feel like it is parents fault! It is like being in a toxic work environment where the boss has a tiny group of cronies who perpetuate myths so that you end up questioning your self even though you know the truth really.

@Iamnotthe1 yes she is leaving in December. Having joined an oversubscribed school of 7 classes 6 years ago, she leaves behind a woefully undersubscribed school of 5 classes, where she has taken over the former staff room and turned it in to her own office (it’s huge and she had her own office before just preferred the huge one!!) and staff now use one of the empty classrooms. The new head will be a teaching head for first time in many years and current one doesn’t like children so she wouldn’t go for that when she knew that was the next step.
and yet apparently she told the governors she was going because she was ‘bullied by parents’. And then you start questioning yourself. Even though we are a bunch of hard working parents who still put hands up to volunteer in school (when it was allowed) and do masses of fundraising, that maybe it is our fault. That is the sign of toxicity I suppose, that in the end they get to your mind!
My brother in law works at a school in a deprived part of London and he has faced verbal threats, been sworn at by parents and felt physically intimidated by a dad in the playground. IMO that is bullying. Polite letters asking about why the outdoor learning area that the local village community fundraised for isn’t being used (not at all) is surely more gentle scrutiny.

If you want to stand firm, the you have to sympathise with what the governor has to say, but point out that staff training is and will remain ultra vires for the PTA

Reaffirm your commitment to funding the additional, enrichment activities no matter how few pupils remain.

But there is no way any individuals on your committee should be asked to risk prosecution for mishandling donated funds and no requests for ultra vires payments will be entertained, whether that's essential training or general purpose stationery or anything else that's properly a matter for the school budget

All business cases must be fully costed and allocated funds will only be handed over after sight on invoices

If she is leaving in December then kick it into touch until the new HT is installed. No point spending loads of money on something the new HT might not approve of.

@TeenDivided thst was exactly the point we made at the meeting. Which is when shouty mum (who it turns out had been asked to ask her work lawyers to think of how to intimate us, total ambush!) started shouting about withholding funds. We said let’s give a bit for training this term but not the thousands and then see what new head wants. Then chair of governor then said new head is going to have the same priorities (how can they know that!!)
I think the coffer is so empty the PTA is the emergency bank to them and they can’t even wait until January as the school has been so badly managed that this is papering the cracks! I even question if it would be spent on training if we don’t ask for clear receipts.
A few years ago the PTA offered to pay for a forest school day the nearest school was offering for teachers who could then teach the rest of their school, all the local schools were doing it and our head had ignored the invitation . The then chair of PTA knew the trainer and so went to school and offered for PTA to pay as so enriching for children, and to our surprise the headteacher put herself forward (the surprise was that we live in a very rural area and she doesn’t let children out unless she had to, doesn’t use outdoor learning area, the grass field is checked at 9am and if a bit damp they aren’t even allowed out there at lunch)
Anyhow the chair’s friend said that our head left the day before lunch (it went on to )When she casually mentioned it to head she denied it. So she had basically treated it like a half day!

It's so sad what a toxic head can do to a school.

Who told shouty mum to speak to lawyers about ways to catch the PTA Chair out?

@FamilyTreeBuilder one of the very new mums who has no idea what we have all been through in the last 6 years as the school ships sinks!

Our experience has been to have a governor attending PTA meetings and a teacher - it links both together, creates more interest and support and has provided clarity on what the PTA wants to spend their fund raising on and what the school would like. E.g one year the focus was on laptops, another year was equipment for the infant playground, another time the PTA bought sets of a new reading programme for the school.

The school doesn't get the final say but they get to say what the school would like - otherwise how do the PTA really know ?

The PTA cannot pay for training that they don't know what it is for and should not pay for staff training.

The PTA funds are not the school funds. Totally separate budgets and accounts.

PTA have a responsibility on how it is spent. Don't be transferring monies into school budgets. All invoices should come to PTA for accountability.

There's advice PTA's can get (can't recall the organisation).