Programs & Campaigns

PTA Family-School Partnerships

PTA’s National Standards for Family-School Partnerships are helping more and more students realize their potential. The Standards serve as a platform for creating programs and practices that promote and strengthen family and community engagement in schools. They are designed to expand the focus from what schools should do to involve parents to what parents, schools, and communities can do together to support student success. Research has shown that no matter what their family income or background may be, students with involved parents are more likely to

• Attend school regularly,
• Earn higher grades and test scores,
• Be promoted, pass their classes, and earn credits,
• Display better social skills, improved behavior, and adaptation to school, and
• Graduate and go on to postsecondary education.

The Programs Department of National PTA has developed a number of resources to help put these Standards into action. They include:

• National Standards for Family-School Partnerships Implementation Guide
• National Standards Assessment Guide
• Family survey
• Parent handouts
• Power-point presentations
• PTA Report to the Community (a template for documenting Standards-based programs)
• Hearst Family-School Partnership Awards

Program staff also conduct workshops at state and national conventions and are available to provide technical assistance upon request. For more information, go to PTA.org/family_school_partnerships.asp.

PTA Healthy Lifestyles

PTA Healthy Lifestyles is PTA’s initiative to encourage families and communities to eat right, exercise regularly, and develop habits for lifelong health. PTA Healthy Lifestyles: A Parent’s Guide pulls together recommendations and resources on physical activity and nutrition, as well as vaccinations, school wellness policies, and addressing the impact of food marketing. For more tips on a balanced diet and daily exercise for children ages 2 to 18, families can turn to PTA’s new Health and Wellness Facts posters. These tools are available at PTA.org/GoodChoices.

PTA units are encouraged to plan health-focused activities for PTA Healthy Lifestyles Month in November. Activities can range from featuring health articles in the school newsletter to hosting a family fitness night to holding a healthy recipe contest to starting a walking club to organizing a community health fair.

To support local activities, PTA offers a limited number of PTA Healthy Lifestyles Awards of up to $1,000. Local PTAs in good standing are eligible to apply. Event ideas, planning resources, and the award application can be found at PTA.org/HealthyLifestyles. Award applications for 2009 must be submitted online by 5:00 p.m. EDT, Friday, September 11, 2009. Award recipients will be notified via e-mail within four weeks of the application deadline.

Send Healthy Lifestyles stories and questions to HealthyLifestyles@pta.org.

PTA Reflections Program

For 40 years, the national PTA Reflections Program has encouraged students across the nation and in Department of Defense dependents schools overseas to explore their artistic talents.

Through Reflections, schools and PTAs can showcase the importance of the arts in education, parents can encourage the creativity and lifelong learning of their children, and students can receive recognition for their artistic endeavors. This exclusive PTA program offers great value—and a sense of pride—to the students and school community.

40th anniversary celebration
This year marks the 40th anniversary of Reflections! To celebrate 40 years of achievement in the arts, PTA encourages all units to participate in Reflections as a tribute to the program’s importance in encouraging children’s creativity and artistic expression. All works must be inspired by the current year’s Reflections Program theme. The 2009–2010 theme: “Beauty is…”

For guidance on hosting the PTA Reflections Program at your school, go to PTAreflections.org. There’s a brand-new PTA Reflections Program Local Arts Chairs’ Guide and promotional posters and fliers along with the student rules and forms. Be sure to contact your state PTA office right away for state rules and deadlines. Make Reflections part of your 2009–2010 year and see what a difference the arts make.

PTA Take Your Family to School Week

Connect parents to their children’s school experiences with PTA Take Your Family to School Week. PTA Take Your Family to School Week is celebrated each February—in the week leading up to PTA Founders Day (February 17)—to pay tribute to PTA’s legacy of building family-school partnerships. This February 7–13, 2010, plan events to welcome families into your school. Invite parents to have lunch with their kids, see what their children are learning and doing in class, chat with teachers and principals, work on school improvement projects, and have a little fun.

For event ideas, Web banners, and a series of posters with tips for family involvement, go to PTA.org/FamilyToSchool. There’s also a PTA membership form, commitment card, and father involvement guide to help you encourage parents to keep coming back throughout the year.

Schools that plan events for this special week are eligible to apply for the $1,897 Awards, whose dollar amount was chosen to match the year PTA was founded. Watch for more information on the award application process later this fall.

PTA Teacher Appreciation Week

PTA established Teacher Appreciation Week in 1984 to say thanks to the awesome women and men who educate our children. These dedicated individuals are there alongside parents working to give children the knowledge and skills they need for a bright future.

Celebrated the first full week in May, PTA Teacher Appreciation Week is your chance to tell teachers—and the entire school staff—just how extraordinary they are. It’s also a launching point for stronger family-school partnerships, a reminder to support teachers throughout the year through cooperation, collaboration, and expressions of appreciation.

PTA offers ideas for public tributes, school events, and tokens of gratitude, with ways to involve parents, students, businesses, and the community at large. There’s also a planning timeline, a sample press release and proclamation, a certificate of appreciation, and colorful posters promoting the week—all available for download through the PTA Teacher Appreciation Virtual Gallery at PTA.org/teachers. The gallery also includes teacher thank-yous from parents and kids and could include yours; visit the gallery to find out how.

Looking for other ways to give your teachers national recognition? PTA’s Thank-A-Teacher group on Facebook is a thriving community. Join other parents, students, and former students in posting words of thanks to your all-time favorite teachers, and share pictures and stories of how your school community supports teachers.

Three for Me

PTA offers parents a great way to get involved in their children’s education through the Three for Me program. Three for Me helps parents find ways to support learning through activities at home, at school, and in the community. By the end of a school year, parents, teachers and students are amazed at how their commitment to being involved has translated into increased academic, social, and emotional success.

Three for Me works because it

• Appeals to busy parents and parents who are looking for ways to get involved,
• Opens the door to the school for the first time for many parents and family members,
• Organizes and increases awareness about volunteer needs,
• Allows for greater participation by families with diverse backgrounds and lifestyles because they can be involved at school, at home, or in the community,
• Increases opportunities for male involvement, and
• Encourages participants to devise creative and innovative ideas for strengthening parent involvement and student achievement.

The Three for Me program offers PTA leaders

• Sample forms and guidelines for an easy start-up,
• A strategy for organizing activities around the National Standards for Parent/Family Involvement Programs, and PTA priority areas, such as arts and culture, health and wellness, student achievement, and advocacy,
• An easy-to use program to increase PTA or other group membership, and
• Through increased involvement, a stronger, more effective partnership of home, school, and community.

Get Three for Me started at your school today and put a new face on parent involvement! More information can be obtained at www.three4me.com, or by calling the PTA Programs Office at (202) 289-6790.

United We Serve

PTA has partnered with the White House on an important volunteer initiative called United We Serve (www.serve.gov). The campaign asks all Americans to give back to their communities in meaningful ways. PTA members are encouraged to get involved with United We Serve by planning service projects that focus on education (literacy), health, and military families.

The PTA Call to Service Toolkit was developed to give step-by-step instructions to plan your service project. Here are a few helpful tips to get you started:
• Assess the needs of your community and design a project to meet those needs.
• Tie your service project into an existing activity, such as a Back to School night, a PTA Healthy Lifestyles event, or Take Your Family to School Week.
• Use the service project as a way to recruit new PTA members by inviting others to join your effort.
• Build partnerships with local businesses and community organizations to donate supplies or volunteers to your project.
• Get youth involved in planning and implementing the service project.

PTA stories submitted through the PTA Call to Service web page will be shared with President Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama, and the Corporation for National and Community Service. To get more information, access the Call to Service Toolkit, and to share your story of service, visit PTA.org/calltoservice.

Urban Family Engagement Initiative

Recognizing that parent and caregiver involvement in urban areas has a unique character and set of challenges, PTA’s national organization has worked to develop new models of parent engagement to ensure students in city schools receive the good-quality education they deserve.

In Fall 2009, PTA’s Urban Family Engagement Initiative will begin a three-year effort to:

• Raise awareness and usage of the parent involvement resources available to urban communities,
• Mobilize parents, caregivers, community stakeholders, and school administrators in urban areas to identify and remove barriers to parent and caregiver involvement in education, and
• Train parents and caregivers to work with others for the educational success of all children.

This effort will be locally driven and tailored to the needs of communities in 15 cities across the country.

In the first year, local PTA and community leaders will host free, community-wide events to help parents and caregivers learn about the benefits of parent involvement and partnering with their schools and community organizations. In year 2, parents and caregivers will be invited to attend free, monthly workshops and discussion groups. In the third year, those who have taken part in the initiative will be invited to an annual conference to discuss progress to date and plan future actions to sustain gains in student achievement.

For more information or to locate an upcoming event in your community, please visit PTA.org/urbandevelopment.