Episode 76: Successfully Managing Parent and Community Groups with Christina Hidek

FocusED Show Notes with Guest Christina HidekChristina starts out with some suggestions about how school leaders can get on the same page with the PTO/PTA President by meeting on a regular basis. The key is to meet ahead of the actual PTA meetings and separate from them.School leaders should explain their vision for the school and the school year to the parent groups, starting with the PTA President.School leaders and PTA Presidents should have a clear understanding of how they want to communicate.Christina describes the strongest relationships that she had with principals and the trust and openingness that it takes.School leaders should attend their PTA meetings and the measure of success is a lack of turnover in the group.Every parent group should have at least one teacher liaison; the main point of the role is to bring the parent group information back to the teachers so that it doesn't fall on the principals.Christina reminds us that parents are volunteers, and they may need training. As soon as a group is formed, they need to be empowered and equipped with the right tools and information to go in the right direction.There’s no PTA school. ~ Christina Hidek.Christina consistently brings the conversation back to professional learning for parents. They can’t be a resource if they don’t know how.She talks about her parent group raising $26K and what that means to the school community.She hates the movie Bad Moms.A tip for school leaders is to celebrate and highlight the work of their parent groups.Christina tells us that there aren’t enough resources for PTOs/PTAs and school leaders who want to engage parents in the best way.PTOAnswers/principals.com has resources for principals who want to better engage parent groups.Check out FamilyEngagementTools.com.