What is the PTA and who can be a Member? Our PTA is part of the national Parent/Teacher Association that strives to enhance children’s educational experiences. Being part of a national organization, we must pay annual dues. To offset these dues, every year, we have a membership drive. Becoming a member does not mean you automatically sign up to volunteer, it just means you support our group and believe in what we’re doing. You will see our membership tables on PTA nights. Last year we had over 100 members – this year we hope to get all parents to join the PTA. All parents and caregivers, along with school faculty can be members, for only $10. Please enroll or renew your membership for 2009-10 and help us achieve our membership goal!

PTA Programs & Fundraising Our primary objective as a PTA is to provide our school with funds, programs, resources and services that will enrich and maximize the education of every child. To meet this important objective, and afford services that are no longer covered by our schools budget, we must fundraise. Though it may not be our favorite responsibility, it is a necessary one. Our school community must raise money if we want to provide our children with the storytellers, story and puppet crafters, music and dance residencies, author readings, concerts, grade and curriculum based assemblies and other hands-on, interactive experiences and presentations that we have in the past. We are excited about several new programs for this coming school year! Our PTA brochure details all of the programs we sponsor and support.

This year Georgia Natural Gas and Chick-Fil-A Calendars are our two major fundraisers. If all goes well, the PTA plans to give $10,000 to our schools, $5,000 of which is for educational programming. Our Chick-Fil-A Calendar sale just began. This is our first year selling Calendars and we hope to have much success. Also in October we will start our First BoxTop Contest of the year a 1st Prize is a Pizza party for the class with the most BoxTops, 2nd Prize is a Yogurt Party for the class. So start collection BoxTops today!

Become a Volunteer…Why YOU should get involved! As you can see, we are a busy group. This is where you can come in! We need your help, and so do your children. Over 500 independent studies on parent involvement show that when parents get involved in their children’s education grades go up, test scores improve, children are more likely to attend better schools after high school, they have fewer discipline problems and they’re less likely to use drugs and alcohol. Get involved TODAY!

Please look at the PTA volunteer sheet, download THIS PDF file

indicate what events/activities interest you, and we’ll contact you to discuss it further. ASK a PTA Board member for all of our volunteer opportunities! Volunteering doesn’t have to mean a huge time commitment. We understand it is increasingly more difficult to find time to give, but please, whatever your time schedule allows, we have need of you. We even have tasks that can be performed in the evenings, during the day or that don’t even involve coming to the school at all.

PTA is Going Green Because of the amount of paper we use that eventually gets thrown away, we are starting an effort this year to dramatically reduce our paper usage. This will help our environment AND reduce our office expenses. Rather than send home fliers, we will send emails and post information on our website. Please help us by sending us your email address. If you already receive our emails, then you don't need to do anything. If you are new to our schools, or have not received our emails, please email us at stonewalltellpta@yahoo.com. Your name will be added to our distribution list. If you do not have access to email, we will continue to send home fliers. Please give us your child's name and teacher when you join the PTA, and any PTA information will go home with your child. Also, our School website – http://www2.fultonschools.org/school/ is a great resource. By September you will see contact information for our PTA board, a fall calendar of events, volunteer opportunities, parenting resources, and other useful information. Check it out!

In conclusion Our parent group is certainly about more than fundraisers! We’re about men and women working together toward a common goal. That goal, simply stated, is creating a better school and a better educational experience for our children. We strive to create an atmosphere where teachers, administrators, and support staff can do their best work – and so can our children. There is so much more that can be done and we need your help. We invite you to join us, we look forward to meeting you!

On behalf of the Stonewall Tell PTA we would once again like to extend a warm welcome and best wishes for a successful school year! Please contact any of us with questions or comments.

Sincerely, The Stonewall Tell PTA Executive Committee

Jennifer Thompson, President
Karen Cole, 1st Vice President
Tiffany Taylor, 2nd Vice President
Heavenly Montgomery, Treasure
Carmen Sneed, Secretary
Sametra Long, Assistant Secretary