Communications Training

Picture Yourself as a PTA Photographer 

Kindergartners round the first turn in the jog-a-thon. Parents advocate at a school board meeting. PTA families attend a family science night. You capture it all on film. With digital technology, all of this is possible with a camera click of your cell phone!
Have you ever noticed that the first thing you look at when you open a newsletter, magazine or a website is a photograph? With all of the information, news, and honors that PTA wants to share, photographs help us bring the story to life. Taking pictures is easy, fun and rewarding – especially when you see them in a school newsletter or on the PTA website. The best part is PTA wants your pictures!
Digital photography—whether we use our favorite camera or our smart phone – gives us freedom from film developing, freedom to edit pictures on-the-go, freedom to take hundreds of pictures at a time, and freedom to share them with everyone via newsletter or social media. Send your pictures, saved as a jpg, via your phone messaging system or from your home computer.
In the digital age, photos are taken eve-rywhere and by everybody. Before you publish those photographs in your news-letter or on your website, double-check with your school office to make sure that parents have signed the release form allowing the school or PTA to use a child’s image. Be cautious not to put in harm’s way children who are in a family protection program; check with the parent before publishing. If your school does not have a release form on file for the child, go to the California State PTA Toolkit, page 362, to find a Photography Release form.
Have fun with photography in your PTA publications. Be cautious and make sure that parents have agreed to have their image or their child’s image published. Using photographs in your publications generates excitement and enthusiasm. The old adage is still true: one picture is worth a thousand words.

By Patty Christiansen
VP for Communications