The Multipurpose Room

Writing grants can be a great way to boost your PTA or PTO funds without asking families for more money but it can also seem daunting! How do you get these grants? Where do you find them? What’s a winning submission? This episode will share leaders’ tips on these questions and more.

Additional Resources:

https://www.pta.org/home/run-your-pta/Awards-Grants

https://www.pta.org/docs/default-source/files/why-pta/2019/grant-writing-tips.pdf

https://www.ptotoday.com/pto-today-articles/article/86-finding-and-winning-grants

The recent “Devious Lick” and “Slap a Teacher” campaigns on TikTok are extremely concerning and must be stopped. As PTA and PTO leaders, we are responsible for creating a positive impact on our students and that arguably includes helping to stop violent campaigns such as these but how? What's our role versus that of the administrators and what should we do? This episode is shares what PTAs and PTOs are doing across the country.

This show is brought to you by K-12 Clothing. K-12 Clothing is a PTA-Dad created business focused on providing high-quality school apparel (spirit wear and uniforms) while increasing access to educational resources through fundraising in schools. Learn more at https://linktr.ee/k12clothing

Including all children and families is central to PTA and PTO missions - how do you make sure you do that? This episode will share how some school structures can create roadblocks, how to overcome those challenges, and how to ensure your school group is including all children. Our guest, a teacher herself, also has some great tips for how teachers can ensure they are feeling included as well.

About Our Guest, Dawn Menge, Teacher & Author

The effectiveness of your PTA or PTO can be amplified when there is a strong partnership with your school administration. But how do you create such a strong relationship and what kind of things destroy the relationship? This episode is a short one focusing on the top 3 dos and top 3 don't of creating a strong PTA-Principal bond.

This show is brought to you by K-12 Clothing. K-12 Clothing is a PTA-Dad created business focused on providing high-quality school apparel while increasing access to educational resources through fundraising in schools. Learn more at https://linktr.ee/k12clothing

After each summer, teachers measure and address the summer slide - learning loss over the summer. But what about the “pandemic slide” where each student’s unique 18 month learning experience has left gaps in what they know and don’t know. How should teachers understand, measure and address this much larger, and more differentiated issue? Our guest today offers tips for teachers, administrators, parent teacher groups, and parents to help support our students over the summer and return to learning in the fall.

About Our Guest: Chris Hull, Co-Founder and CPO, Otus

Chris is the Co-Founder and CPO at Otus. Otus is the first edtech platform to centralize learning management, assessment, and data for educators, students, and families. Chris was named a “20 To Watch” Educational Technology Leader by the National School Boards Association. Otus serves 160 unique school districts with over 1,000,000 monthly users, and has grown revenue by 300% annually.

This show is brought to you by K-12 Clothing. K-12 Clothing is a PTA-Dad created business focused on providing high-quality school apparel while increasing access to educational resources through fundraising in schools. Learn more at https://linktr.ee/k12clothing

Did you know that White and Asian students are 1.8 times more likely to enroll in AP and IB courses versus their Black and Latino peers regardless of grades and desire? Schools, teachers, principals, superintendents and PTOs/PTAs can help to address this disparity. Today’s episode shines a light on some of the inequities that exist in K-12 schooling, how they manifest, and how school districts, teachers, and PTA/PTO can address these inequities. 

About Our Guest: Dolores Caamano, Managing Director, Partnership Development, Equal Opportunity Schools

Dolores Caamano knows what it feels like to have to work six, and most times, 10 times harder just to be seen, just to be heard. As a Latina student who grew up in poverty in a single-parent household, nothing came easy. Not the nice clothes. Not the home-cooked meals. And definitely not the perfect family. She did well in school – in fact, school was the only place where she didn’t have to be the poor girl from an unstable family. At school, she could be the smart, aggressive, go-getter. That had a better ring to it, so she went with that.

Dolores thrived off her positive adult interactions with her teachers. Why? Well, because she didn’t get them at home. And even though her teachers thought the world of her, she never quite fit the mold of the ideal student. Maybe it was the smell of smoke on her clothes or the fact that her mom never showed up for a PTA meeting, but Dolores realized that there was only so much she could do alone. Fortunately for Dolores, all that changed her freshman year. Mrs. Padalecki (P for short) was her journalism teacher. P pushed, encouraged, and supported Dolores in ways no adult had ever done before. She didn’t lower the standards for Dolores because she knew life was hard at home. No, she did the opposite. She made sure Dolores was involved and had access to every opportunity that she knew would get her to where she wanted to be. By senior year, Dolores was a Bill Gates Millennium Scholar, which gave Dolores a full-ride scholarship to any university of her choice.

Dolores always had a passion for journalism, but once she graduated from The University of Missouri, she knew she wanted to be to students what Mrs. Padalecki was to her – their Trusted Adult. After 8 years as a high school teacher, Dolores joined Equal Opportunity Schools as a Partnership Director to ensure schools all over the country had the tools and support they needed to truly SEE students who so often go unseen – outside of GPA and test score – a full, 360-view of who they are and who they want to be. EOS was the only thing that could take Dolores out of the classroom. Now, as the Managing Director for Partnership Development, Dolores uses her lens as a low-income student of color, teacher, and Partnership Director to guide her conversations with prospective districts across the country.

This show is brought to you by K-12 Clothing. K-12 Clothing is a PTA-Dad created business focused on providing high-quality school apparel while increasing access to educational resources through fundraising in schools. Learn more at k12clothing.com

PTA, PTO, “National”, State PTAs - what’s the deal? This episode will demystify the multitude of PTs as well as give tips for the best way to leverage the resources. If you are a PTA leader, PTO leader or parent wondering how to navigate the PT system or how to leverage the resources, this episode is for you. 

About Our Guest: MaryBeth Weeks, New Mexico PTA President

MaryBeth Weeks is currently the New Mexico PTA President. Her term of office began on July 1, 2019 and goes through June 30, 2021. She served as a local PTA President and as a member of the NMPTA Board of Directors before assuming the office of New Mexico PTA’s President. MaryBeth has participated as a member of the New Mexico Public Education Dept Family Cabinet, the Rio Rancho CPAT and as a member of her elementary school’s SAC. She is the mom of seven children ranging in age from nineteen to six. Four of her children receive special education services through her children’s school district. MaryBeth is an advocate for equitable education for all children and believes that every student can succeed when education is provided in an appropriate learning environment.

This show is brought to you by K-12 Clothing. K-12 Clothing is a PTA-Dad created business focused on providing high-quality school apparel while increasing access to educational resources through fundraising in schools. Learn more at k12clothing.com

Are you a PTA member who missed the 2021 legislative conference? Are you a curious parent who wants to know what our PTAs are advocating for on behalf of our children? This episode will summarize this year's National PTA legislative conference, outline the top 5 legislative asks related to schools/education, and share how you can advocate for our students as a PTA or PTO leader or parent.