Friday 19 May is P&C Day WA. This day, created by WACSSO, is an official date in the Department of Education calendar and is designed to celebrate P&Cs across the State.

Many community members will know of the vital work done by P&Cs. Typically, P&Cs provide schools with support, including fundraising, community events, classroom resources, running canteens and uniform shops, and most importantly improving parent engagement with children’s education and building the school community. P&Cs also have special interest sub-committees that focus on, for example, a sport, the music program, fundraising, the school grounds, or school community engagement areas such as dad’s groups.

“P&Cs contribute an incredible amount to their school communities,” says WACSSO President, Pania Turner. “Over the 2020-2022 period, on average P&Cs donated an estimated total of just under $12 million each year to school communities, based on extrapolated survey results. Averaged out across affiliated P&Cs, this amounts to approximately $18,400 donated to their school by P&Cs in WA each year. But the role of a P&C is so much more than a fundraising body. P&Cs also contribute an incredible number of volunteer hours each year, with projects such as fairs, stalls, uniform shops, canteens, breakfast clubs, colour runs, discos and grounds busy bees just some examples of the work P&C volunteers undertake. In the same 2020-2022 period, despite the distraction and complications of COVID, P&Cs contributed a collective total of 498,059 hours to their schools, averaged across the three years. The individual average hours volunteered per P&C is approximately 766 hours a year, or nearly 20 hours a week each Term,” added Pania.

P&C Day WA sits purposely within National Volunteer Week, which has the theme of ‘The Change Makers.’ On P&C Day WA, WACSSO encourages all schools to host thank you events and activities aimed at their P&C volunteers. Rather than arrange their own morning teas, it is the one day that our hard-working P&Cs and their teams can put their feet up and have the event run for them!

Follow #pandcdaywa to see all the celebrations as they unfold on Friday.