When raising money for our playground we put up jars at a half dozen local businesses with a label that said "Pennies for the Playground". The jars were filled every week with people's spare change.
As in most communities, our playground is open for public use as well as school use. So, we gathered enough signatures to have our playground project added the town ballot and the town voted to give $15,000 towards our project.
On our fitness trail we sought sponsors for the equipment. We advertised in local papers, sent letters to companies and individuals asking folks to sponsor a station. If they did, their name or company name was engraved on a brass plaque and affixed to the station for permanent recognition (and advertisement).
Hi Check out the Lowes toolbox for education grant, they also have another grant for improvements, our school last year earned $5000. that we used for play equipment and another $3000 for painting improvements.
maybe out of the box is a good idea, kids are always getting hurt some how. Maybe you could paint hopscotch boards in the school yard, also invest in alot of board games the kids could sign them out at lunch and bring them back after, also rubber kick balls, shuffle board (hockey) arts and crafts
Our most profitable fund raiser is Knowledge A Thon. Each grade level came up with curriculum questions that would be covered in the first semester (100 questions). We have a kick off in January when the questions are distributed and pledge sheets are handed out. The kids get pledges based on the number of questions they get correct or a flat donation.
We try to keep it positive and really based on concepts that are strongly reinforced. They have about 5 weeks to "study". The first year we raised over $25K but had many $1 per question pledges. People have since "learned" and our take is down to $15K. But a very decent return.
The only expenses are for lunch for volunteers (we have about 100 on KAT day, the local high school honors societies help which is great) and copies. Local business gave us coupons to give to kids as prizes, pizza cookies movie rentals and the like. And each child got a coupon for ice cream to redeem at lunch (we actually gave out ice cream to everyone regardless of coupon).
Our school K-5 has about 950 students and participation rate is about 80% although we administer the test to all students. It is a great learning experience and our most liked fundraiser.
slapko,
how did you manage to raise so much with a golf outing? I would love to know because we are putting on our first next month and because it is the end of the "school year" most businesses have told me that they are tapped out and cannot donate. I also have to keep the price down to encourage parental support and to fill the tee times that I have open. Any help would be appreciated!
We asked our MUD district for the money and they paid for the playground which ran about $55,000. They are a utility district, another place is local developers. We also hosted a golf tournament and raised $23K, but that was before the school opened and everyone was really motivated.
