A few years ago, due to low participation rates across the board, the P&F at my current school voted to disband, and instead, we just seek volunteers for specific projects and community events. As small school, we can easily manage ‘A Friends of’ model. We currently don’t require P&F support for fundraising. If we did decide to run a fundraising activity, we would again run it as an individual project. It means less paperwork and administration for the volunteers than managing an Incorporated Association, and volunteers are sourced on an ‘as needed’ basis – so no long-term commitments required.
At a previous school, moving to a ‘Friends of’ model would not have worked, as the P&F was a very supportive group, with a strong history and a fairly healthy committee. The approach at the time was to hold only one ‘open’ event per term, with a guest speaker, with a modified agenda and reporting (excl. AGM, which followed the full procedures). Some guest speakers were more attractive than others, and included a wide variety if topics – parenting, tech, health and more, and the P&F also provided drinks (including beer and wine) and snacks. The more frequent committee meetings were attended only by committee members, and because of they way they were managed, they generally kept to topic and agenda, meaning they didn’t last for hours.