PTA Leaders

Electronic Membership System

LEARN MORE ABOUT TOTEM

California State PTA’s online membership system makes joining and renewing PTA membership at the local level easier for parents, families and community members. With more than 90 percent of our local PTA leaders asking for a simplified electronic membership system,  we heard you loud and clear!

California State PTA has partnered with TOTEM for our custom electronic membership system designed specifically for PTAs in California.

The electronic membership system is an additional way to collect memberships and all PTAs continue to collect and remit membership as you always have. Every District and all but a few Councils are active and ready for your unit to accept electronic memberships. Units, councils and districts are not required to use the new system, but we encourage you to check it out.

“I am amazed at how fast and easy it is to set up!”  — Fourteenth District PTA President

CONGRATS!

Congratulations to our more than 2,000 PTAs that have signed up to use the TOTEM system, where we have successfully processed over 300,000 memberships! Check out https://jointotem.com/ca/pta and drill down or search for units that are accepting electronic membership, and consider this your invitation to join.

GETTING STARTED

Want your unit to grow membership in the TOTEM Electronic Membership System? Watch this orientation video to learn more.

We encourage all councils and units to set up their association in the TOTEM system now. If you are a leader but have not received an invitation to join your association, you can request access using this form: https://bit.ly/totemsignup.

Steps for Unit Setup:

  1. Invite your leaders—you can request your invitation using this link – https://bit.ly/totemsignup
  2. Confirm your PTA/PTSA information specifically your Dues amount (pre filled information is from California State PTA records, but should be confirmed by local leaders)
  3. Connect your bank account – http://bit.ly/eMembershipBanking
  4. Authenticate the bank account (If the treasurer signed your PTA up then the President authenticates, if the President signed up then the Treasurer authenticates — or other two officers)
  5. Personalize your site – http://bit.ly/eMembershipBranding

Once these steps are completed, the PTA is activated and receives an email and so does the council (if in council), the district and the e-membership team at California State PTA

Steps for Council Setup:

  1. Invite your leaders — you can request your invitation using this link – https://bit.ly/totemsignup – or accept the invitation that has been sent to you
  2. Confirm your PTA/PTSA information specifically your Dues amount (pre filled information is from California State PTA records, but should be confirmed by local leaders)
  3. Connect your bank account – http://bit.ly/eMembershipBanking
  4. Authenticate your bank account (If the treasurer signed your PTA up then the President authenticates, if the President signed up then the Treasurer authenticates — or other two officers)
  5. Invite local PTA leaders to participate
    • You can hold a local meeting District or Council
    • You can also request assistance from the Electronic Membership Task Force – we’re happy to come out to your district to get you set up.

“The banking was quick and easy to set up…even for someone who is not computer savvy!” — Thirty-Fourth District PTA President

Resources:

NEXT STEPS

Once you have a membership link, share it far and wide. Make sure you ASK people to join. Sharing and email works best with a specific call to action. Here are things you can do to supercharge your membership:

  • Use electronic membership to join your PTA — and share with the built-in social sharing links in your membership dashboard
  • Send the link to your board and get them all to set the example — and then have them share and tell their friends to join. This is a great opportunity for your board to understand the electronic membership system and to help spread the word around your community
  • Send your membership link to your whole school community including all your past PTA members.  Ask your principal, ASB advisor or other school official to include the link in the next all school notice or newsletter
  • Include the link in your newsletter and let everyone know how fast and easy it is to join
  • Ask your principal/assistant principal to include the link in messages to parents with a personal ask to join their school PTA
  • Post the link on your website with a colorful button. Bright colors like yellow and orange are great to attract attention
  • Post the link on your social media telling people you joined and how easy it was — and ask them to join and spread the word. Use #JoinPTA and #PTA4Kids in all your social sharing.

SECURITY

If you have received an email, you can trust all email received from the jointotem.com domain. This is a legitimate and trustworthy email. All TOTEM websites are encrypted with HTTPS security which you should verify in your browser address bar.

If you receive an email from Stripe seeking additional information, please realize this is an additional security protection for our PTAs at every level. Please verify that the browser address is correct and then follow up with the request. These verifications are there for your security.

Stripe may ask leaders who connect a bank account for personal information, such as your date of birth or government IDs, such as your social security number. This is part of secondary user-identification verification that is required by federal banking regulations known as KYC (Know Your Customer). Stripe uses this information to stay in compliance with anti-fraud and anti-money laundering regulations.

When providing such information, you should double-check that your browser address begins with HTTPS (note the S at the end) and shows the proper name of the website are visiting (ie. jointotem.com or stripe.com).