Wrapping up the PTA year and Setting Up for a Great PTA Fall!

As the 2024-2025 school year comes to an end, here are some tips and reminders for PTA leaders to help wrap up your school year and prepare for a great start in the fall!

At your last PTA meetings......

• Be sure to recognize and thank your volunteers.
• Survey your members and review your 2024-2025 goals. 
• Approve next year's budget and approve any changes to the standing rules. 
• Recruit candidates for non-elected PTA board of directors and chair positions.
• Give your team a deadline for submitting their reimbursable expenses to the treasurer so that books can be closed on June 30th.  
• ​Appoint your end of year Financial Review team. A financial review is required by your PTA insurance and should be completed soon after books close on June 30th. The PTA President needs to appoint 3 or more members of your PTA who were non-signers on your bank account for the period being reviewed. WSPTA has a financial review checklist to help guide the team. Visit the "Leadership Guides" section of the WSPTA website, scroll to "Board Resources" and click on "Finance" (ask your current PTA leadership for the username and password to access these resources!)

Bookkeeping tasks......

• Make sure your two legal binders and/or digital folders are updated with all of the most recent documents.
• Enter your 2025-2026 officers into Givebacks.
• Download a PDF or print out a year-end membership roster for the 2024-2025 year. This should be done before the fiscal year closes on June 30th!
• Register your new PTA leaders with Council (complete form HERE!)

Plan for a NEW team......

• Hold transition meetings for outgoing and incoming board members and chairs. 
• Give new leaders access to digital or hard-copy files. Be sure to reset your passwords on July 1st.  
• Set dates for your summer retreat. Learn more below!
• Review and update policies. Check out Council’s policies here. 
• Plan your fall membership drive. 
• Encourage new officers to take training over the summer. Consider attending the August Leadership Launch event hosted by WSPTA. This virtual event is a great way to get some training on board before the new school year starts!
• Share all the ways the incoming board can connect with Council.  
• Plan your NSD facility use requests for 2025-2026. Designate one board of directors member as your PTA/PTSA contact for facilities. 

What to Plan for your Summer Retreat.....

• Schedule ahead so that people know when it is going to be. Prioritize having the whole team there.
• Make it fun. A game? A picnic? Whatever seems fun to your board and would help you get to know each other! There are a ton of team-building activities like 2 Truths and a Lie that can help you all get to know each other a little better.
• Give out some homework. To save time, ask everyone to read or fill out a few documents in advance. Examples might include: 
  1. Contact information (including preferences)
  2. Your PTA's Standing Rules
  3. Your PTA's Budget
  4. Your PTA Standards of Conduct
  5. Your PTA Money Handling Policy
  6. Your PTA Social Media Policy
• Create an agenda. Although you don’t have to take minutes at a Retreat (since you are not voting on anything), it’s good to have a schedule and try to stick to it.  

What Should be on your Retreat Agenda.......
Create your calendar as best you can.  Get down your meetings and some of your bigger events.
Review the Budget and Standing Rules.
Discuss your team’s communication norms and individual expectations.
Brainstorm new ideas for Membership, Advocacy, Family Engagement, programs and events.

More about Communication Norms.....

• Sharing the floor at meetings to get everyone’s ideas.
• How to use email. What response time am I expecting?  Should I reply all?
• When to use the phone. How late is it okay to call?
• What is confidential and what is not.
• Text message usage. ​Texting is a great resource when someone forgot the ice on the way to the Back- to-School fair. Texting is NOT a great place to: Discuss other board members\students\ families\or staff members, conduct PTA Business, make committee decisions when there are other committee members not on the text message thread, settle disagreements or blow off steam. It’s best to keep business communications and your friendship communication separate.
• When are you ‘off’ work.
• Who posts on social media.

Need more retreat ideas?
Check out this great blog from 2021: Summer Board Retreat - Northshore Council PTSA 6.10!