Parent councils have failed.  I sat on one, and the parents were more concerned about getting on with the principal (who had a different agenda) than getting anything done.  It made me realize that this is why boards of ed are ineffectual as well—just human nature. 
My experience while living in Asia, where parents had school choice, is that parents will silently vote with their feet if they’re unhappy with a school, so the schools in turn were fiercely competitive, and knew to provide a strongly academic, happy environment.  It was great for the children—they thrived.

The first indication of the failure of councils is in your description of them as “Parent Councils”.  That’s the term most often used to start the dumb-down process by teachers, principals, school boards and some parent groups. 

The term “School Councils” should have been the correct label, because had they been rolled out effectively and without the spin of the usual suspects, truly elected and properly structured councils encompassed the great and equal sharing between parents, teachers, school staff, community and students(in some cases).

The balk by the teacher unions and their resulting by-laws pretty much guaranteed that if teachers came to the table they did so under the union umbrella on what they would, wouldn’t, could or couldn’t say or do was a crapshoot.

The best advice I have for parents is that before they decide on where to send their kids to school that they educate themselves on every choice available to them and if they can make the choice that best suits their child in a school that respects the parent through various means to keep them informed and updated through two-way communications channels.

If the public system is the choice, then go in with your eyes wide open and educate yourself to what’s in store for you.  Find out early if the school values you more for your money or your child, or neither….then make changes earlier rather than later.

Talk to someone who will tell you honestly that when it comes to parents, “the blob” will use you, government will use you and yes, even education organizations will use you to their own end. If you’re ok with that by all means get involved on a school council. If not, be your child’s best advocate and to hell with the rest.

I should add more to my first blog entry: 
we did get things done at the highschool which benefitted our children and our parent president—when told of some of the negative things which went on—would not tolerate it, so test papers were released to students and parents (prior there was no feedback);
grade 9 became unsemestered;
teachers were told not to spend classroom time ranting on about the then Premier Mike Harris; and, a political petition that teachers were trying to get the kids to sign was removed from the school. 
I used to get calls from parents in our neighbourhood, and bring problems up at the meetings.  Some times it was pretty scary standing up to the principal, but if he wouldn’t co-operate, I or someone else would call the superintendents.  Eventually the parents on council began siding with the principal:  they were happier just getting along with everyone, so that’s why I said in the first post, that I saw what people are typically like—very few like rocking the boat. 
hmmm.  Lotsa memories and I wouldn’t be surprised if grade 9 is back to being semestered, and test papers are not released…
Do we ever need a competitive system!  As I said in my first blog, if there is a choice available, parents will vote with their feet.