We have a social each year with ice cream, hot fudge, strawberry topping, whipped cream and sprinkles. We get the ice cream and hot fudge donated from a local ice cream place, and get just vanilla (so much easier with just one choice!). All items are peanut/ treenut free except the sprinkles.

We don't, but you could offer a sorbet for anyone with a dairy allergy - on occasion we do an ice cream bar for Teacher Appreciation Week, and we do have a sorbet offering that works well for us there.

We do have ingredient lists for everything handy so that in case anyone questions, it's all right there. If they contact us beforehand, then they come prepared, knowing what can/ can't be eaten. (as a parent of a child with an allergy, I used to contact the PTO prior to the event, so I'd know what to expect before I got there - nothing worse than showing up and finding out you can't eat). Hope that helps!

I am interested in doing this but I'm wondering, how do you accommodate food allergies. Should there be ingredients list or other items offered? I myself have four children with no food allergies but know this is a big topic right now. I was just wondering if anyone has had to deal with this issue.

Look for a licensed ice cream delivery truck locally! Pre-packaged selections of everyone favorites! Most trucks don't charge for a delivery-so you just pay for the ice cream. MOONIE Icy Tunes-Ice Cream Delivery VOTED BEST of 2011-Seattle Magazine

We actually do our Ice Cream Social (ICS) at the end of the year during our Open House (Beginning of the year we call them Back to School Nights)...Anywho, our ICS is more of an appreciation event where we give back to the parents and kids and teachers for all their support all year long. This is a free event.

We purchase ice cream, bowls, spoons, toppings, and whip cream. We set up our ICS assembly line style in our cafeteria about 1/2 hour prior to the classrooms being open and go until we run out or the event is over whatever comes first.

We utilize upper grade students who earn service credits to scoop and topp etc and also we will have them be runners to serve teachers their sundaes ahead of time in their classrooms.

We have a local supermarket either donate or sell to us at cost all of our goods needed to put this on; we do have a budget line item for appreciation and funds can come out from that as well.

It is a hit every year!! we too have over 700 students. We serve over that each year.
Carla

After reading about how some schools offer this at their Open House, I wanted to do this for our school. We have about 750 students. Our Open House is actually about a week and a half after school starts and about 90% of the parents came last year with their kids. This will be the second year at the new school so I am not sure if the numbers will be the same. My challenge is that I will not have any support staff to help distribute or watch kids. We were thinking that the kids could have ice cream in the cafe while the parents went to the classrooms. We don't have any games or music planned for the evening. It was suggested that maybe we distribute the ice cream cups at the exit doors as people leave.

I am frustrated with what to do. HELP!! If we hand them out at the door, how do we limit who gets the ice cream (remember I orginally wanted only students to get it). We were going to ask for donations from a huge local dairy farm but asking for 650-700 little cups seems a little greedy.

I then thought about getting m&m's in school colors - way too expensive!

Any thoughts, ideas, or suggestions - I am open to them all.

Thanks,
LisaMay