• School Smarts is going virtual
• November election wrap-up
• Referendum on SB 793
• Social media theme kit for November: Thankful for our Volunteers
• Upcoming PTA events and deadlines
• What's new in the Resource Library? Thanksgiving science activities
• Thank you for your commitment to children and families

Para leer en español, clic aquí.

Join us via Zoom on Friday, November 20 from 3-4:00 p.m. to learn more about the award-winning School Smarts Parent Engagement Program’s transformation to a virtual environment.

For the past 10 years School Smarts has inspired more than 10,000 parents to more deeply engage in their child’s school experience.

The seven-session School Smarts program provides training and knowledge to help parents understand how they play an integral role in their student’s educational outcomes. Each session offers opportunities for participants to share their own experiences, ask questions, and consider how they can take a more active role in their child’s education.

School Smarts graduates are able to:

• Explain why parent involvement matters so much

• Identify ways to prepare their child for a successful high school experience to support college and career possibilities

• Summarize ways to learn how their child is doing in school

• Describe how to cultivate relationships with the school board, principal, teachers and staff

• Share how to prepare for a successful parent-teacher conference

• State different ways to practice leadership within a school community

• And, much, much more!

This Zoom meeting offers the opportunity to check out the School Smarts program for yourself, and find out how to bring the program to the families in your school community.

Click here for more information, or click here to register.

Thank you to those of you who voted in the November 3 election, and to those who signed our petitions in support of Propositions 15 and 16. We commend your engagement with the political process, and your commitment to legislation that affects families, children and education.

Unfortunately, Proposition 16 was defeated. We are disappointed that it did not pass, as it would have allowed for greater equity in every aspect of life for the children and youth of California.

Ballots are still being counted for Proposition 15, so we are unsure if it will pass or not. If it passes, it will provide billions in funding to schools and local communities by changing the way commercial property is taxed.

California State PTA will continue to support state ballot measures and legislation that provide critical education funding that the children of California need and deserve, and that address the legacy of unequal treatment of underserved communities.

On August 28th, the California legislature passed SB 793, the bill to outlaw the sale of flavored tobacco, into law. However, on August 31, a request for a referendum on SB 793 was submitted to the Secretary of State.

The group submitting has to collect 623,212 signatures by December 10, 2020. According to the Secretary of State website, “if the required number of registered voters sign this petition and the petition is timely filed, there will be a referendum challenging the 2020 law on the next statewide ballot after the November 3, 2020 general election.” This means the challenge would prohibit the law from being enforced unless the voters vote in favor of the law when the referendum is on the ballot. The next general election will most likely be 2022.

This referendum drive is funded by the tobacco industry. We urge you to NOT sign it, in order to ensure the health of California's children.

We also encourage you to spread the word via our #DeclineToSign social media campaign. Click here to find a template with suggested wording and images for your newsletters, Facebook posts, Instagram posts, and tweets.

PTA's monthly Social Media Theme Kits have been going strong for THREE months now! This toolbox of images and text is easy to copy and use on your unit/council/district's social media accounts. We hope you have been finding them pertinent and easy to use.

For November, we've got yet another new theme: Thankful for our Volunteers!

The heart of PTA is the amazing men, women, children, teachers, community members, grandparents, and friends who power the PTA. Every level of PTA from the unit advocacy chair all the way to the National PTA President is filled by non-paid volunteers who support the mission of the PTA and want a better world for #allchildren. This month we want to focus on you and all the good that volunteers like you do (and have done for over 120 years).

Click here to view the November kit, which consists of a series of sample posts and downloadable images for all the major social media platforms, including Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, plus social media support graphics such as Zoom backgrounds, and a viral social media sheet.

We never want you to miss a training opportunity, important deadline or informative webinar hosted by California State PTA, so we decided to start compiling this information in one place to make it easy to find!

Here's what coming up in the next few weeks.

• November 15: Tax deadline, if your fiscal year ended on June 30th

• November 20: School Smarts Virtual Program Launch

• November 24: Leadership Monthly Webinar

• November 30: Insurance Webinar

For further information about these dates and events (including registration/join links), please click here.

The Resource Library has lots of great new content for fall. Check out these items aimed at helping parents undertake home-based experiments with their families in celebration of all things autumn!

• Science with Marshmallow Playdough: If your child enjoys making slime, switch it up with this tasty alternative that utilizes household materials to demonstrate the science behind marshmallows.

• 18 Thanksgiving Science Activities: These science activities celebrate all things Thanksgiving – turkey, pumpkin, cranberries, corn, acorns, and leaves.

• Engineering Marshmallow Catapults: You can create a cool, hand-held catapult using simple materials you probably have around your home.

If you've never used the Resource Library before, why not give it a try? It's chock full of at-home learning activities, videos and documents that support the Next Generation Science Standards – and a whole lot more!

And the Resource Library is easy to use – the search function can help you quickly find what you need by keyword, category, topic, audience type, grade level, and language. Click here to browse.

Since it's the time of year for giving thanks to those whom we appreciate, we thought it was the perfect time to thank YOU for all you do at PTA to support families and children.

Our leaders created the collage below containing personal messages from each of them to remind you that we appreciate you, especially in what has turned out to be an unusually challenging year. We look forward to another year of working with you in PTA!