Northshore Council is continuing to provide Online Meeting Hosting for local PTAs/PTSAs this school year!
This can be used by any local PTA/PTSA that wants Council to host a Zoom meeting for them. Please note that max number of attendees is 100 and that this service is offered on a first-come, first-serve basis. Here is how it will work:
Questions? Contact us! Calling all Advocates! ![]() It's time to get started on PTA Advocacy for the 2021-2022 school year. Here are 6 Advocacy Action Items to add to your PTA's back to school list of things to do:
Bonus Advocacy Action Item: Let’s Vote Challenge! National Voter Registration Day is September 28th! Did you know that Local PTAs/PTSAs can run voter registration drives? You can also include the graphic below in your e-news and on social media to encourage your members to register to vote! For WA state, voter information and registration can be found at http://vote.wa.gov/ and is provided in multiple languages! All PTA/PTSAs must update their officer information in memberplanet, the membership database used by Washington State PTA (WSPTA). Updating officer information is a requirement for all PTAs per the WSPTA Standards of Affiliation. Doing so gives WSPTA and Northshore Council PTSA the means to contact a PTA/PTSA if a need arises as well as ensuring that all PTA/PTSA leaders are included in important WSPTA and Northshore Council communications.
The way to communicate leader information in memberplanet is through its Committees Module. There are a number of resources to help local PTA leaders use and understand memberplanet. However, because the Committees Module feature is so new, the documentation and support is not yet very extensive. Due to the importance of updating officer information, Northshore Council PTSA has created a guide to help users navigate the process. Download the “Assigning and Updating PTA Leaders in memberplanet” guide to get started! Looking for more help with using memberplanet? Attend Northshore Council's upcoming training! Date: September 9, 2021 Time: 7:00PM Location: Online via Zoom Presenter: Amanda Cabana, WSPTA Membership Director Register: zoom.us/meeting/register/tJ0tdemgqDsvH9UAZzVDvhbpvGFvlGoqd7HU Additional Resources:
Looking for help with using memberplanet? Attend Northshore Council's upcoming training!
Date: September 9, 2021 Time: 7:00PM Location: Online via Zoom Presenter: Amanda Cabana, WSPTA Membership Director Register: zoom.us/meeting/register/tJ0tdemgqDsvH9UAZzVDvhbpvGFvlGoqd7HU This training is intended to teach Northshore PTA Leaders how to navigate memberplanet, update PTA officers, enter memberships, and more! Registration is required. Once registered, participants will be emailed a link to join the Zoom on September 9th. Questions? Contact us! Hello Northshore PTA Leaders! We all know that last year was incredibly challenging, stressful and at times downright frustrating. But, the barriers COVID presented also encouraged us to think outside our comfort zones to come up with new and innovative ways to engage with and support our communities. Through it all, our Northshore PTAs have continued to be strong, flexible and tenacious. I am so proud of every single one of our PTAs for not backing down in the face of such an extreme challenge and continuing to achieve their mission of supporting every child's potential. As we step into the 2021-2022 school year, it seems that this next school year will be more of the same - challenging us once again to pivot quickly and adapt to changing circumstances that are beyond our control. I want to let you know that we are always here for you. Our mission as your Northshore PTSA Council is to support the work you do at the local PTA level. We have many resources that can help you navigate the day to day PTA work, as well as the unexpected, including:
Our 2021-2022 Council team is ready to help you continue to do amazing things for our students, families, schools and communities. Wishing you a fantastic school year! ![]() Below you will find links to Q&As from each of the eleven (11) Northshore School District School Board Candidates running in the August 2021 Primary Election. To view the responses, click on each candidate's image which will open a PDF of the Q&A. Note: These are best viewed from a desktop type device. A message from our Co-VPs of Advocacy: To reach as many voters as possible and provide them another resource to make informed choices on their ballots, we invited the school board candidates to answer seven questions taken from the most common questions and themes we heard from PTA and community members. We know that candidates are providing information on their own websites and social media, but it can be helpful to have one place where people can access information on all the candidates to compare them more efficiently. We chose questions that cover a variety of interests and concerns from across the district. We emailed each candidate using the email address listed on the King County Elections page. We asked candidates to submit their answers via a Google form by July 12th to allow us time to publish everyone’s responses before the ballots arrive in the mail. This gave candidates one week to respond. We recognize this was a short turn around but we were eager to get information to the voters of our district after having to pivot quickly after canceling our Zoom forums. The candidates’ answers are cut-and-pasted from the Google form so you will see their complete, un-edited answers. If they have any concerns about how their responses are presented, we have asked them to let us know, so that we may address the issue. We really appreciate that all of the candidates took the time to answer our questions. NSD School Board Candidates for Director District No. 1 NSD School Board Candidates for Director District No. 4 NSD School Board Candidates for Director District No. 5 Voter information and registration can be found at http://vote.wa.gov/.
Council's virtual school board candidate forums that were scheduled to be published later this month have been cancelled. For a statement as to why these forums have been cancelled, please see the video below from Council President, Jane Chiodo. Our hope is to work towards hosting an in-person forum this fall before the general election in November. For a written transcript of the video below, please click here. Northshore Council PTSA Mission Statement Northshore Council PTSA is a welcoming organization that works to support our Local PTAs and serve the children and youth of our community through advocacy, education, mentoring, collaboration, and leadership. Website Links for School Board Candidates Contact Information Taken from King County Elections Page 6/29/2021.
¹No website listed. Link directs you to candidate statement on King County elections page. Voter information and registration can be found at http://vote.wa.gov/.
![]() Council recommends local PTA leaders do two important things this summer:
A board retreat can be a powerful way to kick-start your PTA's new year. If fact, it can be such a powerful tool that Washington State PTA considers having one to be a PTA best practice. A retreat is more than just a regular meeting; it is an opportunity to:
![]() There are many things to consider when planning for your retreat. While board retreats can take place in person, due to Covid guidelines or the individual needs of your board members, it maybe be best to plan a virtual retreat, which adds a few more items to that list.
![]() Great retreats also include a few key social elements that serve as ways to allow board members to connect, bond, and get to know each other, all of which work to help build a more cohesive team:
The extended nature of a retreat means that a board can have time for conversations and discussions with more breadth and depth. Consider some of the following discussion areas and questions as you build your board retreat agenda:
![]() Finally, remember that some of the most important work will happen after the retreat ends as ideas are put into action. Take time through the year to reflect and check-in with one another regarding discussions, action items, and progress toward goals. Additional Resources:
Recently, Council has been sent several questions asking about our upcoming School Board Candidate Forum and felt it was best to address those questions publicly.
On June 22, 2021 at 7pm, the Northshore Council PTSA was scheduled to host the first of three scheduled Zoom Forums for each of the three open positions on the Northshore School Board. Unfortunately, all but one of the candidates pulled out at the last minute. We will leave it to the candidates to share their reasons. Due to this, the first recording was not able to be done. We are currently working on rescheduling this forum. Northshore Council PTSA has held many candidate forums in the past including school board candidate forums and most recently state representative forums in 2018 and 2020. Council volunteers have done their best to create a fair, non-partisan forum in which each candidate is asked the same questions and has the same time to answer the questions. Council took input from PTA/PTSA members as well as community members for these questions which represent a wide spectrum of issues and concerns from across the district. The three recorded Zoom Forums, though recorded on different days, would be all posted to our website on the same day and will not be edited or altered in any way. Members of the community have asked about the possibility of us hosting an in person forum. Due to the short time-frame, we do not have time to find a venue and organize an in-person forum before the primary school board election, but we will consider hosting one before the general election. Click here to learn more about the format of Council's 2021 School Board Candidate Forum. We hope that given another chance, all school board candidates will choose to participate in our Zoom Forums as it is important for voters to have the opportunity to hear about their experiences, views, and vision for the education of Northshore students in order to make informed choices. If you have any additional questions, please feel free to reach out to our Co-VPs of Advocacy by emailing [email protected]. Are you new to your PTA role this year? Are you on a Nominating Committee and looking for the best candidate? Is your PTA looking to fill a role or create a new one? Then you might find our newest resource helpful: PTA Job Descriptions! We've added a new section to our Forms, Documents, & Procedures page that now includes PTA Job Descriptions. These descriptions are provided by Council to help your PTA better understand some of the different roles within PTA. We recommend that you create these for your specific PTA as well. Providing a job description is a great starting place for someone new to the role or when you are working on recruiting a new volunteer to your board.
Have a PTA job description for your local PTA that you don't see listed on our site? Feel free to share it with Council so we can share it with our local PTAs! Email [email protected]. |
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Northshore Council PTSA is a welcoming organization that works to support our Local PTAs and serve the children and youth of our community through advocacy, collaboration, education, engagement, leadership, and mentorship.