I am not sure if this is the correct forum to write this on and I know it will probably generate some talk but here goes- what are your feelings when it come to PTOs and politics? For example- school budgets. Our PTOs are told we must support the budgets no matter what (this comes from town wide). I believe that as a PTO we should support telling people TO vote but not HOW to vote. I believe people should be educated in how to vote and why the budget may be beneficial to the school system. I feel like we are told to blindly say yes without letting people voice concerns that maybe the education budget is not a good thing. If you are anti-budget you are seen as anti-school which I don’t believe is true. I have worked in schools my whole life and have seen some great and some terrible budgets in that time. What are your thoughts- should we a group always support the school budgets or should we support people learning about the budget and voting they way they feel?

Thanks!

Mikki

simple answer...no...you should tell people that they should vote but you should not as a group voice tell them how to vote. How can you be sure that by saying xyz pto supports the budget that all of your members truly do support the budget.
This is always a very hard area to get around, I wish you luck!

I've never heard "support the budget" before. The budget for the school district ultimately rests with the school board in our district and while individuals may voice their opinion - we don't take any position. But, as to support or non support - that's not a position I would want to take at all.

Mikki -
Our district does the same thing. Over the years we've witnessed the PTOs used as a way to deliver "yes" votes, and anyone that questions aspects of the budget is demonized and if the person is a parent, ostracized. There's a thread on this board that I started a few weeks ago:

www.ptotoday.com/boards/involvement-idea...to-2.html#post141407

There are so many issues raised by this - oversight, democracy, the voices of the majority, breaking up of community, etc. One of the most insidious is by having perpetual "happy talk" about our district, we never address major issues or improve the quality of education. Everything is a band-aid. And a very expensive band-aid I might add! We are going to lose our senior citizens.

All of the PTOs in our district have funs designated to print up bumper stickers and posters and full page ads in the paper that say "Vote Yes!" These funds are supplemented by individuals, including school board members.

We are encouraging our local paper to do an article on this phenomenon. I will let you know how that works out. Meanwhile, any more information you can share would be very helpful.

I guess I have one question, would you be happy if your legislators never took a position or vote on an issue because they couldn't guarantee they were speaking for every constituant? Find out how your parents feel in general, inform them, and then take an educated stance... that's part of being a leader.

Legistlators are voted in to take positions on political issues. PTO leaders in most cases are not. PTO leaders are voted in to support the mission stated in your bylaws. In most cases that revolves around enhancing your child's educational experience by joining together the significant talents of your parents with the significant talents of your teachers and administrators. If your bylaws indicate that you are there to take a political stance on political aspects of the school operations, then feel comfortable in doing so as an elected leader. If however, you are like most of us...leave politics to the politicians and do exactly what you indicated--get folks out to vote.

d