Below are general descriptions of each PTO Board and Committee Chair position and their duties. All descriptions include at least the responsibilities listed. Some information, responsibilities or duties may have been omitted.

President of PTO

Works with the Principal of the school in order to have a successful year.  Items to talk about with the Principal include:

• Meeting dates
• Fund-raiser dates
• Special events
• How can PTO help?

The PTO President is in charge of leading all PTO meetings and is responsible for  checking with Volunteer Coordinator in making sure all events are covered. The President keeps PTO Board Members informed about the status of events and issues that may come up.

If you can, attend the Parent Council meetings once a month; that would be a huge help in knowing what is happening in the District.  If you are unable to make the PTO meeting, the Vice President will lead that meeting.

You will also need to add your name to the Check signing for PTO. Any checks over $100.00 need to have Treasurer's signature along with yours. Make sure you keep in close contact with the Treasurer, helping this person ensure all proper taxes are filed.

It is important to remember to keep your PTO meetings under 1 hour. Teachers and staff are ready to be with their families.

Vice President of PTO

The responsibilities of the Vice President of PTO are to assist the President wherever and whenever needed.  The VP will run PTO meetings if the President is unable to attend. Assist, as needed, in compiling agenda items for PTO meetings. Plan upcoming meetings or PTO events. Attend all PTO meetings and PTO Executive Board meetings as scheduled.

Treasurer

• Assist in the planning and execution of the budget.
• Keep a ledger of all financial transactions.
• Maintain a sub-ledger for each budget item and each income item.
• Write checks for expenses and retain receipts for each transaction.
• Make deposits and retain receipts and records of each deposit.
• Keep a transaction record for the PTO bank account and reconcile it monthly with the statement.
• Retain all bank records.
• Prepare a detailed expense/income report and updated ledger to present at PTO meeting every other month.
• Try to collect on returned checks and keep records of your efforts.
• Prepare/file PTO tax documents by March 30th each year.

Secretary

• Attending all PTO meetings
• Attending all PTO Executive Board meetings
• Taking notes all both of the above meetings and compiling those notes into Minutes for each meeting.
• Minutes must be presented at PTO meetings (and Executive Board meetings, if held) for review, corrections and approval. Once Minutes of a past meeting are approved by the Board, they may be published to the PTO web site.
• Maintaining any logs (binders, books, etc.) containing the Meeting Minutes for the PTO. Maintaining any other documentation for the Board as needed or required in the PTO Bylaws.

Volunteer Coordinator

Long Term position:  August – June

• Coordinate Volunteers for all committees and events
  • March – Determine which committees need a new chair in the fall.
  • April – Find volunteers to act as committee and event chairs for the upcoming school year.
  • April – Prep & print volunteer flyers and have at 6th Grade Welcome Night.
  • August – Update volunteer packet & print for “back-to-school days”/schedule pick-up.
  • September – Collect sign up forms, create data base, give chairs a list of their volunteers.
• Provide training / orientation for all volunteers
  •    September – Provide chairs with job descriptions and reports from previous chairs
  •    Periodically touch base with all chairs to ensure jobs are running smoothly.           
• Attend all Executive Board and PTO Meetings
• Track all volunteer hours – provide info for end of year report to Parent Council.

Spirit Wear Chairperson

At THE BEGINNING OF June you will need to contact the T-shirt Company and figure out what design you want to use and what items you want to offer.  These items and order forms need to be ready for Schedule pick up in early August.  Sell these items at a table along side the PTO table.  Run the sale for about 1 week after school starts.  Turn the orders and money into the Company.  Once the orders are filled, you will need to pick items up from the company and separate.  The office helpers will be able to help deliver items to the students.  This sale can also be done again in the first week of November and parents can order for Christmas.

Parent Council Representative

Attend the meetings of the Westerville Parent Council of PTAs and Report all information back to the PTO.

Teacher/Staff Appreciation

This PTO committee provides parents and students the opportunity to show their appreciation for the dedication and commitment provided by our teachers and staff at Blendon Middle School.

• November Parent-Teacher Conferences Dinner and Breakfast:  A Thursday night dinner and Friday morning breakfast are provided to all BMS staff.  Some food items have been purchased/catered and others donated by Blendon parents in an effort to keep costs down. Dinners provided have included Subs and Salad, Soup-Salad-Bread, and Italian meal with salad and garlic bread. Breakfast items have included muffins, bagels, donuts, juice and coffee.  2009 food was based on a 65 person count (50 person count should be considered for 2010). A written invitation should be sent out to all staff (include custodians, office staff, teacher aides, therapy and special services.
• Spring Teacher/Staff Appreciation:  Ways can honor teachers and staff may include:
  • Staff Luncheon
  • Coffee/Tea Bar delivering beverages door to door with the help of student barristers and parents
  • Desserts (items to eat at school and to take home to families)
  • Teacher treats in mailboxes (candies, pens,…)
  • Student thank you notes.  Students man a table in front of the office where others can stop by and write a thank you to one of their teachers.
  • Provide student groups with resources to make banners and posters during Teacher Appreciation Week 

Fundraiser Chairperson

In charge of main fall fund-raiser for the school. This involves working with the Principal and PTO President to choose which Vendor Company we will use each year. Then you will work with the Vendor Company and Principal to determine a start date of the fund-raiser sale (usually within the first three weeks of school starting). You will work with the Vendor and Principal to determine a date and start time for the kick-off morning assembly. You will need to be at the morning assembly and assist the Vendor with set up and distributing any papers / forms / packets to students. Help prepare announcement for your sale, and then give to the school secretaries. Once the orders and money start coming in you will need to have PTO Volunteers help count the money and make sure the orders are filled out correctly.  At the end of the sale, work with Vendor to make sure all prizes are passed out and or any special events are covered with Volunteers.

GEM Chairperson

The GEM Chair usually attends a training session - in October or early November. Communications about the opportunity to nominate people for the GEM Awards will likely happen in late November or early December.  This would require the GEM Chair to communicate with the principal or whomever puts out their school newsletter, etc.  It's up to each GEM Chair as to which kind of communications work best for their building -- email, posters in the hallways, newsletters, daily announcements, or any combination.  We have a deadline for when the nominations are due to the GEM Chair.

Within a week of receiving nominations, the GEM Chair hosts a meeting (day or evening - whatever works best for their group - usually consisting of a combination of parents, staff and administrator or administrator representative).  WPC has a scoring system that the GEM committee follows to select a winner.  Once the winner is selected, it is sent on to the District GEM Chair.  Most GEM Chairs copy the nominations and send the scoring sheets home with committee members to score at their leisure, then the meeting is just to tally the scores and come up with a winner.  If the numbers don't identify your winner (if there is a tie), then the committee needs to make some decisions to come to one winner.  This is all spelled out in GEM Chair training.

After a school winner is selected and submitted, the only remaining thing to do is make sure the GEM winner and others who were nominated are recognized in some public way (assembly, school picnic, newsletter, etc.).  The point of GEM is to recognize those who go over and above to help students and make sure they know their school community appreciates them.

The GEM Chairs are welcome to come to the GEM reception and awards program to support their winner, but it is not required.

Scholarship Chairperson

Responsible for planning annual Blendon PTO Scholarships, working with the Executive Board and Treasurer regarding the scholarship offerings each year, advertising the scholarships with the high schools, setting or amending application requirements as needed and organizing an application review board.

Membership Chairperson

Track and maintain membership information, a log or spreadsheet of all PTO members who have paid dues for the current year, contact information (including but not limited to name, address, contact phone number and e-mail address). Plan and implement ideas on how to increase membership and continue membership involvement.

Dance Committee Chairperson

The Dance Committee Chair is responsible for overseeing all aspects of the dances at Blendon and working with all volunteers to coordinate the different sub-committees involved with planning the dances.

• Determine the schedule for the dances, dates and times from PTO President and confirm with principal
• Work with student council/student council teacher rep to come up with theme (the month or two prior to the dance)
• Coordinate volunteers through the dance volunteer contact list (provided by volunteer coordinator chair)
• Request DJ services from Vice Principal/Principal
• Set up dance sub-committee heads, set up/decorations/video games, door ticket sales/management of front door area, food, craft, novelties, clean up
• Work with committee heads to determine needs and give particular requirements and instructions for each sub-committee, volunteer assignments, determine what food will be served, what theme appropriate crafts/novelties will be sold, setting up clean up team with instructions, communication between  sub-committee needs to custodial staff
• Communicate dance theme and request deserts from baking chair for the dance
• Order soda through the school at least 2 weeks prior to dance
• Responsible for dance announcements getting out & working with student council teacher rep/student council on signs for dance, including all price lists for the dance (food and anything else being sold)
• Responsible for requesting dance tickets (from office) and ticket recording sheets the week before sales are to start
• Responsible for coordinating volunteers to sell ticket the week of the dance (Wednesday through Friday) during all lunch periods and communicating directions for the volunteers, including procurement of cash box and giving instructions
• General oversight of dance at the actual function
• Procure all needed cash boxes from PTO President prior to dance including balance sheets
• Complete any reimbursement requests from sub-committee to be turned in to the Treasurer.

Web Site

In charge of making sure all information on the PTO web site is up-to-date and relevant. Required to attend a how-to class put on by the district in September. Update site as needed, including information on upcoming fund-raisers, dine-out nights, dance dates & information, staff appreciation dates, PTO member names, spiritwear items (and images), meeting minutes and agendas (and archive prior information as needed). Work with previous web site chair as needed.