Several parents and a School Committee member are concerned about the group's finances.

School Committee member-elect Michael Ruggiero says he is concerned that the McGlynn Elementary School Parent-Teacher Group has engaged in questionable financial activity, based on 990-EZ forms dating from 2004 to 2015 as well as issues raised by parents of students at the elementary school.

Ruggiero obtained the publicly available 990-EZ forms for the PTG, a 501(c)(3) organization, and says he is particularly concerned about the large expenditures from fundraising activities over the years, which peaked at $66,783 in fundraising expenses in 2009. In 2009, 2011 and 2012, the group incurred a net loss from fundraising events, losing $17,525 in 2009, $2,216 in 2011 and $2,513 in 2012.

He is also wary of a $6,092 penalty that the organization paid to the IRS in 2013.

“I’m just worried [about] where this money is going,” Ruggiero said. “The fact that it’s not transparent for the parents is a little concerning to me.”

Until 2014, the PTG apparently did not break down how much it directly spent on student activities such as field trips, school supplies or other events. And in 2015, there were significant unexplained items of both income and expense listed in the 990-EZ forms.

The treasurer of the PTG did not provide the Transcript with specific information regarding the group’s finances, saying she did not know why money was lost some years during fundraising events.

Several parents of students at the McGlynn Elementary have expressed similar concerns regarding how money is being spent and how much is being raised by the PTG, as well as a general lack of transparency when it comes to the group’s decisions and actions.

“There are about a dozen parents who have talked to me about the McGlynn PTG,” Ruggiero said. “Maybe it wouldn’t be as much of an issue if parents got the bylaws or received the budget or got a chance to look at the books [after] the many times they’ve asked for them.”

McGlynn Elementary School principal Diane Guarino told the Transcript that the financial ledgers for the group are confidential and that she does not monitor how much the group raises or spends.

“I don’t see the books. I just know what comes in and comes out. I don’t do any of the paperwork,” Guarino said. “The superintendent knows everything about finances.”

But Superintendent of Schools Roy Belson said that because the PTG is a 501(c)(3), their finances operate outside of the jurisdiction of the central administration and the principal is responsible for approving spending decisions.

After the Transcript sent Belson the 990-EZ forms, he asked Guarino some questions about the group.

“I asked [Guarino], ‘Do they show you their balance when they raise funds?’ and she said, ‘No,’” Belson said. “I said, ‘Do you ever ask them for what they’ve got in their account?’ She said, ‘No.’”

Belson suggested that Guarino meet with the PTG president and keep track of what is being spent and what is in the PTG account going forward.

He also concluded that a meeting between the McGlynn Elementary School PTG and the central administration, as well as meeting with other PTGs and PTOs across the district, is warranted.

“They do have impacts on the schools, with regards to how they spend money and where they spend their money,” Belson said. “Our intention is not to be totally restrictive or to micromanage them, but to help them understand their obligations to proper reporting [of spending].”

Parents speak out

Four parents of students at the McGlynn spoke to the Transcript about the PTG executive board members’ unwillingness to disclose detailed financial information or to share the group’s official bylaws.

These parents – three of whom have children in kindergarten and one of whom has one child in second grade and one in kindergarten – said that the executive board members would only give an estimation of how much money had been raised from the membership drive at the start of the school year, an estimate they believe was inaccurate.

“I know how much I donated and I know how much a couple other people donated, but between the three of us, we donated more than [the president] told us came from the whole drive,” said Bailey Schendell, whose daughter is in kindergarten at the McGlynn.

The president of the PTG did not respond to the Transcript’s requests for comments.

One parent, who has been attending PTG meetings since fall 2016 and spoke to the Transcript on the condition of anonymity, said she has never been shown a detailed breakdown of the budget.

She also said that since having joined the PTG, there has never been a public announcement about when elections for board members are held, nor about when the group votes on how to raise and spend funds.

“I went to at least two meetings last year ... I was the only [non-board member] parent present for those meetings,” she said.

When she asked the board members in 2015 why participation of parents was so low, they reportedly told her it was because parents were too busy to attend meetings.

Guarino similarly told the Transcript that the group has always had low membership, attributing it to the demographics of the school – 56.8 percent of students at the school are considered high needs (students whose families are economically disadvantaged, students who are English Language Learners or students with disabilities).

“We don’t have a lot of volunteers or parental input because they don’t come. Everybody works and that’s the problem,” Guarino said. “That’s frustrating for us. This is our population and this is what we are dealing with.”

However, the four concerned parents said they have been trying to take on active roles in the group and have been turned down by the executive board.

Additionally, the PTG has not been meeting consistently since the start of the school year, instead announcing meetings with little notice beforehand, making it harder for parents and teachers to attend.

“We have been told, ‘Everything has been planned out.’ We have been told, ‘You don’t get a voice. You have to be on the board,’” said Amanda Sulham, the parent of a kindergarten student.

The four parents also have requested several times over the last few months to see the PTG’s voting records and bylaws. They were told in person and in writing that the bylaws were available on the PTG website, even though they are not.

“The principal said the last election was in September, but we were told by the PTG board that it was May,” Sulham said. “We’ve gotten conflicting views on whether elections were yearly or every two years.”

According to the bylaws that Guarino sent to the Transcript on Dec. 18, PTG members can include any parents or guardians of students at the McGlynn as well as any teachers at the school who want to be involved.

The bylaws further state that all members may vote during elections, which occur once every two years in May, and must approve expenses and purchases “in advance in the annual budget or by a vote of the membership at a meeting.” Additionally, a financial report must be presented at all executive board and membership meetings.

Upon seeing the bylaws, Schendell wrote to Guarino, the treasurer and the president of the PTG to express concerns about conflicting information she and other parents have received.

“We specifically asked about our rights in voting on ideas proposed to the McGlynn PTG. We were told that ONLY board members have the right to vote on plans of action,” Schendell said in the email. “This is just one example of a very clear conflict between the information we were told by your group and the bylaws of the McGlynn PTG.”

A call for transparency

According to the PTG treasurer, while there have been some tensions between the current executive board and new parents this year, no parents have asked about specific financial information.

When asked about the 2013 IRS penalty, the treasurer said it was due to an error that the previous treasurer had made years prior, though she would not disclose what exactly caused the fine. She also said that she did not know off the top of her head how much money had been raised from the membership drive at the beginning of the year.

Ruggiero and Sulham said the fine has garnered a lot of suspicion from him and other parents.

“They took away money or lost that money right out of the parents’ pockets, and at our school that is a very large sum of money,” Sulham said.

Ruggiero added that he has looked into the operations of other Medford PTOs and PTGs, finding that most are much more transparent in their financial handlings.

According to Alexis Rodriguez, secretary of the Roberts Elementary School Parent Teacher Organization – also a 501(c)(3) – financial information from their PTO is regularly presented to parents in explicit terms.

“Any money we get is logged in our bank account, and we present our financial reports to everyone present at meetings to let everyone know how much came in, how much came out [and] how much money we spent on everything,” Rodriguez said.

Moving forward, the four parents would like to work with the McGlynn PTG to provide students at the McGlynn with the best programs and extracurricular activities possible. At the latest PTG meeting on Dec. 14, the board members and Guarino agreed to allow the newer parents to actively participate in more PTG activities.

Schendell emphasized her intentions to work with the PTG executive board, but added that access to the bylaws and financial information is warranted.

Another parent, who also spoke on the condition of anonymity, said she is hopeful that the situation will continue to improve.

“I really would love to see a budget and more transparency [showing] where the money is going,” she said.