Create a PTO Website That Works

PTO Websites

Never created a website before? No problem! We'll walk you through the process, from getting a domain name to promoting and maintaining the site.

by Sharron Kahn Luttrell

02/03/2023

If communication is the key to parent involvement, then consider a website to be a virtual door that opens onto your PTO. Even if your group publishes a monthly newsletter, sends home notices, and submits items to the local newspaper, there's still room in your media mix for a website.

An online presence will not get misplaced, nor will it end up crumpled in a ball at the bottom of a child's backpack. What it will do is give parents instant access to the information they need, when they need it.

Getting Started

Put someone in charge. Behind every good website is a webmaster. Appoint a volunteer to take charge of your website. The person in this role will provide content (or solicit it from other parents and school personnel); maintain the site regularly (you should update it at least once a month—more is better); and train a successor.

The main requirement for a webmaster is enthusiasm. Experience and technical know-how certainly help but aren't strictly necessary. Carmon Brooks of Brownsville, Ky., thought an online presence was so important for the Kyrock Elementary PTO that she volunteered to create and maintain a site even though she had never done one before. She learned the basics from the school's technology resource teacher. Then, using a free website creation and hosting service, she put together a site.

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Secure a domain name and a host. If you don't already have a domain name and a server to host your site, then talk with your school technology coordinator about the best option for your PTO. These may include a fee-based web hosting service; your school district's own server; a community organization that's willing to give you space on its server; or a free service, such as Weebly or Google Sites.

Before settling on a host, decide as a group what you want your site to achieve. If your intent is to post basic information, such as events and a meeting schedule, and you have little desire to get fancy with your site, consider a free service or your school server. If you'd like to get more out of your site, then a web hosting company is probably a good investment.

A web hosting service will give you the most flexibility, and you'll have a better shot at securing a domain name that's easy to remember and reflects the name of your parent group (such as www.cloughpto.org for the Henry P. Clough School PTO, in Mendon, Mass.). But as long as you have a link somewhere to your school's website, users will be able to find you online, no matter how indecipherable your web address.

The Jamie McGee Elementary PTO in Bolingbrook, Ill., turned its site into a dynamic, interactive communication tool by moving it from the school server to an external host. The site features a bulletin board, which allows parents and board members to leave messages for one another online. It also has the capability to accept online registrations for PTO events and allows users to order school supplies and spiritwear online. McGee PTO President Michael Bielski, who designs websites through his firm TheBielskiBunch.com, has another compelling reason to take the PTO site off the school's server. After agreeing to host the parent group's site, the school administration had second thoughts when it realized the group needed access to the district's server. By then, the PTO site was live, but the group was unable to update it. The information quickly grew stale. "They never really envisioned us putting a site up there that we'd want to keep working with. They thought it would just be a page," Bielski says.

Before accepting space on a school or community server, find out about restrictions. And keep in mind that if their server goes down, you're out of business until it's back up. If you use a free web hosting service, make sure your school server will link to it. Brooks was surprised when, after she labored to create the Kyrock Elementary PTO site on Yahoo’s GeoCities service, she learned that nobody could access it because her district's server had blocked the server that hosted the site.

Creating the Site and Adding Content

As a parent group with a lot of information to share, you'll have no difficulty filling your website. The trick is to keep the content meaningful, useful, and fun while presenting it in a way that is easy to read and navigate.

Recruit some outside help. If your Internet volunteer is not a skilled web developer, recruit someone who is. Ask a web-savvy teacher, parent, or even teenager to create templates and train your PTO webmaster to use them. Free web hosting services also tend to be user-friendly for inexperienced webmasters, providing simple templates to build pages.

Display the name of your group prominently on each page of your site. Colorful fonts work well for school sites, but make sure they are easy to read. If you have a logo for your group or your school, include that, as well.

Keep your homepage fresh by using it to showcase recent accomplishments and "breaking news." If you enjoyed record turnout at your first annual Family Fun Festival, post a brief article and photos on the homepage, where users will see it first. Top it off with a splashy headline. If your group sponsors an opera performance in the school cafeteria the next month, post pictures and a write-up. If you have room on your site, create a "Past Events" or archive page and move old articles and photos there. Also reserve a spot on the homepage for fundraising results and upcoming events.

Your website is the perfect place to integrate a volunteer management software system. Linking it in allows parents to review all of your volunteer opportunities and share interests and availability right online. If you don't use volunteer management software, at least link to the email address of your volunteer coordinator to make it easier for people to enlist.

Other, less newsy information can be accessed from the home page via a navigation bar. Sections may include:

About Us. Who you are and what you do may seem obvious to you, but not everyone knows what a parent group does. Brooks, who is now developing the website for the PTO of the Edmonson County 5th/6th Grade Center, where her son is a 5th grader, plans to include what her group is not. "Another feeling around here is that 'PTO' is another name for a clique," she says, explaining that she will post a "mythbusters" list which, among other things, states that "a PTO is…for everyone."

Board Members. Include titles, names, and contact information. If you're not comfortable including members' telephone numbers, email links will make it simple and convenient for users to reach individual members.

Meeting Schedule. Don't worry about posting a year's worth of meeting dates on your site. A simple "Third Thursday of every month, at 7:30 in the media center" will do.

Volunteer Acknowledgements. Your website is a great place to thank all of your volunteers by name.

Pictures. Photographs will draw users into the website and entice them to read about the events illustrated. If confidentiality is an issue, identify children only by first names and last initials or leave the names out entirely. Brooks runs all photos by school administrators, who keep a list of parents who have OK'd the publication of their children's photos.

If you have room, you might also want to include the following on your site:

Newsletters. The Highcrest Middle School PTO in Wilmette, Ill., decided to save $6,000 on annual printing costs by making its 25-page monthly newsletter available exclusively online. You may not be willing to give up your hard-copy newsletter, but it's easy enough to post an electronic version on your site, as well.

Meeting Minutes. Yes, some people do read these. It's a way to keep people informed who aren't able to attend a meeting.

Bylaws. Like minutes, posting bylaws provides a good resource for someone who wants to use them as a reference, even if they're not read in full each week.

Fun Stuff. The McGee Elementary parent group borrowed a running joke from David Letterman when it published the "Top 10 Reasons To Be Involved." (No. 7: "I like field trips, too!")

You might also create other reasons to visit your site. The Highcrest Middle School PTO sponsors after-school clubs during the year. Acceptance is on a first-come, first-served basis, and the clubs are so popular that not every child who signs up is guaranteed a spot. Soon after sign-ups are completed, the PTO posts on its site the names of the children who got in to each club.

When writing for the web, keep it short or break up your text with subheads. Reading online is uncomfortable for many people. Make it easier for them to find what they're looking for by marking key words in a bold or colored font.

Promoting Your Site

After putting so much effort into creating and maintaining your PTO site, you want to make sure people use it.

Advertise your web address on all notices that the PTO sends home. If your address is one of those headache-inducing strings of letters and characters, give out your school's web address instead and instruct parents to click on the PTO link. Or create a shorter web address that redirects automatically to the main web page.

Write an article about your website in the school or PTO newsletter. Include instructions on how to submit items. Ask that your web address be included in the school handbook. If the handbook has an entry for your parent group, put it there.

Ask your webmaster to give a presentation about the website at one or more PTO meetings. Maria Bettini-DeBoer, the webmaster for the Highcrest Middle School PTO, did this at her elementary school PTO's first meeting of the year, and she used the opportunity to ask parents to submit articles for the site.

Keeping It Going

As with everything else a PTO does, continuity is critical to the success of a website. A site with old information and broken links is about as useful as a mailbag with a tear in the bottom. Unless a transition plan is in place, the website will become frozen when the person in charge moves on to her child's new school. You'll lose your audience, and your group's image will suffer. A case in point: When Carmon Brooks left the Kyrock Elementary PTO board to become president of the Edmonson County 5th-6th Grade Center PTO, the website she had labored so hard to create withered away.

The Jamie McGee PTO has addressed this problem by putting the website in the hands of its three-person publicity committee. While one committee member maintains the site, the others provide the content. When the webmaster moves on, this guarantees that someone familiar with the demands of the website is prepared to take over.

The Highcrest Middle School PTO has made the webmaster a board position, ensuring that there is always one person involved with the PTO who is charged with keeping up the site. "It's key to make it a board position. Your responsibility for that job is to keep it maintained for the school year and to make sure it's turned over," says webmaster Bettini-DeBoer.

Despite the setback with Kyrock's PTO site, Brooks is focusing on the 5th-6th Grade Center parent group's web presence. Even if just a few parents use it, the effort will pay off, she says.

"Many parents work and have access to computers at work. If they can pull up a web page, it will really help. That way, they can come home and know what to talk with their children about," she says. "At the end of the day, if parents are still not involved, I will rest easier because I have tried everything to get them involved."

Comments   

# Sandi Dale 2008-02-11 10:13
Great article!
# Melissa 2008-07-24 11:22
I loved this article. We are in the process of creating a website for out PTO group and did not know exactly where to start. This article gave me great information and many things to think about.
# Larry Holish 2009-02-26 22:41
Nice introduction. I would like to add that there is lots of free, open source software that is available to help you get a PTO site up and running. We use Drupal (drupal.org) as our platform, which is offered by many web hosting companies as an easy "one click install" as part of their hosting package. Drupal has web-based configuration (no programming req'd) and all of your site's content is entered via the site itself, which means anyone in your organization with permission can help keep content up to date from their own computer. Drupal includes many useful community features including blogs, calendars, picture galleries, forums and user polls.
# Bill Paulson 2009-03-13 03:23
I like the content suggested in this article. However, is there a web based tool that we can use to allow all of the content authors to publish their own content? I found one at www.powerpto.com. Is that the only one available on the market today?
# Melissa Hathaway 2009-03-18 17:40
Bill, you can host your own Wordpress self hosted blog and find the right 'theme' to fit the needs of your PTO website. The other option if you don't want to pay for your own hosting is to create a free one on wordpress.com. HTH!
# Tee Ming Ooi 2009-06-29 06:50
I created a social networking site for my child's middle school PTA recently and used the socialgo platform. It's free (but has Google Ads) and easy to use. In a few hours of experimenting, I already had something running.
Instead of a just a website, I wanted a space where PTA members could interact online even if they are not able to attend meetings or volunteer at the school. Members can blog, post on forums, post photos/videos/music, join groups and "friend" other members. Bulletins can also be sent to groups and a calendar of events displays important dates.
# Theresa Whittaker 2009-09-11 16:59
Help, I am so confused. Do you have to pay for a website? I am trying to get one started for our PTO. I am very unfamiliar with the process.
# Lisa Gundlach 2009-09-11 20:50
Hi Theresa-
If someone in your group has the knowledge you can create a "free" website-- but you won't have unique domain name that way. To find out how other PTOs are doing their websites, you could post a question to our message boards here:
http://www.ptotoday.com/boards/
~Lisa
# Cindy Sawyer 2009-09-17 18:32
Has anyone tried paperlesspto.com? It offers the ability to take credit card payments as well as manage e-mail communications, etc...
# Dana 2009-09-24 18:14
Our PTO created a website through godaddy.com, we used their website tonight program, we pay about $50 year for the domain name and hosting serveice, but we like that there are no google ads. We have had huge success with the site. We also connected our site to a facebook page where "fans" can upload photos and share information. Great article!
# Veronica Hugger 2009-10-01 18:26
I highly recommend Google Sites -- it's free and collaborative, meaning user and ownership rights can be granted so many people can contribute to the site, either as contributors or editors. And the interface (the look and feel) is very easy and intuitive. Plus, with all the Google gadgets available, it's easy to add dynamic content to the site, like photos, calendars, comments, attachments, and more. And, again, IT'S FREE!! Here are two school sites I've done:
http://www.galvestoncatholicschool.org/
http://www.galvestonec.org/
# James Adams 2010-01-22 15:58
I took the tips from this article and created our elementary school PTO Web site. Please take a moment to see how we share information with parents, teachers and the community to support our school. http://www.wipto.org
# David 2011-04-30 16:03
I don't understand the need for free. Most groups want their website to show donors their mission statement, calendar, Form 990, 501(c)(3) certification, minutes, financial statements, success stories, BoD, a blog, slide shows, videos, etc. Spend a little money, do the website well, and the ROI will please even Zuckerman. I personally use iPage which is about $35/year, then perhaps $10/year for the domain, and various other fees for features. There are hundreds of features, such as premium web design, ConstantContact, WordPress, Quickbooks, Google, etc. Live a little. Pay for a great website.
# Greg Uhrlen 2011-09-19 13:40
At Farmer SEO, we have been building PTA / PTO websites for awhile and find that the template sites do not offer all the tools many organizations need to help in their fundraising as well as giving people the autonomy to makes updates on their own. Even though we create Joomla and Drupal websites, we prefer the WordPress model for ease of use for folks who will be updating the websites.

A couple words of caution though; first, please make sure you have clearance from parents of any photos that may include children on your PTA / PTO website. Secondly, take a real close look at whether you want to open the can of worms involved with a forum. Slanderous comments can occur and legal issues are a possibility. Proceed with caution. Greg
# SAHMing 2011-10-17 12:24
Our District gives us a spot on the school's website and we have a lot on it. It's FREE and if we have a major issue, we have the tech support of the district. It's a really great site. We offer tons of information, have links to other places, links to our Facebook page, calendar (which links to the school's calendar), all of our minutes, flyers we send home, etc.. Best of all it's FREE. That would be my first stop.. then look on. We're lucky to have such a great opportunity. The URL is not unique, but we are easily found through the school and can easily be googled. http://asd1.schoolwires.com/hmpto
# Debbie A. Butler 2012-03-04 04:57
Does PTOTODAY give free web sites and do they help you through setting one up for your school PTO group?
# Craig Bystrynski 2012-03-04 23:12
Hi Debbie -- Sorry, that's not a service we're equipped to offer. However, there are lots of inexpensive web hosting companies out there. You might start by seeing whether your school uses a web hosting company -- perhaps you can use the same service.
# PTO Mom 2012-08-02 06:54
We are in the process of setting up a PTO website and the one BIG concern is how to have the link with the PTO Directory (with parents addresses and emails) confidential. We are going paperless and having the directory secure is a big deal. How would you suggest we do this? How can we ensure the parents it's confidential?
# Angélique 2013-08-26 14:18
I created our website using my-pto.org. They are awesome - free service for the core (which provides more than enough capability for most PTOs imho), much more customization available than with the "template" sites but still starts you off with a core site that you can have up in hours just by updating the "template" content. They also have a bunch of fee based higher level services - ecommerce, advertising, etc. Great tutorials, super helpful support. You can tell I'm a big fan! I piloted a couple of other options, and quickly killed them once I got this site up. The out of the box templates aren't quite as smooth as some other options available, but with the customization options you can make the site be pretty much anything you want.
# Jill Stover Martinez 2014-12-02 16:44
We are using PaperlessPTO for 4 of our campuses in our district. So far we have had a good experience with them. Feel free to check out our websites. www.cambridgepto.org

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