A message from your 2020-2021 Seattle Hill Elementary PTO
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Hello, and on behalf of the S.H.E. Parent Teacher Organization welcome to another year at Seattle Hill! Although this year is going to be different than we’re all used to, we still would like to take this opportunity to let you know who we are and what we do.
The PTO is a group of parents and teachers who, through volunteering their time and efforts, work to enrich and enhance students’ experiences at Seattle Hill. In real-world terms, that means we coordinate with the school and parents to raise money; hold festivals, movie nights, and other fun activities; and run a number of in-school programs, including mileage club and outdoor classroom.
With the exception of what we need for operating expenses (making flyers and paying government fees), the entirety of the money we raise goes back into the school. We give teachers money directly to spend on their classrooms and equipment, we give to the school library, and we help pay for the online programs our kids use. We also support field trip busing, cover club costs, and pay for Dance Week in the spring – though some of those expenses are unlikely to happen this year.
Just as all of you were, we were significantly affected by Covid-19 and the closure of school last spring. We do the majority of our fundraising in the spring, and so missed out on nearly $25,000 of projected revenue (while also reducing expenses, of course). Sadly, we don’t anticipate this year being all that different, and so we’re coming to you with a request.
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In this difficult year, we would still like to be able to provide some of the gifts we usually give to the school. We want to continue to give money directly to teachers for things they use in their classroom; we want to provide grade-level gift money for the teachers across a grade level to use to enhance their teaching, which we were unable to do last year but have done in prior years; we want to continue to give to the library to allow them to expand their catalog and programs; and we want to continue to do our usual teacher appreciation celebrations, as maybe now more than ever we all realize just how difficult and important their work is.
To allow us to do all this, we’re asking for a donation of $20 per child (please click the DONATE button below. We know how difficult things are right now and that not everyone is in a position to contribute at that level; if you can do that much or more, great, and if you can do less or none at all right now, we understand that too. Please note we will continue to have a few fundraisers throughout the year, but fewer than normal.
Thank you so much,
The Seattle Hill Elementary Parent Teacher Organization
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