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Advocacy
PTA advocacy is supporting and speaking up for children—in schools, in communities, and before government bodies and other organizations that make decisions affecting children.
Alexandria PTA Council (PTAC) is committed to supporting advocacy efforts on behalf of Alexandria students and staff.
Help Take Action Now
On February 22, 2024 the ACPS school board passed an ambitious budget to fund the 2024-2025 school year that included additional FTEs. Shortly after, PTAC launched Fully Fund ACPS 2024, a campaign to bring families, educators, and community members together to support student success and a thriving city through advocacy at the city level.
City council got to hear the concerns our PTA units had voiced to us over the first several months of the 2023-2024 school year about teacher retention and more directly from the students, teachers, and families these challenges impacted the last few years. Several members of PTAC’s board also spoke publicly about the need for fully funding our public schools, which requires MORE than what the city manager’s budget included when it was presented (Read PTAC Board Members Fully Fund ACPS testimony to City Council).
The city passes its budget, which includes funding for ACPS (almost 80% of our school funding comes from the city budget), on May 1.
Important dates are approaching:
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April 13 - City Council Public Hearing
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April 24 - City Council Work Session
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May 1 - City Council Final Vote on Budget
How you can help now:
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Continue to submit statements or testify at the city council public hearing about the budget (You can also email them. Here are instructions with letter writing samples in five languages as well as some helpful talking points). While some suggestions may not be “eligible” for adding to the budget this year, it’s important to make the council aware of the real life experiences of students and teachers to inform their final vote on the FY 2025 budget AND pave a path to further city support for our schools for FY 2026.
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Continue to attend or watch city council budget meetings and report back to your PTA, friends, and neighbors about what happened. See the calendar.
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Write a letter to the editor of one of our local newspapers, such as The Alexandria Times or The Alexandria Gazette Packet, to voice your support for additional funding and other resources for our students and teachers.
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Attend City Council candidate campaign events and ask candidates about how their support for ACPS translates into budget numbers. Also, consider attending PTAC’s upcoming candidate meet and greet on May 7th at the ACHS cafeteria at 7pm to chat with candidates about public education.
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More school funding advocacy support is needed at all levels - school, city, state, and federal. Join your neighborhood ACPS school’s PTA and lend your support and hand with their advocacy efforts related to the budgets for 2024-2025 and 2025-2026.
Please consider following us and your school PTA on social media. Like and share posts about the budget with your friends and family. Or, write your own social media post about the budget and include our hashtag!
If you are interested in supporting our advocacy efforts or have a new city-wide issue you’d like to discuss, please contact:
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In general, PTAC encourages our PTA units to drive their own school advocacy efforts, but PTAC also writes advocacy letters to support our PTA units. Read some of our advocacy letters here:
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4/13/23: PTAC to City Council regarding the City Manager’s proposed budget for FY 2024
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8/17/21: Letter to ACPS School Board: Urging COVID-19 surveillance testing in schools
Other examples of advocacy we encourage our units to consider include:
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Discussing a topic of importance to your school community with ACPS & Alexandria City School Board
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Hosting an educational event at your school on an issue
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Providing comments to a school board meeting
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Working to implement strong family engagement policies
Resources:
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Have a question, concern, or comment you want to share with ACPS leadership? Community members can ask questions about division-wide issues to ACPS leaders at ask@acps.k12.va.us.
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To submit a letter to the Alexandria City School Board, use this link.
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To provide public comments to the Alexandria City School Board, use this link to register.