PTO Today

The power of PTO Today rests in sharing resources and leaders helping leaders. You see the cooperative spirit around our community in our message boards, Q & A, and file exchange. In recent months we’ve added new groups to provide a place for leaders to “meet” to get and give ideas about specific events. If you haven’t been there yet be sure to visit:

School Auction Group
Family Reading Night Group
Family Movie Night Group

We’d love to add more of your event photos to these group pages. To that end, we are going to sweeten the pot to encourage photo sharing. The first 5 people to upload their event photos (at least 5 photos per person, please) to one of the group pages mentioned above gets a $25 Target Gift card. Who couldn’t use a little extra, right? And you’ll be helping other leaders by sharing photos of how you set up your fabulous event.

While you are there, be sure to add your input to the tracker section of the group pages: popular auction items, read-loud book hit or misses, or family movie favs or flops.

Any questions, don’t hesitate to contact me at lgundlach@ptotoday.com. Can’t wait to see your photos!

Lots of chatter about school auctions this time of year! Did your school just have an auction? How did it go? Have you done a debrief on your event?

Here’s a question: Did some of your auction items create bidding wars? I bet they did. For tips on how to create bidding wars and other ideas on how to make your next auction a big success, watch Tim’s video blog. Also be sure to visit our new Auction Group page — your spot to access great auction tools and information, collaborate with other leaders,  share your event photos and tell other about your most lucrative and unique auction items!  Hope to see you over there soon.

We’ve been having a lot of fun at our PTO Expos this year. Being able to talk face-to-face with energetic parent group leaders never gets old. Whether it’s hearing about the challenges you face or exchanging ideas about our School Family Nights, the experience of spending time with leaders at our Expos makes everything we do worthwhile. Of course, hearing all the positive feedback about our website, magazine and Expos is pretty darn neat too.

Moving forward, we hope to be sharing videos of conversations with Expo attendees about their school events and their reaction to the Expos. Here is our first video of two PTO leaders from Rhode Island, with their feedback on the Massachusetts Expo.

Hello All –

Would you mind taking 5 minutes to help us help you and other parent group leaders?

There’s a link to a quick survey here: Parent Group Leader Survey

We haven’t done this in a while, but it’s always helpful to get an update on the latest with parent groups and parent group leaders. What you’re doing. How you’re using the web and technology. What we can do for you? All that good stuff.

Really appreciate your taking the time to help us out. Confident that you’ll see the results in the next few months as we plan our next advancements here on the site and beyond.

Happy Valentine’s day, Happy Chinese New Year, and Happy President’s day!

Here’s a quick overview of articles from this week. Perhaps these stories about creative PTOs & PTAs will inspire some new ideas for your parent group:

PTO reaches out community members in need. Very nice.
Like how this Nebraska school puts the fun in  fundraisers.

Always enjoy reading about school auctions with fun, upbeat themes.

PTO sponsors afterschool program prepares kids for the business world.

There has been an alarming amount of news about bullying in schools recently. Nice to hear that this PTO is doing it’s part to take on bullying issues.

Also, it’s sad to read so much about school closings. Threats of school closings has sent some parent groups into fundraising overdrive.

Came across several contests that I thought parent group leaders may be interested in:

http://www.meetingtomorrow.com/audio-visual-giveaway.html
http://www.gardenabcs.com/
http://www.parenting.com/momcongress/

Enjoy!

Did you know that by the end of last year approximately 18 million people were using Twitter? Many schools have jumped on the bandwagon and are successfully using Twitter to get the word out about school events and get quick feedback on issues. On a personal level, it’s a great way to stay on top of news and trends that matter to you — like parenting.

If you are not familiar with the basics of twitter, watch the video below:

Most importantly, Twitter is a great tool for building parent involvement. Here are some sample posts or tweets from parent groups:

PTO Meeting this Thursday. XHS Princpals will be on hand to talk about the upcoming transition for the 8th graders. Don’t miss it!

Thanks to all who have volunteered for Friday’s Holiday Shoppe. We still need more volunteers – if you can help, DM me.

Working on our school auction. Anyone have an ideas for a fun theme?

Some Twitter lingo and basics:

Follow- When you follow someone on Twitter, that means you elect to see, in your twitter stream,  the tweets that they post.

Tweets – this is just another word for post or status.

Your “followers”-  (a.k.a. “tweeps,” or “tweeple”) are the people who have chosen to see your tweets.

@ Replies – When you want to reply to someone or simply get their attention, you use the @ sign followed by their username and your message. Note that when you do this, everyone who follows you and that person sees your message.

Direct messages –  To send a private message you type a ‘d’ before their user name and then the message. Direct messages  are often referred to as “DM.”  You cannot, however, DM just any Twitter user – only people who you follow and happen to be following you back. This restriction helps prevent spamming.

Adding links to your Tweets:  You can include links in your tweet simply by posting the complete URL, including “http://”, but some URLs are long. Luckily there are free online services that will shorten your URLs. Three popular services are Hootsuite, snurl,  and bit.ly. They all work basically the same way: You enter the long URL, and the service generates a shortened URL. You then copy and paste the short URL into your tweet.

Still not convinced you should jump on the Twitter bandwagon? Watch this Youtube video about the social media revolution.

Now that you’re convinced, we hope you’ll follow us on Twitter:

http://twitter.com/ptotoday
http://twitter.com/TimPTO
We’d also love you to join the conversation on our Facebook page. http://www.facebook.com/PTOToday
Does your school use Twitter? We’d love to hear how you are using it and how you have encouraged parents to engage with this new form of communication.

Well happy Friday PTO Today community! Can you believe that January is coming to an end? Felt like a fast month to me, how about you? When you live in New England, winter months flying by is a good thing.

Here’s the news recap for this week:

Found more great stories about schools and parent groups coming through for Haiti with creative ideas:

http://www.mysuburbanlife.com/darien/newsnow/x1920347013/Glenbard-schools-host-fundraisers-for-Haiti

http://www.courier-gazette.com/articles/2010/01/29/news_update/252.txt

http://freehold.injersey.com/2010/01/28/freehold-twp-pupils-hopping-for-haiti-2/

Always happy to see articles about fun family events:

Mini golf:  http://www.cannonfalls.com/main.asp

Science Fair: http://www.morningsun.net/featured/x562888504/Lakeside-hosts-annual-Science-Fair

Fundraising, the good, the bad, and the ugly:

Good: http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm

http://www.redbankgreen.com/2010/01/get-ready-to-keel-over-in-the-kitchen.html

Bad: http://www.ktvb.com/news/regional/Papa-Johns-franchise-short-changed-elementary-schools-83042432.html

Ugly: http://www.kvia.com/Global/story.asp

Remember, if your parent group  has been in the news and you’d like to share your story with other leaders email me at lgundlach@ptotoday.com and I’ll include your story in our round-up. If you are wondering how to get your school event in the news, be sure to read our article on how to write a press release.

Tim talks about the 2010 Back2School Program and explains why parent group leaders should take advantage of this great opportunity to reach out and connect with parents at their schools.

Lots of PTOs and PTAs in the news. Here’s a round-up of some recent articles and blogs:

Loved reading these stories about what schools and parent groups are doing to help Haiti:

Dimes for Haiti teaches kids math skills and more importantly, about helping others in need.

PTO organizes “dress down day” to raise funds for Haiti.

Some nice work done by PTOs & PTAs (maybe their events will spark some ideas for your group):

PTO sets up “Study Island” for parents.

PTA runs Healthy Family Fun Night.

PTO surprises staff with break room make-over.

PTO helps turn Principal into a human cake!

Theft and controversy in PTAs & PTOs:

Middle school in Texas wonders what’s going on with their PTA funds.

Former PTO President accused of theft.

Parents protest alternate school zoning plan.

Has your parent group been in the news and you’d like to share your story with other leaders? Email me and I’ll include it our round-up. lgundlach@ptotoday.com

Yes, I know it’s still January, but this is actually when we start accepting registrations from groups who want to sign up for our very cool annual Back2School package of know-how for your group and giveaways for your parents. You don’t want to miss this one.

Complete details on Back2School 2010 are here on the website. The program does fill up, and we have to turn away groups every year.

As a summary, the centerpiece of the Back2Schoool offering is Jump In! magazine, which is written to help parents make it a great school year. How and why to get involved. Tips for communicating with teachers and helping the kids succeed in school. Lots of stuff. You get one copy for each parent in your school to hand out from your parent group. (Check out some sample Jump In! articles and other content.)

We also provide custom materials to help you make the most of back-to-school night and ideas on kicking off a great involvement year for your PTO or PTA. There are usually extra giveaways from our sponsors and supporters, as well, which are always nice. And all of it is completely free for K-8 PTOs and PTAs.

Again, here’s the link for learning more and signing up. Hope we can help you take advantage.