Print

Q&A

Mandatory fundraiser by principal to pad general fund legal?

Our principal contracted with a fundraising company and registered a teacher to be the coordinator without their consent. The teacher was overwhelmed with collecting and counting the money and asked the PTO treasurer to help. The PTO treasurer complained about the work they had to do for the teacher fundraiser and asked the principal to explain but the principal said the money would go to the general fund instead of to that teacher’s supply budget as promised since pto did the work. It turns out that the checks were set up in the fundraiser to be written to the school and not the pto. Can a principal assign a fundraiser to a teacher to fund anything? The transparency statement for the fundraiser was prewritten by the principal in a vague manner stating that the funds would be to improve the school community. Do principal’s have the authority to set up and commit a teacher to a fundraiser, say it will be in a PTO account and then change it to a general fund. Can a principal pre-set the fundraiser transparency statement and how the checks should be written without teacher or pto knowledge or consent and direct the money from the fundraiser afterwards?
-