Top 5 Christian School Fundraising Ideas + FAQ
Your Christian school relies on much-needed revenue from your students’ families and friends to operate. If you’re new to fundraising, this essential process can be overwhelming. How do you choose a fundraiser and get your students interested? First, you’ll need to understand the basics of fundraising and tools at your disposal. After reviewing our favorite Christian school fundraising ideas, we’ll answer some essential questions about how to run a school fundraiser.
Top Christian School Fundraising Ideas
1. Read-A-Thon
Read-A-Thon is a program in which students read a certain amount of books in an allotted amount of time. Parents can make a one-time donation or pledge money based on the number of books or minutes the student will read. These donations take place on an online platform, which makes it easy for parents to give and your school to track.
Your school can choose approved reading materials for your students. You might offer prizes to students who reach a certain number of books or minutes. This can encourage your students to read quality books. Since they can read at school or take books home with them to read after school, it builds the healthy habit of reading outside of the classroom.
You could also set aside a specific reading day. You might incorporate this into the students’ weekly schedule or host this day as a special event. Consider participating in Read Across America, which celebrates reading on Dr. Suess’s birthday, March 2nd.
2. Product fundraiser
A product fundraiser allows your school to sell goods for fundraising revenue. There’s a wide variety of products you can sell, such as branded merchandise or snack items. You can choose what works best for your school and get these goods from a product fundraising partner, who will supply the items for you in exchange for a cut of your fundraising revenue.
Since you can choose which product you’d like to sell, ask your students for their input. If you consider their preferences, they’ll be more motivated to sell and may even buy from each other. Students might request to sell candy bars, for example, because they like candy bars. Popular products will sell quickly among students and their families. When any donor participates, they’ll appreciate receiving something tangible for their support.
This method of fundraising can also teach valuable lessons about hard work to your students. If your elementary school students want to go on a field trip, for example, have them raise the money themselves to fund the trip. This will help them understand the rewards for their hard work and the value of the field trip.
3. Matching gift day
Donors are more likely to give if they know their gift will be matched, but billions in matching gift revenue goes unclaimed every year. Bridge this gap by making your donors aware of corporate matching gift programs they can look into. On matching gift day, run an awareness campaign about these programs and encourage your donors to check to see if they’re eligible.
The important thing to remember is that a matching gift day is just that — one day. Set a goal for the giving day so your donors realize the urgency of the campaign. Consider using a matching gift database with autosubmission to make the process effortless.
4. Field day
What better way is there to get students and parents excited about your fundraiser than by spending a school day outside playing games? Hosting a field day can be a fun way to raise money for your cause. Pit students against each other or teams of students against teams of teachers to encourage a bit of friendly competition.
Remember that the target donor in this fundraiser is parents, family members, or friends. Your students don’t likely have as much to contribute, since they’re less likely to have disposable money. So, plan for your target audience and charge for admission and concessions. You could also sell t-shirts designed to match the theme of the field day.
5. Dunk tank
A dunk tank is a fun activity to add to a field day or pep rally that incentivizes fundraising. Have your students nominate a teacher, coach, or faculty member to sit in a dunk tank above several feet of water. If the nominee agrees to participate, they’ll be dunked into the water without warning if a target to the side of the tank is hit with a ball. You can sell a certain amount of throws or balls to students so they can try to dunk the volunteer.
Christian School Fundraising Ideas FAQ:
Planning stage
Assess your current fundraising situation with a SWOT analysis, which is an overview of your school’s fundraising strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. Use this to figure out what you do best and how you can make improvements. This will help you determine your goals for the campaign and the resources available to you.
What is the purpose of your fundraiser? Whether you’re raising money for your school’s library or a class field trip, you’ll need to define specific, monetary goals before your fundraiser gets started so you can track your progress during the actual event.
Then, conduct a stakeholder analysis. Consider all the people who will be involved in your project or affected by it. Plan how you’ll involve these key people in your fundraiser and how you’ll communicate with them throughout the process. Also, assign roles to the members of your organization who will be involved in getting your fundraising campaign off the ground.
Establish a budget in which you spend no more than 10% of your revenue on the fundraiser. Consider all your potential expenses, like any tech solutions you’ll need to succeed. You’ll also want to plan your marketing strategy so you can factor any marketing materials into your budget. If you have the resources, consider using a nonprofit fundraising consultant to help plan the campaign.
Marketing stage
This is where you get your name and cause out there. Based on the marketing materials you prepared in the planning stage, you can start creating communication materials, such as:
- Direct mail outreach: It’s no secret that students don’t always keep up with the important papers they need to take home. By sending direct mail, you can directly reach out to families at home with a physical copy of necessary information about your fundraiser.
- Emails: Emails can help make your digital communication personal. It’s like sending direct mail, but faster and easily accessible. Take your campaign straight to your supporters’ inboxes by sending them an email about your fundraiser.
- Newsletters: Build on emails by creating eye-catching, informational material about your fundraiser and cause. Newsletters can be all-inclusive, summarizing everything that’s going on at school while also giving specific insight into your fundraiser. You can pass out newsletters at school sporting events or volunteer days to make sure they reach a lot of people.
- Social media posts: Use social media to reach supporters on a more casual and consistent basis. Posting information about your fundraiser across platforms can extend the reach of your communications. Students’ extended family members or friends, for example, might not receive direct communications from your school but still want to be involved.
In addition to these tangible materials, it’s also crucial to cultivate your word-of-mouth messaging. Teach your participants, like parent volunteers and students, about your fundraiser’s purpose and how to speak about your organization. That way you’ll have a singular, united message instead of disorganized and confusing messaging.
Training stage
As the campaign draws closer, make sure your volunteers are ready for action. You might hold training sessions based on roles and responsibilities to ensure everyone is on the same page. If you have beginners on your fundraising team, skills workshops can help them visualize and practice their donation request strategies. Don’t make these sessions too long or frequent. After all, your volunteers are donating their time, so you should remain conscientious of their schedules.
Fundraising stage
This is where you finally put all your planning into action. During this stage, don’t stop working on the previous stages. Stay on top of your budget and revenue so that you can see how far away you are from your goal. Keep communicating about the fundraiser, especially if it’s longer than a one-day event. Remind parents/family members how much time they have to give and how far away you are from reaching your goal.
Follow-up stage
Your work doesn’t stop when the fundraiser is over. Follow-up is crucial to a successful fundraiser and necessary for hosting more fundraisers in the future.
Analyze your data and compare it with past campaigns to see what changed. Did you see an increase or decrease in funds raised? Did you get more volunteers or participants? Can this be attributed to your marketing strategy? Considering all these factors allows you to see what worked and what didn’t for future references.
Most importantly, thank your donors and volunteers. Write notes or prepare gifts for those who made the campaign possible. If you decide to send gifts, consider preparing them ahead of time to avoid long lapses of time between the fundraiser and follow-up stages.
How do I make my fundraiser stand out?
The key to raising more donations is asking for support in a unique and compelling way. You can do this by:
- Using your school’s unique branding and creating campaign-specific branding.
- Partnering with community organizations related to your cause. This will get your name out there to organizations’ customers, such as corporate sponsors.
- Integrating your campaign messaging with your school’s values/religious beliefs so that like-minded people will want to donate.
Your school’s mission, values, and core beliefs influence parents to enroll their children. Since this is what makes your school stand out, use it to make your fundraiser stand out, too. Your brand, partnership, and communications should reflect your values in a way that makes your community want to support your school.
How do I get students involved?
Your students are the heart and soul of your campaign, so you should try to involve them as much as possible.
Try a peer-to-peer approach. If your students have social media accounts, allow them to create and share donation pages that collect donations for your cause. This might get more student attention since they’re likely using their social media accounts daily. Your students will want to participate if they have a personal stake in the campaign’s success.
Consider incentivizing their involvement with prizes for your school fundraiser. Offer fun dress-up days, like a pajama day, or plan rewards for the top earners. Pizza parties or homework passes could be given to anyone who earned more than a certain threshold.
Ask for their input while planning the campaign. Students will be quick to give input on what prizes they’d like or how they want to be involved. Not only will this give them a sense of responsibility, but they’ll also be more likely to participate if they like the idea.
Wrapping Up
