- Image by Isaac Singleton Photography via Flickr
After a long day of school, the kids come home excited, bubbly with a lot of fliers in their hands. Oh, great, it is school fundraiser time. Every year during the fall, the students get their sales booklets, catalogs, and samples; plus, the over-hyped sales pitch and promise of prizes for those who sell the most items. Every year, your kids promise that they will do all the work that you can sit back and relax while they go door to door. But you know this won’t happen. You know they will forget, and you will be the one dragging them kicking and screaming door to door selling wrapping paper, popcorn, peanuts, and cheap candy. Or worse, you will have to be the one taking the booklets to your co-workers trying to get your kids sales up to prize level. Unfair isn’t it? Many times while you are slaving away for the school, you wonder where is this fundraiser money going? How is it being spent? Why can’t we just donate money and avoid the whole sale fundraiser? If you pay taxes, why all this fundraising?
These are all important questions for parents especially parents of school age children. Of course, you pay taxes for the your children’s education, but the tax money cannot pay for everything required for school. Due to the economic crisis, many schools must cut back on classroom supplies, new computers, even the quality of food in the cafeteria. Teachers are being forced to buy chalk, paper, even pay to copy tests and quizzes for you students. What your taxes do not cover is what makes fundraising so important. You may only see the wrapping paper sales as an annoyance, but your children’s teachers see this as their lifeline for school supplies so that they can teach effectively. So, while you are going from door to door, think about how your sales are contributing to happy, effective teachers which means your kids will be better educated.
Fundraisers may seem tedious to those who don’t know what it costs to be in school, but some adults are now realizing exactly what those fundraisers can do for their child’s educational opportunities. Especially when or if parents experience the bulk of a college tuition or textbook bill. Thankfully fundraising and school supplies have taken a back seat the the technology age, with websites like educationforadults.com even veteran students have the ability to cut down on bills, and paper, with the internet age.