School Board Meetings

The Corperation of National Community Service found this statistic that volunteering and being involved in the local government can give you 27% higher odds of finding a job rather than non-volunteers. When I finish High School I might have 27% higher odds of getting a job because I have met my civic responsibilities. I have met my civic responsibilities by going to school board meeting, babysitting for the parents of Parent Teacher Organization and working the PTO Fun Run, and I learned even the small things make a difference.
The importance of attending school board meetings are greatly neglected. Many people think that they don't have a say in what happens to the school or the board won't take into consideration what the people have
to say about an issue. On March 30th I attended a very important meeting and I was surprised by the amount of parents and teachers who attended.
Within the first 30 minutes there is a public forum where people from the community whether they have kids in school or not they are able to stand up and give there
opinion on an issue. Many teachers spoke about how it would impact the amount of teaching they would get done in a shorter class period. Many opinions were heard the one that stood out to me the most was a parent, her argument was that with this 8 period schedule it would limit the amount of classes that were available to her child. Months after the meeting the school board revised the 8 period schedule and instead of having each teacher getting a full block of prep they are only getting a skinny so another skinny is offered as a class.
Weeks before I attended a meeting that was not highly attended and not as talked about in regards to the content that was being discussed. On February 2nd the meeting was not as interesting. It discussed the 2016-2017 school year schedule and the budget and how we needed to make cuts. The board members were asking a lot of important questions and Mr. Marshall just walked around them and didn't give them a specific answer. One question was about changing to an 8 period schedule and since we already had some teachers retiring we wouldn’t have to hire any more and that would save money. Mr. Marshall agreed that an 8 period schedule and not hiring any more teachers would definitely save a lot of money. After attending both of the meeting I learned the importance of being involved especially in a small community like ours.
After attending the school board meetings I helped directly with community by helping with the PTO Fun Run also known as the Mustache Dash. At first helped by carrying tables and setting up the photobooth. Before anyone was there we got everything set up and ready for when they did. I thought it could've been more organized, there wasn't much of a turn out but overall I had a fun time. There was hulla-hoops, a photobooth, a game where you threw bags into holes of a ladder, a game on the playground, also bowling. The kids were really adorable and looked like they were having a blast. I think the kids really enjoyed seeing Stormin’ Normin and playing games with him. After two hours of playing with the kids I felt really good about the fact that I was making a positive influence in their childhood.
Babysitting for the PTO meeting was also how I helped my community.
I was babysitting with three other high schoolers and I was told that there are normally more kids that attend but the night that I was helping there was only four kids. There was a dinner before and they had spaghetti and cookies along with milk or juice. It smelt really good but I had practice before so I was not able to attend the dinner. I did end up getting a cookie and that was really good. After the dinner when the meeting started we were able to go into a teachers room and play with the toys or stay in the gym and shoot hoops or run around. The little girls decided they wanted to go into the room and I was more than happy to go in there and play games. Girls are normally more my thing. Nathan came with and helped, we played hangman on the board and “house” that didn't last very long. One of the girls wanted to play “teacher” so she gave me and Nathan a spelling test and by that time it was time to go. I had a lot of fun playing with the little girls. I took one-two hours out of my night to help the parents of the kids so they could focus on the meeting and not worry about what their kids were doing in another room. When I was little my mom was in PTO and I still remember when high schoolers came to help and I hope they remember when they are my age. Knowing that I was making a difference made me want to realize the importance of helping the
community.
I learned even the small things make a difference. It could be anything there are things in every community mine included, going to school board meetings, babysitting for the parents of Parent Teacher Organization and working the PTO Fun Run. The small things make just as much of an impact as the big things. I never knew how much you could learn and how I could make an impact on the issues that impact me the most. I enjoyed working with the kids and knowing that they we having a positive role model. I learned a lot of valuable lessons from helping the community I enjoyed going to the meetings and learning that I could make a difference in the community and the importance of being involved.