Okay, so I admit to procrastinating about what our plan is going to be for the upcomg PTO meeting scheduled next Thursday. And so of course now that the holidays are over and I have no more reasons to procrastinate, the 'uh-oh' phase has been entered.

Here is my biggest excuse for procrastinating...I have no clue what a PTO meeting is supposed to consist of. We had the standard opening PTO meeting at the beginning of the year which was about as exciting as getting your lungs vacuumed out through your nose. It's way too late in the game, in my opinion, to ask someone to come and speak. And frankly, I haven't been able to come up with a single idea for what that person could even speak about that would be of interest to parents.

So what I would like to know is what is an example of a standard mid-year PTO meeting? Do you have an agenda you would be willing to share? And then there is the whole subject of whether or not to provide something for the kids to do. How does your group handle this?

Unfortunately, our board, who is usually very supportive and helpful, feels even less motivated than I do to come up with something. But, as President, I feel like we have to come up with something. And I'm not the kind of person who is willing to get up in front of a bunch of people and look like an idiot, thus making the PTO look like a group of idiots.

Any help you can give me, whether it be advice, information, ideas, your offer to come and speak (just kidding...sort of) I will be ecstatic!

Hi
The File Exchange on this WebSite has a number of sample agendas as starter.

Typical agendas (and mid year specifics) are:

President's Report
- Past Events/Upcoming Events
Principal Report
Treasurer's Report ( Budget/Actual Review)
Committee Review
- Fundraiser Review (how did you do/ feedback on it/suggestions for next
year)
- Enrichment Review ( Past Programs/Feedback from Teachers , Upcoming
Program Review
etc, etc.
- Any other committees

New Business
- anything from the principal or from general members..

Do you have a Teacher Liaison-- perhaps they could speak to Upcoming Classroom Activities, i.e. upcoming Read Across America plans, any particular support requesting of PTO.

Our fifth grade parent often meets after the mid year mtg to review/plan fifth grade activities.

Hope this helps

Good Luck

Take a look at the Rob't Rules on the Web Site as well.. the File Exchange is a great sourc

Typically, the purpose of you meeting is to review what you have accomplished so far and what is in the works for the future. Most agendas follow a fairly traditional business format.
Do you have committees? Were there activities in the fall semester? Do you have plans for Teacher Appreciation, school events, bookfair, etc.? Are there activities on the horizon for which the PTO needs to recruit volunteers?

Formats may vary, but here's one agenda sample:

Welcome & Overview
• Introductions
• Year-at-a-Glance Time Line
• Format of Meetings/Parliamentary Procedure

Approval of the Minutes

Treasurer’s Report

Principal’s Report

Committee/Project Reports
• T-Shirt
• Fundraising
• Hospitality
• Community Relations
• Membership
• Publicity
• School Directory
• Volunteer
• Grade Parent Reports

Old Business

New Business

Next Meeting
Date/Time/Location

If you want to -- you can make this a "State of the PTO" address as the main event. Give everyone the current budget, the current programs, what you've done to date, where you plan to go this "new year" what your priorities are. I think making a point of a time limit is very important and if you are going through the committees, having a status sheet that can be read before is a great idea to keep the program moving.

I have a sample state of the PTO power point slide if you are interested...just email me at dlflett@msn.com and I'll zap to you. You have to have powerpoint to open however,....all the other "technical aspects" of the agendas presented above are certainly the right outline to pursue...!!!

Great luck--
d

ps--if you're in VA I'm up for a drive ....

I have a sample state of the PTO power point slide if you are interested...just email me at dlflett@msn.com and I'll zap to you. You have to have powerpoint to open however,........


Hi dlf -

Our File Exchange/File Sharing tool is perfect for this. I hope you'll feel free to upload your slide right to the new tool. And then you can send folks the link to the url of your tool. Sound good?

http://www.ptotoday.com/filesharing/

Tim

Hi Tim--thanks--I'll have to spend some time sanitizing names etc out of it if it is out there for public consumption. Glad you can handle powerpoint....

d