I've read the article PTA vs. PTO and seen the year 2000 stastics. What is the current percentage of schools nationally who remain PTA and not PTO. Virginia has a strong state PTA. There as been a recent building boon of schools in that state. I'm looking for percentage of schools that are PTA members in Virginia as well. Thank you!

The number quoted in the article is not for PTO's but for schools that are not members of PTA.
Some schools do not have any parent group!
The FACT is that more school/parent groups are part of PTA than ALL OTHER GROUPS COMBINED!

And National PTA has more members than Rotary, Kiwanis and Lions International COMBINED!

YES, there is no National PTO! Each PTO/HSA etc is an independent group. All the more reason to join together as part of PTA!

Hi All4 ad JHecht -

Couple of notes:

1. Easy on the ALL CAPs. We get the passion. The Rotary, etc. comparison is awfully flawed. Everyone who joins those groups knows exactly what they're joining. The vast, vast majority of PTA's 5 million plus members have little or no connection whatsoever to the national organization called "PTA" -- they simply joined the "parent group" at their kids' school. They would have joined it if it was a PTO or a PTA or an XYZ.

2. Hecht -- we don't have updated numbers for you on Virginia. You're right it's a big PTA state. If you find the PTA unit count, the math is fairly easy to do.

3. On the percentage math, I actually think it's pretty conservative. All4 -- you're right that "PTO" means all non-PTA groups. That's the definition of PTO. And you're rght that some groups don't have any parent group (though that's a very small percentage). But what you're missing is that there are more than 112,000 K-12 schools in the U.S, and PTA has fewer than 26,000 units (including international and non-school units). So the 25%-75% math is actually conservative. National PTA has quoted the same numbers in its own materials (though I can't find the link right now).

Tim

Well I do know that in our school district, about 30-40% of our schools don't have a parent group of any kind (PTO, PTA or anything)... so based on that, I would assume that the 30% that are PTAs and the rest have a non PTA in their school, which would make the number of PTAs and PTOs about equal.

Hi AvonMom --

What district? That's a high percentage of no parent group.

Certainly there are districts (and states for that matter) with higher percentage of PTAs than others, but I think over the country the 25-75% math stands up pretty well.

Tim

I have also noticed that, depending on how strong the local support is makes a difference of the likelihood of finding a PTA. When I lived in Texas, it seemed like they only had PTAs. In our area, we have several school districts, PTAs seem to have fallen out of favor. In fact, out of 31 elementary schools in our district, only 1 is a PTA. Our school opened 10 years ago, when PTAs were declining and we have always been a PTO.