Detailed Information Regarding

Volunteer Hours

West Shore Parents and Guardians are required to volunteer 20 hours per year per family and these volunteer hours are mandatory. These hours are self reported and a ledger to record the hours you have volunteered is available in the Attendance Office during school hours.

How do most families complete these hours?

• PTA membership! Each family can receive a maximum of five (5) hours per year. This includes households that are multigenerational/multiple caregivers. All are welcome in PTA including parents, stepparents, guardians, and extended family; however, the maximum number of volunteer hours per family is five regardless of the number of memberships purchased. Currently (2023-2024) the cost of a family PTA membership is $20.

• PTA Meetings! There are a minimum of three General PTA meetings held each school year. They are often informative and showcase student achievement/coursework, current or upcoming events, voting and membership information, and occasionally feature guest speakers. Meeting dates will be announced in advance. One (1) volunteer hour is earned per member. This means if two parents attend TWO (2) hours are earned for that family.

“My personal favorite is the first General meeting of the year in the fall where Mr. Fleming gives his “State of the School Address” and we are presented with detailed information on our students State and AP test scores, student success/accomplishments the previous school year, and this data is compared to data from previous years and all across the state. It is a wonderful chance to examine data trends – our students and staff at West Shore work hard and it is such a joy to see how that hard work translates into student achievement!” Heather B. (PTA – New Family Liaison)

• Box Tops for Education! “For over 25 years, Box Tops for Education has given families an easy way to earn cash for schools — with products they already buy! Today, you can find hundreds of participating products throughout the store. Scan your receipt with the Box Tops app and you'll earn for your school with every Box Tops product you buy.” (boxtops4education.com) For the 2023-2024 school year, up to HALF your family volunteer obligation can be fulfilled by participating in the Box Tops for Education Program. For every one ($1) dollar that Box Tops for Education donates to West Shore on behalf of your student, your family can earn one (1) hour of volunteer work for a maximum of 10 hours. Donations are earned by downloading the Box Tops 4 Education App on your iPhone or Android Device, registering for an account, shopping for participating products and redeeming Box Tops via the app using your receipt. These dollars/hours are reported by you, the parent, into the volunteer ledger for your student. If you have any questions, please reach out to our PTA Box Top Coordinator, Lael Woods, at lael.woods@gmail.com .
  
  

“Box Tops were a wonderful way to get half my hours in when my son entered Middle School and I hadn’t yet figured out how I could best help. I would keep an eye out for “bonus” offers and shop for things we already use. My husband also uses the app and we both earn toward those hours!”

• Get Involved with your Student’s Club or Sports Team! Many of our activities or sports teams rely heavily on parent support and the time that you invest in your child’s activity is able to count toward your volunteer obligation IF it is done for the “benefit of all” and not exclusively for your student. Areas of specific need vary, but can include transportation, cleaning uniforms, the purchase and delivery of specialized equipment, coaching, or even assistance on competition days or field trips. Reach out to your child’s coach or activity sponsor with questions about their specific needs.

Here are some examples:

Transportation:

You pick your child and his best friend up from school Friday for a sleepover. The next morning you drive them both to their Lacrosse game, watch the game (Go Wildcats!), and take your student and his friend home. This would not count toward volunteer hours.

You pick up your child and his best friend from school on Friday for a sleepover. On Saturday you drive with them to the school to meet with the Lacrosse team and pick up a few more teammates to transport to the game at the coach’s request. The time you spend driving to West Shore and transporting the students to and from the game would count toward your volunteer hours because the coach specifically requested your assistance.

Cleaning Uniforms:

You wash your child’s uniform after band practice in order to turn it in at the end of the year. This would not count toward volunteer hours.

At the request of the Music Director, you bring home the band uniforms to wash and fold them after a season of use. The time you spend picking up, washing, drying, folding and driving the uniforms back to school would count toward your volunteer hours.

• General Assistance! Our students at West Shore stay BUSY! There are often requests for adult volunteers for assistance selling tickets for student fundraisers or to support activities. These opportunities are sent out to the email account that you have linked to your parental Focus account via SignUpGenius and often come with specific start and end times. Please only sign up for one opportunity per event to allow other families the chance to participate. The time you spend at West Shore participating in the event you signed up for would count toward your volunteer hours.

 

“Parent Volunteer opportunities last year included assistance with specific needs on Registration (MANY opportunities), pre-selling t-shirts, yearbooks, powderpuff tickets, special spirit day fundraiser tickets, “days of service” including painting the senior parking spots and other school beautification projects. Project Graduation and the Senior Boards event need support from our parents at all grade levels to be successful and offer lots of opportunities to get involved to get those hours in!”

• Donating Items Requested by West Shore! There are times throughout the year that teachers, staff or PTA request items to support specific events. While there is no way to “claim” hours for the cost of the items you purchase, you are able to translate the time it took you to shop and deliver the items to West Shore toward your volunteer hours.

Here are some examples:

The West Shore Middle School Dance is coming and an email went out to all parents with a signup list for nut-free snacks. I sign up, drive over to Sam’s Club and buy a Frito-Lay variety pack, and deliver it to the school. This would count toward volunteer hours. I drop by the Attendance Office and record the hour it took me to buy and deliver the snack into my student’s Volunteer Log.

Senior Boards are a day where West Shore invites prominent members of the community for presentations on our Senior student’s research/thesis projects. It is the culmination of a year of hard work by our scholars, and requires a lot of preparation by our West Shore PTA and volunteers to act as hosts for the event. A SignUpGenius is emailed, and I sign up to deliver fresh coffee carafes from Dunkin Donuts for the event. While I cannot directly claim the cost of my donation, my time coordinating the order prior to the event, driving to the store, waiting for my order to be filled and delivering/setting up my coffee donation would all count toward my volunteer obligation. I drop by the office afterward and record the 2.5 hours it took to coordinate/deliver/set up my donation in the log book.

• Volunteering at our Harbor City Elementary, our Sister School! Your hours do not need to be filled exclusively at West Shore, we have adopted a nearby elementary school, Harbor City, and there are volunteer opportunities available at that location throughout the school year. These opportunities are coordinated by Ms. Halbuer and are generally sent via email (SignUpGenius). The hours you earn at Harbor City count toward your volunteer obligation at West Shore and should be recorded in your student’s log.

How do I record my hours?

A set of binders is kept in Ms. Kim Morin’s (Attendance) office. Each student has a “log” or “ledger” page and the students are listed in alphabetical order. To enter your hours just flip to your student’s log page and record the date of the volunteer work, a brief summary, and how long it took. It also has a column to keep track of how many hours you have “to go”. These binders are also usually available during PTA or evening meetings so that you can record your attendance at these events. If you have earned your hours by volunteering for a sport or activity, the teacher sponsor/coach will NOT enter your hours into the binder, you are responsible for tracking and entering your own hours.

Of Special Note:

•  Remember, each family is obligated to fulfill 20 hours of volunteer work per school year.

• Sign ups are sent via email from SignUpGenius to the email account you have linked to your Parent Focus account. A listing of all volunteer opportunities (past and present) is posted on the West Shore home page and can be found at https://tinyurl.com/west-shore-volunteer-sign-up

• Please sign up for only one opportunity per week in order to allow other families to participate.

• When you sign up, show up!

Things happen, people get sick, other obligations can arise, but when you sign up for a volunteer spot, please attend. If you are unable to fulfill your obligation due to a last-minute emergency, please remove your name from the Sign Up Genius. This could allow someone else who was looking for an opportunity to fill your spot! We have had a lot of adults not cancel and not show up and it reflects poorly on our community and is a bad example to our students.

• Once your Volunteer Hours (20) are complete, stop signing up for new volunteer opportunities.

Your enthusiasm is so appreciated, but taking a step back will allow other families the opportunity to fulfill their volunteer obligations.

• Questions? Please contact Kim Morin at Morin.Kimberly@brevardschools.org