Creative ways to raise funds and involve community

 If you are like me, you've tried it all, cookie dough to the coupon books. They can be very successful but it just seems like we've flooded the market with a lot of the same types of fundraisers and a good deal of our profit, is not staying in our pockets. COVID changed the game for fundraising. Not only was it hard to sell much, no one seemed to be as enthusiastic to buy. Now that my colleagues and I are all rushing to rebuild these dwindingly accounts, I'm starting to think outside the box when it comes to fundraising. I have to tell you, it seems to be going well. Here's a few activities we did this past year that proved to be pretty lucrative but more importantly, built school spirit and and included our community.

The Turkey Bowl! 

I let the students choose teams and we ran a flag football tournament on the Saturday before Thanksgiving. We charged each player $15.00 for their t-shirt and and we charged spectators a "donation" for admission. We had 6 teams sign up for our inaugural bowl and parents sat in the rain to watch their kids cut up and play a little flag football on a Saturday Morning. If you do the quick math, 6 teams of 8 students at $15 each, and spectators donating on the way in. In my opinion, it beats a bucket drop and the kids get excercise and you can't beat the entertainment value. Fun fact, the teacher team won (and it wasn't rigged). 

Holiday Yard Signs

We did this because we have a great community partner who makes and prints cool things for us. I like some of their yard signs and I heard about a past job featuring a snowman. Next things you know, we were selling these guys for $15 and sold out in a week. It was fun driving around town and seeing our snowman as part of the Holiday Decor. 

Spring Break Bingo

The best part of this fundraiser is we charged sponsors $100 to advertise on a square and we charged participants $15 for shirt and a 12X12 color bingo card. This was an amazing fundraiser and we were able to get our community involved. It was an honor system type of game but next year we may feature participants on our Instragram if they tag us while out and about working towards their Bingo.