As a PTA leader, I know that Back to School Night might be the one opportunity to connect with ALL our parents. We welcome them, want them to LOVE our school, and most importantly, invite them to participate as volunteers supporting our teachers, our children, and our many fundraisers.
At our school, as you enter the building, there are tables and tables full of clipboards asking for parents to sign up to volunteer as library volunteers, science volunteers, recess and cafeteria helpers, book fair and carnival volunteers, field trip chaperons, silent auction chairs, and more. Our hope is that every parent finds something they can fit into their busy schedules -- whether it's a weekly commitment in the copy room, a one-time volunteer spot at the football concessions stand, providing cupcakes for the bake sale, or extra classroom supplies for the teachers.
My school has been using the clipboard table forever but now that computers are more common than transistor radios, we've decided to embrace technology and make the sign up process easier than ever by using VolunteerSpot's free and easy volunteer sign up tool. This also lets parents sign up even when they are not physically in the school building, by simply visiting the school website and clicking the 'volunteer' link.
Starting this Fall, all the sign ups for our different activities at school will use VolunteerSpot, which has a neat functionality that allows users to create a URL link to the signup sheet, so users on email or visiting the school website or booster club website can simply click on say the 'Fall Carnival Volunteers' or 'Recess Helpers' link and the entire schedule is sitting there awaiting their sign up. Also, by doing sign ups this way (instead of a clipboard), VolunteerSpot also automates confirmation messages and reminders to the volunteers (especially helpful for people who sign up in the Fall for an event in the Spring)!
For schools with good
computer access, connected computers can be set up with a committee
chair manning the sign up. Parents can choose their volunteer spots
'on the spot', sign up, and a confirmation message with their
assignments will be waiting in their email inbox when they get home.
Another option is to have parents request the URL on the spot, and go
home to choose their actual assignments (where they can consult their
calendars).
For schools still embracing clipboards, VolunteerSpot makes it easy for committee chairs to turn those parent signatures into online assignments. Once entered into the online calendar, VolunteerSpot takes over with automated confirmation and reminder messages. Donna, the Career Day chair at an elementary school in Pataskala, Ohio sums it up, "Thanks for saving me so much time and making my job so easy! Because of VolunteerSpot, I'll be the chair next year too!"
Lori, a working-mom and elementary school parent from Augusta, Ga says this, "WOW - that was easy! Even a computer-challenged mom like me could sign up to help - and I'm liberated from all the reply-all messages our room mom used to send!"
The easier we make it for parents to volunteer and sign up, the greater the participation level we will achieve - and isn't that what every school wants and needs?! So enjoy your Back to School Night and don't forget to volunteer!