The 2013 school year is officially up and running and the Fountain Hills Unified School District PTO recently celebrated with a back-to-school social.

Parents, teachers, administrators and town officials gathered in the McDowell Mountain multipurpose room Tuesday night, Aug. 20, a departure from the PTO’s typical morning event.

Designed around giving parents a chance to hear from local administrators, a celebration of the previous year’s efforts and a kickoff for the year ahead, the PTO social was hosted by the organization’s new president, Tara Lamar.

“My passion is for my family, and I’m here to make sure they have the best education possible,” Lamar explained.

The evening began with a brief look at some of the areas the PTO’s contributions (both in volunteer hours and fundraising) benefit.

Lamar explained that, through the various PTO fundraising activities like the membership drive, the fun run and Golf and Gala, the local organization is able to financially support activities like Character Counts, Youth Frontiers, homework lab, technology upgrades and classroom supply funds for each teacher within the district.

“Your PTO money is really working for our schools,” Lamar said.

District

Following the introduction, district representatives, Mayor Linda Kavanagh and Fort McDowell Director of Education Dr. Bill Myhr addressed those in attendance.

Superintendent Tom Lawrence said that he feels the two most powerful shaping instruments for local children are their parents and their schools, and that the PTO helps bridge those two entities.

Because of that relationship, Lawrence explained that FHUSD has continued to excel.

“FHUSD recently made the list of the top 25 school districts in Arizona, putting us in the top 10 percent of Arizona schools,” Lawrence said.

“Obviously, our goal is to become number one, and we’ll keep working toward that. There are challenges ahead that we eagerly accept, but we can’t face those challenges alone. The PTO helps us face those challenges head-on.”

Lawrence was followed by McDowell Mountain Principal Joanne Meehan and Four Peaks/Middle School Principal Anita Gomez.

Meehan stressed the importance of reading with one’s child at least 20 minutes a night while Gomez addressed the new “Reaching Students’ Hearts” program (see related story elsewhere in this issue).

“This program has students getting to know each other, respecting each other and working through their problems as they arise,” Gomez said.

“It’s been the smoothest start to a school year that I’ve experienced in eight years.”

Myhr also shared a few words with the group, explaining that, within Fort McDowell, school readiness begins at birth.

“We have dozens of ongoing programs for school and world preparedness,” Myhr explained.

“And along the way, we monitor our students from birth all the way through college to make sure they are doing okay and find out if there’s any way we can assist.”

Myhr said that this dedication can be no better demonstrated than in the Fort’s recent opening of the H’man ‘shawa facility, geared at educating young students from infancy all the way up through kindergarten.

Town

Kavanagh and former Mayor Jay Schlum spoke briefly on items important to the town and the district alike. Schlum encouraged attendees to get informed about the upcoming town road bond election while Kavanagh spoke to her desire to see more young families move into the area.

“The PTO and our local schools make that job a lot easier,” Kavanagh said.

“One of the top questions any family looking to move into town asks me is ‘how are the schools?’ and I get to tell them we have great schools, that we have an A district and that our schools are excelling.”

Overrides

Finally, PTO board member Dwight Johnson spoke on the upcoming budget override and bond elections and, like Schlum and the road bonds, encouraged attendees to get informed and vote as soon as the mail-in-only ballots arrived in the mail.

“The PTO can only do so much, and that’s why we also turn to our community residents to help out with things like overrides,” Johnson explained.

“The beautiful thing about the override is that there is no increase in taxes, as it’s a continuation of existing taxes.”

Johnson explained that continued funds from the override would help keep class sizes down and provide competitive options for hiring highly qualified educators.

Additional benefits would be the continuation of free full-day kindergarten, professional development for teachers and additional teacher’s aides for the classrooms.

As for the bond item (totaling $8 million for up to 20 years), Johnson explained that the increase in annual taxes for an average Fountain Hills home would be about $32 a year.

“Those monies go to help improve district facilities, add security infrastructure, technology, transportation, lighting, AC renovations and more,” Johnson said.

“The longer the district waits on these types of projects, the more expensive they’re going to get.”