Sign Me Up
How I came to love the PTA.
by Holly Korbey
December 1, 2008
When the superhero tore off the mask and revealed her "true identity" as PTA president, I started to tune out. I was expecting to hear how we'd be doing neat little projects around school, like cupcakes for the holidays, maybe a fundraiser selling those delicious chocolate bars, maybe a spring fair. Everyone does a spring fair, right?
I could not have been more wrong. She began rattling off a list of programs — Art Education, Environment and Beautification, Mentoring, After-School Tutoring, the Book Fair, the Science Fair — that the PTA fully supports. She asked for 400 volunteers straight away to staff the weekend-long House Tour fundraiser — a project that, last year, raised $200,000 for the school. Two hundred grand? I thought I must have misunderstood — thoughts of flat-screen TVs and fancy playground equipment swirled in my head. But, when a parent asked what they did with the money, the PTA president said they bought dry erase boards for each classroom. Before last year's House Tour, the teachers hadn't had anything decent to write on.
She also said they needed daily volunteers to come and sit with the kindergarteners at lunch. I could not have been more wrong about what the PTA does. I raised my hand to ask why they would need help. She told me that lunch was the teachers' only planning period, so most days there was only one teacher assigned to watch 150 kindergarteners for the entire lunch period. The school did not have the budget to hire more help, and little ones had a difficult time opening milks or ketchup packets by themselves.
No one to help my son open his milk? He definitely did not have the dexterity to open it by himself. I felt myself straighten up in my seat.
©2008 Holly Korbey and Babble
About the Author
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Holly Korbey is an actress, writer, and mother of two. Her work has appeared on McSweeneys.net and in "How to Fit a Car Seat on a Camel, and Other Misadventures While Traveling with Kids," edited by Sarah Franklin. She lives with her family in Dallas, Texas. |
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