A resource for PTA and parent involvement project ideas

Should we have a PTA Facebook page?

Our elementary school PTA had a meeting today and, as usual, we had a minimal turnout. One new face, however, suggested that because a lot of teachers and parents at our school use Facebook, why not have a PTA Facebook page to communicate with parents. Right now our main form of communication with our parents is letters sent home in backpacks. And of course, you take a letter from the backpack, skim it, put it on the counter, another paper goes over it and you've forgotten the PTA ever needed anything.

I feel it is a good idea but I worry that some parents will feel a social networking site is inappropriate for an elementary school organization. We are a lower elementary with grades PK-2nd.

I would appreciate any advice.

Thanks,

Jessica

Tags: Communication, facebook

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Jami Fogle on November 28, 2011 at 11:48am

Kyle, can you share some verbiage that we can post on our PTA Facebook page regarding good online citizenship/cyber-bullying? Would love to share with PTA members with a positive tone.

Thanks!

Jami Fogle

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Permalink Reply by Karen Bantuveris on September 7, 2010 at 9:24pm

We're seeing more and more schools with a facebook page. Here's a link to the facebook developer site where you can grab the code for the "See who Likes our School" widget you can put on the website - when people see their friends, they are more likely to "Like" your school on fb.

http://developers.facebook.com/docs/reference/plugins/like

Also, add a "Like" call to action message with a link to your outbound emails and flyers. E.g. "Show your Cougar pride and "Like" Central Elementary on Facebook, click here"

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Permalink Reply by Becka bossons on September 25, 2010 at 2:07pm

we have one. We do not post pics or names on there. Facebook is the greatest way to remind people on a day to day basis. People do not check our website everyday but a lot of people check facebook daily

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Permalink Reply by Joe Spencer on September 28, 2010 at 1:32pm

So, one of the mom's at my daughters school thought it would be cute to enter me into a radio station contest for San Diego's best MOM. They said since I was a single Dad and did so much for my daughter I should be entered.

So will you please visit the web site and vote for me?

www.star941sandiego.com

Find the SUPER MOM contest and find me amongst the entries....and vote....I'd appreciate it....

Also...you can vote ONCE per email address, so if you have multiple emails....you can vote more than once! And you can vote once per day until October 10th...

Please pass the word on to your friends as well!! Thank You!

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Permalink Reply by Randee Rudick on September 30, 2010 at 5:39pm

Our PTA has a FB page and we do not post any kids photos or use their names.
Basically we use it as a reminder for our events or for turning things in.
You can search Quail Run PTA (phoenix) and "like" us to see what we post.

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Permalink Reply by Emiliana Martin on October 1, 2010 at 3:30pm

This is the first year we have a Facebook page (Cupertino Middle School PTA) and Twitter ID (@CMSPTA). We use Facebook to send out information and event reminders. Twitter is event reminders only. We've even had a few parents ask questions on the Facebook page, which we were able to answer.

So far only a small percentage of parents subscribe but this is our inaugural year so we're building membership. All info is public so whether you "Like" or "Join" is up to the parent. The info is available just the same.

We try to limit the number of posts so as not to "spam" parents. Of course, we are open to suggestions to improve our web presence.
Emiliana Martin

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Permalink Reply by Scott Rhyne on October 4, 2010 at 7:18am

My local unit has a facebook page. The only content I allow on is that which would be found in a newsletter. I do not allow posting of videos or photos of children. Only the admins can post links on the site.

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Permalink Reply by Karen Bantuveris on October 4, 2010 at 8:41am

Thanks to the great conversation, you sparked a new blog article! Please check it out:

Is Facebook Right for Our School PTA?

6 Tips to get the most out of facebook with school-parent groups - includes a few examples.

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Permalink Reply by Shirley L. on November 29, 2010 at 1:01pm

I would strongly be against a FB page unless you shut down it's wall. If you keep the "wall" open, t could end up being a place for parents to slam other parents and teachers - not a good thing. It's best that you have a website - does your school district have a main website that a page for your PTA can be added so that parents have one source to go to for info. and updates? Our entire district has gone green, practically eliminating paper notices - everything is now via email, pdf file. The parent has to "opt in" for this otherwise they still get the paper notices. Email is much faster in getting the word out for volunteer recruitment and easier to manage a "paperless trail" vs. an actual paper trail.

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Permalink Reply by Brian Mannix on February 2, 2011 at 3:15pm

One way to increase turnout may be to set up babysitting cooperatives so that one or more members watch a bunch of your members' children, while the others can attend a meeting.

To fulfil a need in my house (to eliminate the cost of babysitting), I recently started with a teacher from school a website that manages and schedules babysitting with your friends by setting up a babysitting cooperative point online point management system.

The site is BabysittingBarter.com and it is free. Basically, it is pretty simple. Start a "village" with a bunch of your friends and family and shoot out a Babysitting Request (time, date, which children) to all the members using the site. Someone accepts and you pay them in points. Everyone starts with 30 points and BabysittingBarter.com keeps track of both the points and the schedule.

The site is free and it helps you essentially get free babysitting. I think it might be perfect for getting more members to the PTA meetings. You could set up a few villages and then just rotate one person who doesn't go to the meeting.

Just a thought.

Sincerely,

Brian Mannix

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Permalink Reply by Karen Bantuveris on November 28, 2011 at 11:54am

Hi Jessica -

I've been speaking a lot on the topic lately and YES YES YES - do consider a PTA/School Facebook Fan page!

Here's a link to our recent blog post with a webinar summary and a list of helpful articles on:

Using Social Media to Boost Parent Engagement, Membership and Fundr...

Good Luck!!

~ Karen

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Permalink Reply by Jami Fogle on November 28, 2011 at 12:56pm

Love your question, Jessica. We have several different communication tools for our K-5 PTA membership:

Personal web site offered by city-wide public school system, which includes Principal blog and photos.
PTA web site.
Weekly generated e-blast.
Online store website: for spirit sales, general donations, parent involvement events like father/daughter or mother/son event tix, waste-free lunch products, etc.

Facebook PTA page is excellent for schools working with a basic backbone of communication (paper as you mentioned above). As you consider Facebook as a platform, I strongly encourage that you deliberate on how you set up the Facebook PTA page from inception. Based on my recent research of businesses (small to large, consulting firms and mom/pop shops), no one offers more than a push-out/alert notification Facebook format. Certainly, this still enables people to comment on the wall post, but it limits conversation to the wall post topic.

Our Facebook PTA page was set up before I was voted into my position as VP/Fundraising. It is an open forum. I don't agree with it, but to change it might be difficult at this point because it would be considered censorship according to a small % of membership. Facebook is an interesting phenomenon. It is a social network, platform and vehicle. For your school, it is probably a fantastic leap from paper. For our school, it might be watering down all the other communication vehicles we provide. We do so much work to provide our membership as much information as possible for the entire year, and still...it is easier for members to simply ask on Facebook than to plug into all the documents we include online (live documents that are updated regularly) at all times.

Therefore, we are forced to reckon with a somewhat philosophical process management question we have to pose to ourselves:

Should we keep up with the times and make it easier for people thru the use of Facebook while we continue to load more volunteer responsibility upon ourselves to communicate effectively with our audience?

Do we all need to step back and train our members on proper usage of Facebook PTA page?

Or, do we move to general protocol based on research of what mass majority is doing...push-out/alert notification system of communication with our Facebook PTA page?

Facebook is a great option for you, no doubt.

The reason I ask you to deliberate on the set-up is that I have recently experienced parents cyber-bullying on Facebook. When a wall post invites a 25-to-30 thread of negative comments, it is a form of cyber-bullying. I had a parent take a private FB message I wrote (asking her to take her negative comments down and discuss with me directly) and post it - without my consent - on the wall of the page. When another influential PTA leader came to my defense in yet a separate private FB message, that leader's private message was posted on the public wall of our Facebook PTA page - again, without his consent. This act is otherwise known as denigration, one of the six most common forms of cyber-bullying...of which we can look forward to educating our children on in the future.

Based on your thoughts, I strongly encourage you to implement a Facebook PTA page. However, I would also strongly encourage you to keep it to a push-out/alert system of communication to create some form of decorum with the comments that follow. In the least, start out this way and it's still a win-win!