PTO fundraising advice for a newbie

[Anonymous]

Hi all, I'm the fundraising point person for a brand new PTO at a Title I DCPS school with a high English learner population.

I'm not usually the kind of person who takes on voluntary leadership roles - not really a 'joiner' - but there are many parents at our school who don't have the job flexibility or language skills to help with this. I want to support our school's awesome staff and at least raise enough money so our wonderful principal doesn't have to keep buying pizza out of her personal pocket for school events.

I'm stepped up because no one else was up for it. But organization and outreach don't come naturally to me. And I haven't tried to fundraise for anything since our high school choir trips more than two decades ago.

Our PTO is only about a year old and so far, fundraising has been slow. A very small portion of the parent community can contribute significant funds - say $100 or more. But our school is about 50 percent at-risk, so we don't want to consistently put parents on the spot. We are hoping for support from local businesses since we are in a relatively commercial and wealthy part of the city. But that's been like pulling teeth so far.

Any suggestions for getting small donations from parents of about $5 or larger donations - $200 plus? Is that even the right amount to go after? - from local businesses welcome! Thank you for any and all pointers!

[Anonymous]

Questions for you - what specifically are you fundraising for? Pizza at school events? Food and childcare at PTO meetings? Enrichment activities/field trips? That may help tailor the responses.

[Anonymous]

Have you got your IRS and DCRA paperwork in order? That's the first step.

Try finding some grants from big stores such as Target. That counts as fundraising. Many places such as Harris Teeter will give you in-kind donations and that can count too.

[Anonymous]

Reach out to the DC Lawyers committee. Every DCPS school is matched with a law firm. They usually donate and can also help you with legal issues that may come up, such as forming a nonprofit.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Questions for you - what specifically are you fundraising for? Pizza at school events? Food and childcare at PTO meetings? Enrichment activities/field trips? That may help tailor the responses.

Thank you. Great question. At this point, we are just hoping to help support the school in whatever way the principal/assistant principal and teachers ask. This year, for instance, we helped fund the annual picnic and a teacher appreciation lunch, helped a staffer attend a virtual conference for professional development, and gave out smallish Amazon gift certificates - $100 I think - for every teacher to buy classroom supplies.

I've heard that schools with wealthier demographics than ours are able to do big things like provide every teacher with an aide, fund a mindfulness coach...all sort of wonderful things.

Our school has significant needs and we would love to be able to offer that kind of support some day. For instance, teachers tell us the school could use more mental health counselors since many students have experienced trauma.

But for now, something like bringing in new staff is totally pie in the sky. We are thinking small - money to help with events and celebrations, fill in resource gaps for teachers, that sort of thing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Reach out to the DC Lawyers committee. Every DCPS school is matched with a law firm. They usually donate and can also help you with legal issues that may come up, such as forming a nonprofit.

This is helpful. A law firm - probably our partner? - has donated free books for kids and the school library, but not money.

We are very fortunate that there are a couple of lawyers among the parents who secured non-profit status for the PTO for the first time in the school's history. So that's taken care of.

Many large and wealthy law firms are located in our community and we would LOVE for them to give us say, a couple thousand dollars, but it's been very hard to make that case!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Questions for you - what specifically are you fundraising for? Pizza at school events? Food and childcare at PTO meetings? Enrichment activities/field trips? That may help tailor the responses.

Thank you. Great question. At this point, we are just hoping to help support the school in whatever way the principal/assistant principal and teachers ask. This year, for instance, we helped fund the annual picnic and a teacher appreciation lunch, helped a staffer attend a virtual conference for professional development, and gave out smallish Amazon gift certificates - $100 I think - for every teacher to buy classroom supplies.

I've heard that schools with wealthier demographics than ours are able to do big things like provide every teacher with an aide, fund a mindfulness coach...all sort of wonderful things.

Our school has significant needs and we would love to be able to offer that kind of support some day. For instance, teachers tell us the school could use more mental health counselors since many students have experienced trauma.

But for now, something like bringing in new staff is totally pie in the sky. We are thinking small - money to help with events and celebrations, fill in resource gaps for teachers, that sort of thing.

If you're able to do that many $100 gift cards, you're actually doing pretty well. Where is that money coming from?

[Anonymous]

I had a similar position once and eventually it came down to big picture goals:
1) what scope of money are you trying to raise funds for/what do you want to do with the money? What I mean is - if you can't raise enough to do more than buy some supplies for classrooms or food for events, you may want to just skip the middle step and ask people to buy classroom supplies and offer up food for events.
2) are you doing 'fundraising' to raise money or to just create social opportunities at school? If so, you may want to lean into the high participation/social aspect and just organize fun events, with fundraising being a sideline/hopefully a benefit of large-scale participation.
3) in a school with a portion of the parents being upper income, you might want to just simplify the Rube Goldberg fundraising machine and say,
"hey parents who've got the means to donate: we're asking that if it's easy for you, and so that you won't stress thinking about fundraisers, that you all offer a donation of $200 this year. Or $100 if you can manage that better. We're not going to check if you gave, won't pester, and you can still contribute how you see fit, but we're just making this straight up ask so that you can simply give and not have to follow all the details of fundraising for school events if that's too much for you. We know being a parent is a lot of work and appreciate you regardless of whether you give or not."

[Anonymous]

I have better luck with real estate companies than law firms. Maybe work on drafting an appeal letter that is professional and rather than emphasizing neeeeeed, emphasize what is excellent about your school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Questions for you - what specifically are you fundraising for? Pizza at school events? Food and childcare at PTO meetings? Enrichment activities/field trips? That may help tailor the responses.

Thank you. Great question. At this point, we are just hoping to help support the school in whatever way the principal/assistant principal and teachers ask. This year, for instance, we helped fund the annual picnic and a teacher appreciation lunch, helped a staffer attend a virtual conference for professional development, and gave out smallish Amazon gift certificates - $100 I think - for every teacher to buy classroom supplies.

I've heard that schools with wealthier demographics than ours are able to do big things like provide every teacher with an aide, fund a mindfulness coach...all sort of wonderful things.

Our school has significant needs and we would love to be able to offer that kind of support some day. For instance, teachers tell us the school could use more mental health counselors since many students have experienced trauma.

But for now, something like bringing in new staff is totally pie in the sky. We are thinking small - money to help with events and celebrations, fill in resource gaps for teachers, that sort of thing.

If you're able to do that many $100 gift cards, you're actually doing pretty well. Where is that money coming from?

Well, that's good to hear! It's a very small school so it wasn't that many gift cards.

For now, money is mostly coming from parents like me who have some disposal income and are planning to stay at the school long-term. There are maybe 10 or so of us who made significant donations ($100 or more).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I have better luck with real estate companies than law firms. Maybe work on drafting an appeal letter that is professional and rather than emphasizing neeeeeed, emphasize what is excellent about your school.

This is a good idea, thank you! And yes, we aren't getting very far by emphasizing our high poverty level - seems smarter to talk about the great staff.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I had a similar position once and eventually it came down to big picture goals:
1) what scope of money are you trying to raise funds for/what do you want to do with the money? What I mean is - if you can't raise enough to do more than buy some supplies for classrooms or food for events, you may want to just skip the middle step and ask people to buy classroom supplies and offer up food for events.
2) are you doing 'fundraising' to raise money or to just create social opportunities at school? If so, you may want to lean into the high participation/social aspect and just organize fun events, with fundraising being a sideline/hopefully a benefit of large-scale participation.
3) in a school with a portion of the parents being upper income, you might want to just simplify the Rube Goldberg fundraising machine and say,
"hey parents who've got the means to donate: we're asking that if it's easy for you, and so that you won't stress thinking about fundraisers, that you all offer a donation of $200 this year. Or $100 if you can manage that better. We're not going to check if you gave, won't pester, and you can still contribute how you see fit, but we're just making this straight up ask so that you can simply give and not have to follow all the details of fundraising for school events if that's too much for you. We know being a parent is a lot of work and appreciate you regardless of whether you give or not."

Thank you!

It can be hard to tell, honestly, who has the means to donate more than a few dollars and who doesn't. I like your proposed language and I can say that kind of direct thing to my friends...but they're mostly the ones already kicking in the money.

And yes, we are asking for in-kind donations, especially food for events. We've been hitting that hard but it's like 15 asks for every yes so far. Maybe that's just typical and I shouldn't get so discouraged? Any tips for getting more of those or forming relationships with area restaurants?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Questions for you - what specifically are you fundraising for? Pizza at school events? Food and childcare at PTO meetings? Enrichment activities/field trips? That may help tailor the responses.

Thank you. Great question. At this point, we are just hoping to help support the school in whatever way the principal/assistant principal and teachers ask. This year, for instance, we helped fund the annual picnic and a teacher appreciation lunch, helped a staffer attend a virtual conference for professional development, and gave out smallish Amazon gift certificates - $100 I think - for every teacher to buy classroom supplies.

I've heard that schools with wealthier demographics than ours are able to do big things like provide every teacher with an aide, fund a mindfulness coach...all sort of wonderful things.

Our school has significant needs and we would love to be able to offer that kind of support some day. For instance, teachers tell us the school could use more mental health counselors since many students have experienced trauma.

But for now, something like bringing in new staff is totally pie in the sky. We are thinking small - money to help with events and celebrations, fill in resource gaps for teachers, that sort of thing.

If you're able to do that many $100 gift cards, you're actually doing pretty well. Where is that money coming from?

Well, that's good to hear! It's a very small school so it wasn't that many gift cards.

For now, money is mostly coming from parents like me who have some disposal income and are planning to stay at the school long-term. There are maybe 10 or so of us who made significant donations ($100 or more).

Honestly you'll never get a ton of money from parents of young kids. They just have too many other expenses.

Form a tiny grants committee (like two people) and set a goal of applying to one grant each. It gets a lot easier after the first few, because you can recycle a lot of the text. You can ask the teachers for suggestions, sparing them the work of doing the applications themselves. Do not neglect in-kind grants such as Kennedy Center's Get On The Bus. You can estimate a value and include it in your year-end PTO report to the school.

Consider getting insurance for the PTO, it isn't that expensive. Fraud happens all too often!

Congrats on your transition from baby PTO to a growing organization!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Questions for you - what specifically are you fundraising for? Pizza at school events? Food and childcare at PTO meetings? Enrichment activities/field trips? That may help tailor the responses.

Thank you. Great question. At this point, we are just hoping to help support the school in whatever way the principal/assistant principal and teachers ask. This year, for instance, we helped fund the annual picnic and a teacher appreciation lunch, helped a staffer attend a virtual conference for professional development, and gave out smallish Amazon gift certificates - $100 I think - for every teacher to buy classroom supplies.

I've heard that schools with wealthier demographics than ours are able to do big things like provide every teacher with an aide, fund a mindfulness coach...all sort of wonderful things.

Our school has significant needs and we would love to be able to offer that kind of support some day. For instance, teachers tell us the school could use more mental health counselors since many students have experienced trauma.

But for now, something like bringing in new staff is totally pie in the sky. We are thinking small - money to help with events and celebrations, fill in resource gaps for teachers, that sort of thing.

If you're able to do that many $100 gift cards, you're actually doing pretty well. Where is that money coming from?

Well, that's good to hear! It's a very small school so it wasn't that many gift cards.

For now, money is mostly coming from parents like me who have some disposal income and are planning to stay at the school long-term. There are maybe 10 or so of us who made significant donations ($100 or more).

Honestly you'll never get a ton of money from parents of young kids. They just have too many other expenses.

Form a tiny grants committee (like two people) and set a goal of applying to one grant each. It gets a lot easier after the first few, because you can recycle a lot of the text. You can ask the teachers for suggestions, sparing them the work of doing the applications themselves. Do not neglect in-kind grants such as Kennedy Center's Get On The Bus. You can estimate a value and include it in your year-end PTO report to the school.

Consider getting insurance for the PTO, it isn't that expensive. Fraud happens all too often!

Congrats on your transition from baby PTO to a growing organization!

Thank you!

I love this idea! Constructive and doable! Is there a clearinghouse or resource for local (or not local?) grants someone can point me to?

[Anonymous]

For food: seriously, ask families to contribute the kinds of things they'd like to have at events. Say "we know how much the kids love having pupusas or tamales or jollof rice or mac and cheese at events and parents are good at making them. Could you consider making some for our "Summer End of Year/Fall Back to School Party? If you can, let us know what you'd like to make and how much! THANK YOU!"

we did something like that and got a lot of tamales, for example.