PTA Fundraising Ideas please help.......

BargainBabe_3

:question: I am an active member of my daughters school PTA along with the other 8 parents out of 220 pupils that can be bothered. Do any of you out there have the same problems with your childrens schools?

We are in a lower middle class area and have very mixed types of families attending the school. Although we really struggle with drumming up support for fundraising events. The sad thing is that the money we do raise benefits all the children in the school with essential things that they need not just luxury extras. We do send letters out to parents but we get little or sometimes no response. I was wondering do any of you lovely MSE,s out there have fantastic and fun money raising ideas that have little or no outlay that would capture the imagination of children and parents alike. Hopefully some of you might be able to help. Thankyou for your time. BBx:D

Scarlett1

my school has recently set up a website whereby you can shop online and the school receives money from it, like the R Points site

susie_boo

Hi

My childrens school PTA is doing a mass sleepover! All children bring bedding, PJ`s etc to the school hall and "sleep" over under the watchful eyes of staff/volunteer parents etc. The parents can then have a night out or whatever. Charge will obviously depend on the area etc but I think its a winner!

Good luck!

jap200

There are some good ideas here:

http://www.raisingkids.co.uk/mem/tips35_pta.asp

http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk?topicid=43&threadid=108189&stamp=060908180607

Amanda65

As an ex-PTA Chair, and then a parent governor at my childrens' schools unfortunately this is an all too familiar tale. I had to accept that few people do most of the work andjust get on with doing the best job I could. Sadly in today's society when a lot of parents are working they don't seem to want / be able to take on another committment.

One of our biggest fundraisers was involving copmpanies that parents worked for in 'pound matching' funds riased. Not all businesses will do this for mainstream education but some will - Barclays definitely do. If you can find a parent who works for them to commit to 'helping' at an event they will match up to £750.00 of funds raised - this boosted our raffle takings 7 years running at our summer fair.

For fairs / fetes we approached local business for sposnorship eg our local car showroom sponsorted the bouncy castle, effectively paying for the hire of the castle in exchange for their ad board on site on the day and this meant all the proceeds from the castle were profit.

We also had a french circus on site for a week - the school included this in their lessons for the week, the children all learnt circus skills and on the Friday evening there was a Big Top show which included some of the kids and tickets were sold to kids / parents to attend - it was a great success and raised I believe in excess of £1000.

Good luck with whatever you do, get the staff and children involved as much as possible and just remember that your children will beenfit from what you do! As an aside, I also made some very good friends from the PTA that I wouldn't have necessarily otherwise met as their children were in different years to mine

inkie

Our school has a 100 club - numbers 1 to 100 are sold at £1 each (you keep the same number each month), and then each month a number is randomly chosen and the winner gets £50, and £50 to the schhol - you could also do this split 1/4 to 3/4 or 1/3 to 2/3 whatever you decide.

looneyleo

Oh I'm going to be really controversial now...remember this is just my opinion...my DD attends a shool where the PTA are VERY active. I'm not joking when I say almost every week there is something I am asked to pay for, and one week I was asked to send money in 3 times... It costs me a small fortune and I just can't do it all. I groan every time I open up the book bag for fear of another request. Quite simply there is pressure to contribute or send an item up for this, contribute to that etc etc etc. I would prefer the PTA be upfront decide on a target they want to achieve in the year, tell the parents and ask for a contribution e.g. £20.00. Then run events FOR FUN throughout the year...not just another "back of the packet" money raising thing. It's just my pet hate I'm afraid. I'm all for good standards in school and I'm willing to pay extra but I'm a busy mum too so don't waste my time on sending 50p for this £1.00 for that, an old pair of shoes, some spring bulbs...blah blah blah...JUST TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT!

rant over and best of luck...hope you get some good ideas!

Becles

Our PTA sent out a "skills sheet" asking all parents to volunteer various skills and services. Events have been planned around that.

For example, we run a mobile disco, and have volunteered that and someone else works for a catering company that got a cheap deal through on an outdoor BBQ. We had a summer party one evening where people paid a ticket fee which included some BBQ food, and had to bring their own tables/chairs/rugs and drink. We supplied the disco and there were party games, a raffle, bingo and other daft activites throughout the night. It was very enjoyable, and it's a yearly fixture now!

The PTA has done a lot since they started running which can be seen in improvements in school, such as a new floor for the hall, a set of PC's to make an IT room, manky old childrens toilets replaced with new ones, outdoor play area for nursary and foundation children and so on.

shykins

unfortuately in most schools its the same people who offer to help every time.. all u can do is try and target new people ... every year we hold a new parents morning where they can come and chat to the PTA members and hopefully some will join us.. the first time we did this we gained 3 new members last year only 1 but it all helps

we run film nights, discos and do a xmas and summer fete.. we really targeted local companies this last fete and all our prizes were donations...the other thing we do is xmas present stalls, also mothers and fathers day ones..the kids like them and so do the parents cos they dont have to go out shopping themselves

we also asked the children to draw their faces and scanned the whole lot into a computer and printed them out class by class.. i managed to get some A4 frames in poundland and we sold them for £2.50 each

we try and concentrate on events etc that we only need 6-7 people at so that the committee can run them, u just have to get used to the fact some people will never offer to help (one woman i asked to help was VERY abusive to me) but at least u are doing your best and helpin the school to provide things they otherwise couldnt

good luck

inkie

Depends on how well this will be received with your target audience, but what about themed evening dinners with an after dinner speaker - quite a profit margin to be made in catering if you have people with the relevant food hygiene certificate - and of course this is something that would appeal to people outside the 'school circle'.

Emmylou_2

What about giving people £1 and seeing how much they can make from it.

There could be a prize for the person/group that raises the most