Offering teacher incentives can definitely be a mixed bag. Some teachers will help push the sale regardless, while others won’t do anything no matter what you’re offering. You may be better off asking for a few minutes of their time at the beginning of an already scheduled faculty meeting just before your sale is scheduled to start. Offer to bring in coffee and donuts in exchange for the opportunity to inform them on how the school will benefit from the fundraiser. It’s also just as important that they know where they can be a benefit if they decide to become involved. Introducing your campaign in a polite and sincere way can go a long way towards getting them on board. Keep their involvement simple by asking them to periodically remind their students to sell. Believe it or not, sometimes it’s what sponsors forget to mention that often hinders teacher willingness to become an advocate.
One of our biggest teacher (and student incentives) is to have a lesson taught by the principal. Teachers enjoy the time off and students get a kick out of time with the principal. This is a mixed bag though. Many teachers love it. Some teachers have said they take as much time to prep a lesson for someone else to teach as they do just doing it themselves.
As for silent auctions, we have some teachers who donate others who don't. We try to hype up how much was earned and how excited the students were about that as a prize. Some teachers hesitate to donate because they don't realize how much the kids enjoy it. It was also huge for us to get the custodians and other support staff to be included. One of our top earners was lunch with a custodian.
We don't offer the teachers incentives, but we often have pizza or ice cream parties for the top selling classes in each grade. As for auctions, that is hit and miss. We have 30+ teachers and 6 of them donated their time (and money) towards teacher outings for our auction this year. That is more than we had last year.
What do you offer to your teachers in order to give them an incentive to push their students to sell, sell for the fundraiser?
Also, do your teachers donate their "time" for fundraisers? For example - like a silent auction where the highest bidder gets to have lunch with Mrs. Brown or whatever? How do you motivate your teachers to donate their time?
