Anonymous wrote:This is a good idea but it sadly doesn't work because women are stupid and all the negative stereotypes of the female gender come out in this situation.

1. The room parents turn into crazy queen bees ruled by rage at how some parents do not give. They gossip.
2. Some parents go crazy with rage that the queen bee room parents take the credit for the gift that they gave to the teacher.
3. Some parents who want to give the teacher a bigger gift are aggravated that they know they are only subsidizing parents who give nothing letting them hide.
4. Some parents who don't celebrate Christmas are offended that there is collection near Christmas.
5. Some parents ignore the whole thing and just send in a card to the teacher on their own anyway.

Its great for the teacher because then they theoretically they get one large generic gift card rather than a stack of smaller gift cards often to random places.

This is what annoys me.

This is a good idea but it sadly doesn't work because women are stupid and all the negative stereotypes of the female gender come out in this situation.

1. The room parents turn into crazy queen bees ruled by rage at how some parents do not give. They gossip.
2. Some parents go crazy with rage that the queen bee room parents take the credit for the gift that they gave to the teacher.
3. Some parents who want to give the teacher a bigger gift are aggravated that they know they are only subsidizing parents who give nothing letting them hide.
4. Some parents who don't celebrate Christmas are offended that there is collection near Christmas.
5. Some parents ignore the whole thing and just send in a card to the teacher on their own anyway.

Its great for the teacher because then they theoretically they get one large generic gift card rather than a stack of smaller gift cards often to random places.

I was the room parent for DCPS K class. 17 of 20 families participated (I included those who said they'd pay me later in this total even though I haven't been paid yet). I signed the card from the whole class.

I've collected 2x for daycare/preschool. Both times, 100% participation although not everyone gives recommended amount. At my old daycare (small center) gifts were collected center-wide and split among all teachers and they also had 100%.

Anonymous wrote:OP here. I signed for the whole class. There are always going to be parents who can't afford it, and some parents gave cash anonymously towards it.

This is what we do, and so far this year, for class donations or gifts, I get about a 1/3 participation, too. I expected higher. Small private school.

OP here. I signed for the whole class. There are always going to be parents who can't afford it, and some parents gave cash anonymously towards it.

I have no idea how many parents participated - maybe half? Contributions were a mix of cash, checks, and paypal and I didn't track the numbers to that level. The gift was explicitly from the entire class, which was communicated to all parents from the beginning of the process. No suggested amount - any and all contributions were welcome.

Anonymous wrote:I didn't this year but did the last two years. Participation hovered at around 50-60%. None of my business whether the non-participating parents did something separately for teachers.

And yes, it was a class gift. It would be nice if the participation level was higher but that's not up to the teachers to know and I'm not going to guilt families into giving money. I don't know why they chose not to, and it's none of my business. Maybe if just two or three people contributed then we'd make it a gift specifically from those three families, but I don't feel like playing games. It's a class gift, regardless of how much is collected.

Seriously? Never coordinated the class gift. There are people who don't participate. Obviously, I'm naive.

I asked for 3 dollars from each parent. 14 kids..I was aiming for a 40-50 dollar gift card from the class. Four people participated but one gave 10, two gave 20, and one 30. I added 20 so we ended up with a 100 dollar card. I think people just ultimately forget. I got ALOT of emails every week saying "Im gonna send in money on monday" and it just didnt come.

In our class, 15 out of 21 families participated.

I didn't this year but did the last two years. Participation hovered at around 50-60%. None of my business whether the non-participating parents did something separately for teachers.

and the question that will really get DCUM going - Did you put indicate the gift was from the entire class or just the parents that participated? Did it depend on what percentage did/did not participate?

I'm not a room parent, but the amount collected for our class was more than the number of kids x the suggested donation, so I'm assuming our participation rate was pretty high.

How many families participated in the class gift?

For my kid's class, it was just over 1/3.