Thank you all for the insight on this matter. I think I will pick and choose what fundraisers we can participate in and attend the meeting at my sons school to hear what they may have planned for the future.
Sure, you can opt out of any fundraiser that come your way, but there's still a down side when a PTO does fundraiser after fundraiser. Every appeal, even those "little" "optional" ones, consume some amount of precious volunteer time. And every time your parent community is confronted with another fundraising appeal their interest in participating wanes a bit more. I don't need to buy this candle, because I can be pretty sure there will be another sale for something else next month. I'll just wait till then. See the problem? PTO's need to take a macro view to fundraising and not bombard their parents with request after request. If the PTO can't raise the funds it needs in one or two fundraisers, you might just need to cut back on your plans. If you commit all your precious volunteer time to managing fundraising, you might never get around to doing the really meaningful stuff of school enrichment, family engagement, etc. No you're not crazy to be upset. And your PTO leaders need to hear why you find repetitive fundraising annoying. Not just because times are tough, but because most PTOs want to be more than just fundraising machines.
A real-life example: I am co-chairing a fundraiser this year that the principal committed to last spring. It was not our PTO's choice, but we were contractually bound. This particular fundraiser has required 1-2 hours of order processing at school every day for over 2 weeks. So instead of planning our next family event, or coming up with new ways to improve school-PTO communications, I'm logging orders and handling returned inventory. Yes, it's optional to participate in this fundraiser, but behind the scenes, it's consuming a ton of volunteer time.
Our PTO is very new but in my limited experience I have found it is easier to ask parents and teachers to donate items so you can fundraise outside of the school. We have done this with a bake sale and a yard sale. The few items that we have sold at the school have been homemade one of a kind items. We have tried to keep everything reasonable.
It also helped that all of the organizations in our school had a fundraising meeting to clarify what each was selling and when.
We do a lot of fundraising in the fall as well-- and at our 2nd PTO meeting we had parents come and vents their frustration at the 3rd fundraiser that had come home since school started in Sept. We ran our Entertainment book sale at the start of school since so many other companies- banks, church, boy scouts, etc... sell as well) then we put out our spiritwear order form-- which we don't make money on-- but it does cost money and if we want families to have school clothing to wear now-- not in the spring time, school pictures came out-- not through PTO, but still you have to pay again, we started our walk-a-thon pledge form and now cookie dough sale forms went home--- it was a lot to start the school year off with-- but we also tell everyone that you can't participate in every fndrasier-- you have to pick and choose and we don't expect everyone to participate-- you couldn't! Some families love entertainment books and can sell 12-- and other families love cookie dough and will buy 5-10. We make almost all of our funds in the fall-- and then we so a lot of fun free events after the new year!!! we try and promote this to everyone as well... and show that we are trying to raise funds for our budget which is over 38,000. I know your feelings-- if I thought I could raise as much and do less, we would in a heart beat! Good luck to you.
You aren't crazy and I couldn't agree more and I also found Jewel statements to you a tad on the harsh side and I don't need to sit down and take a breath to say that.
That being said, I cannot speak for others local economies but ours stinks. People are laid off of work everywhere. Our PTO too has decided to hit every month almost with a new fundraiser. It is a tad much. I am a heavily active member of the PTO and refuse to participate. My family can barely afford this and I know many other families that can't even if they wanted too. Last year we raised copious amounts of money but things have changed and I have heard it from the horses mouths so to speak. They are tired of all the hounding to buy.
So to be a president yes are crazy but to be a concerned parent who just thinks all the fund raising is a bit much....no way.
