December is that time of year when it seems like everyone is running as fast as they can, but the list of “things to do” never ends. A holiday shop at your school or church may be the answer to shorten that endless list.

Here is what I have seen as a result of running a holiday shop from various perspectives: Students love it!

For many students it may be the first time they experience the thrill of picking out their own gifts for family and friends. The excitement leading up to the day of the shop is contagious. I truly believe there is nothing that can replace the joy in a child’s eye as he or she selects gifts for parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, siblings and even pets!

Parents love it! As parents try to complete their own holiday chores what a relief it is for them to know that their child is shopping in a safe, non-commercial setting. A holiday shop is truly a great help during such a hectic time.

I believe most parents would agree that this fundraising event is irreplaceable!

Teachers love it! Many faculty members have used the holiday shop to teach their students about budgeting and spending wisely, but at the same time emphasizing the joy of giving. Our economy has experienced so much turbulence and teaching students the value of money is certainly a necessity.

Fundraising companies may offer the holiday shop to parent groups as either a service to the students or as a fundraiser. In either case, many shop providers offer the gifts on a consignment basis.

However, there are several important questions to have answered before you sign that contract.

1. Who is responsible for the shipping costs?

2. What is the price range of the gifts?

3. Are the items price coded to provide a fast checkout?

4. What is the profitability as a service vs. fundraiser?

5. What additional supplies are provided for free? (gift bags, parent letter, budget envelopes)

Something to consider when exploring school fundraising ideas!

President Dwight D. Eisenhower envisioned a time where there was no hatred between different countries, a time were each country supported each other and a time where the world evolved based on the sharing of knowledge between each country, no matter how different they were.

This thought process brought about the People to People Student Ambassadors Program. He felt that this initiative would be better off consisting of the youth of today instead of having People to People International involving congressmen and leaders of the different countries.

By working together at such a young age with other students from different countries, the U.S. Student Ambassadors will help to develop camaraderie between the different countries. By being involved in activities that are “hands-on” the students will learn a great deal through arts, sports and the family life of different cultures around the world.

There is no other student travel program or family vacation that will allow the students to see what they will see and experience all that they will that will help them as they really begin their journey through life, as there is when involved in the Student Ambassador Program. Each People to People delegation consists of around 30 to 40 students.

Over the past 50 years since the organization was established, People to People has been to around 34 different countries in all of the seven different continents. It is said that each student who is invited to be a student ambassador returns home with not only more confidence, but also a better self-esteem.

What they see around the world will help them to have a better appreciation of the United States. They will also be a step ahead when it comes to college. Their experiences will help them with high school and college credit and enable them to write better essays and stand out in interviews. This experience will be life changing.

The words of Alan Raisman, a high school student who was a student ambassador explain what happens during the event. He says, “I have made long-lasting friendship through People to People. I know that wherever I travel in the world, I will always have a friend there offering me a home to stay in and food to eat. I have made friends from people of various cultures. I have seen an Israeli and Palestinian exchange e-mail addresses. I have seen the Japanese and Americans exchange kind words at the Hiroshima Peach Park.”

The costs can be a little high, but the experience gained from being a part of the People to People Student Ambassadors Program is unforgettable. There are many different ways to raise money for the cause. If you are ever invited to participate, do not miss the opportunity to be a part of President Dwight D. Eisenhower’s dream.

When you are part of a college sorority, you will know about all of the great benefits to working as a team for a good cause. This could be something that directly benefits all of your sorority sisters, like raising funds for upgrades to your sorority building.

Or it could be something you do in support of a local cause or charity.

Whatever your reasons for getting together and working as a team, sorority fundraising ideas are a good way to get the results you want. With these ideas you can turn any fundraising project into a fun and exciting activity for everybody in your sorority to enjoy.

But how do you develop the best sorority fundraising ideas that will get everybody involved thrilled to take part? You might like to try something simple and straightforward, like one of our product fundraisers.

You will find a huge range of these products throughout our website, and there is likely to be something to fit everybody’s needs.

You could decide to go with our Sorority Fundraising Scratch Cards, which offer great profits (up to 90%) on sales that your team makes. So let’s say that you have come up with a great product to sell for your next sorority fundraiser. You might think that there is nothing else to do before you get started with your fundraising activity.

But in order to pull off the best event that everybody can get behind you are going to want to promote your fundraiser around the campus so that everybody knows that it’s happening, and when. It may seem obvious, but spreading the word about your sorority fundraising ideas to people around campus is the best way to rally support for your cause, and makes sure that your financial targets are reached with relative ease.

If you are someone that loves books, chances are you have been to a used book sale. They are popular with the community, with some of the larger ones drawing people from fifty miles away – or from other states!

A used book sale can be a terrific fundraiser for a library, and an excellent way to recycle books that would otherwise be discarded at the library.

Facts About Library Used Book Sales

Tom Oram, Co-Owner of BookSaleFinder.com lists approximately 50,000 sales at their website each year. “We have probably 5,000 different used book sales from around the country from libraries, that’s from 3,000 libraries. That’s a ballpark figure, most used book sales are from libraries. 75% are from libraries.

Oram thinks many things make a library used book sale so popular as both a fundraiser, and a community event. “It’s a great opportunity for them (the community) to two things one is for the community to donate books to the friends of libraries and also for the people of the community to buy books at really great prices. That’s where the popularity lies. As a fund-raiser, everybody benefits: the people who donate, the people who buy and the people who hold the fund-raiser,” said Oram

The Success of an Ongoing Library Used Book Sale

The Greenwich Library in Greenwich, CT has an ongoing library used book sale at their Café. Called The Book Brigade, the book sale features hardcover books for fifty cents and paperback books for twenty five cents. Funds raised goes towards the Friends of Greenwich Library to present special programs such as films or concerts to the public.

Marsha Fosnot is a Friend of the Greenwich Library and is in charge of the The Book Brigade. “The café manager takes the money from the sale and collects it for us. We give him ten percent of what we make to ‘spur him on’ to collect for us. The sale makes approximately $2,000 a year,” said Fosnot. What is in the sale truly depends on what is in the shelves at the library. “The library is constantly weeding to make room for new acquisitions. We have children’s books, travel books, cookbooks and fiction books. When a new bestseller comes out, the library will buy 20 copies and then they will wind up discarding about 16 into the sale. So it depends on what the library is weeding out,” said Fosnot. Some of the books are damaged and are taken to a recycling place.

“Greenwich Library is sort of unusual, they are a rich library and there are always books available. We constantly get calls from people in the community who want to give us books and we say no because we have too many. The town dump is a place where people can take their books and people can take ten books for free,” said Fosnot.

Fosnot suggests if a library would like to create an ongoing used book sale, they need to have shelves available for the sale. “Someone has to collect the money or an honor system of putting money in a box. It (the sale) really would be library dependent if you could do a library book sale. It is so library specific, depending on the library situation. It is small money per book, dependent on volume and having a large amount of books,” said Fosnot.

Large Used Book Sales Equal Large Numbers

Two libraries that hold periodic sales are the University of Wisconsin-Madison Library sale which is held twice a year, and the Plano Texas Public Library sale which is held once a year.

The University of Wisconsin-Madison Library has a sale once in October and once in March. “The October book sale is held at the same time as a book festival held in Madison that brings a lot of authors to speak and read from their books,” said Tom Garver. Garver is a Liaison with the Friends of the University of Wisconsin-Madison Library Book Sale.  The sale in March of 2007 raised $25,178 to benefit the library.  Around 15,000 books are sold at each sale, 30,000 each year. The sale is primarily books but they also sell a small number of LPs and CDs as well.

The Friends of Plano Public Library holds their sale each year at the Plano Centre convention center.  The 26th Annual Book Sale held July 30 – August 1, 2009 raised over $44,000.  An additional $43,000 was raised in year-long Friends Lobby Sales held at each of the five Plano libraries. “Since 2000, our Friends Book Sales have raised over $440,000,” said Sandy Gillman, Library Staff Liaison to Friends of the Plano Public Library and the Davis Library Manager.

Funds raised from the sales benefit the five libraries in the Plano Public Library System. “This year Friends will make a $100,000 donation to assist in changing English as a second language video and tapes to CD and DVD, as well as children’s books on tape to CD. Additionally, the Friends fund our yearly family programming events, summer reading, and stipends for librarians to attend conferences,” said Gillman.

High Quality Books Make a Big Difference

“One thing that’s appreciated by our customers is the high quality of our books, some are discards from the University, and some are from professors who are cleaning their shelves or who may have died. We have acquired books from this source; it is a very high class, high quality sale. It is very interesting that the man who runs the sale that the man who runs the sale worked for years in the conservation department off the library,” said Garver.

The quality of the books is critical. “There is no question about it. I make an effort to be sure we have a high quality in our inventory, to get rid of the junky stuff,” said Garver. “I would say that I discard 40% of the stuff we get right away, from the box it comes in right into the recycling. The advantage is that we get more books than we need. So we can be pretty choosy,” said Garver.

Their book sale is a combination of discards from the library system and many donations. They have their donation system very well-organized. “The way it works is people contact us and say they have books to donate. If they are able to, they leave them at the loading dock. We have a large cage adjacent to the mail room they put them in there. The books are all sorted by subjects. So the books are well sorted – one of the principal sorters is a retired professor of comparative literature,” said Garver.

A Multi Day Fundraiser Reaches a Wide Audience

Both the University of Wisconsin and Plano Library sales are multi day events. The University of Wisconsin sale is held over four days, and it is popular on each of the four days. Garver recognizes that they have a bit of a different type of book buyer on each of the days. “It opens on a Wednesday evening from 5:00 p.m. to 8:00 p.m.; you pay five dollars to get in. The prices of the books are twice as high for the books on this day when the selections are largest. This is when we get the most book dealers. These people are not gentile about buying books; they will snatch armloads of books and sort through them. They recognize that paying a premium is still a good deal for them, a premium at our sale is still very inexpensive. We have a lot of dealers who sell only on the internet. Many people just have a base of books that they sell on eBay or Amazon,” said Garver.

They have a wide variety of books at their sale, one of the reasons they are so very popular. “Well we get pretty much things across the board, but pretty much things of an academic nature. Scholarly books show up at our sale. We do get a few romance paperbacks, Danielle Steel is always there and we do get cookbooks as everyone likes to cook. The majority of the books come from the community, outside of the campus. A good number are also library discards,” said Jim Dast, the Book Sale Manager for the Friends of University of Wisconsin-Madison Libraries.

At the Plano Library sale the opening night is called the “First Nighter Sale,” and there is an admission of $5 per individual or $10 per family. The second and third day of the sale offer free admission. Hardbacks are $1.50, paperbacks are seventy-five cents and audios, videos and CDs are $1.50. They also have a ‘Collector’s Corner’ with rare books and first editions for sale at their book sales. The sale does not charge sales tax.

Teams of Volunteers Needed for a Successful Sale

The set up for the large book sale takes teamwork and great organizational skills. “Set up on a Monday takes all of Monday to set up in a large room of the library first floor Memorial Library. Tuesday afternoon and Wednesday open the sale to the library bibliographers, they will look over the books that are there and they take away several hundred to run a check and see if they have them for the library,” said Garver.

They have 40 volunteers working on the sale with 2 different types of volunteers. There is a group of 4 to 5 volunteers that work year-round collecting books. Other volunteers work on a regular basis helping sort the books, determining where they will go, guarding the entrance door, taking the money, resorting the books and generally keeping an eye on things.

The Friends of Plano Public Library Book Sale is staffed by many dedicated volunteers, an estimated 400 plus volunteers help out each year.  A special group of about 24 volunteers work throughout the year sorting donated library materials into subject categories in preparation for the Book Sale. They start planning the next year’s book sale “immediately” following the book sale, making reservations for the next sale.

Whether ongoing or once-a-year, a library used book sale can be an excellent opportunity to raise much needed funds for your public or private library!

Through our website Top School Fundraisers we’re sponsoring a one-time grant program.  A quality education is something that every child deserves and I’m happy to be able to “give back” in some small way.  With this in mind only projects that are educational in nature will be considered.

This grant is not a contest per se and no purchase is necessary.  You simply need to fill out an application and provide a presentation (letter, video or something creative) to demonstrate what your school will use the funds for.

Any public, private or charter school, pre-K through 12th grade, in the United States or Canada is eligible to apply.

We have already received many applications for this grant and unfortunately we only have $5000 to give away.  But don’t let that deter you.  If your educational project really stands out you still have a good chance to get an award. You can go over to the website to get more information and an application for this grant.

My name is Jim Berigan.  I am the managing editor of Top School Fundraisers, which is a sister site to Step by Step Fundraising.  Our single goal is to connect schools with great fundraising ideas.

If you’d like to know more about school fundraising, I’d like to encourage you to check out the website and sign up to receive its bi-weekly email newsletter.

I have been writing for Top School Fundraisers since January of 2008.  Before that, I worked as a private elementary school principal in Gaylord, Michigan.  During my tenure, I was involved in many of the same fundraising activities that you have tried at your school- auctions, golf outings, cookie dough sales, bake sales, you name it.  I struggled to attract volunteers and had to deal with a sluggish economy complicating our fundraising efforts.

My personal goal is to sift through all that I have learned and experienced and frame it in a way that is helpful to others who are engaged in trying to help our kids get a dynamic and thorough education.  Nothing frustrated me more than when we had to cut a program or a teacher because of a lack of funds.  I hate to see kids hurt like that.

So, I gladly welcome and invite you to not only start keeping up with our regularly updated blog, but to also take a few minutes to go back and read some of the posts from the first part of this year.  We’ve got some helpful advice in our archives.  We hope you take full advantage of everything at Top School Fundraisers.

Here is a great program for public or school libraries.  You can honor your favorite, hard working librarian for the “I Love My Librarian Award.”  The Carnegie Corporation of New York and the New York Times created the award to recognize the accomplishments of librarians in public, school, college, community college and university libraries for their efforts to improve the lives of people in their community.

The nominations for public librarians run are due by October 1 and nominations for school and academic librarians continue through October 15.

Up to 10 librarians in public, school and college, community college and university libraries will be selected to win $5,000 and will be honored at a ceremony and reception in New York at TheTimesCenter, hosted by The New York Times.  In addition, a plaque will be given to each award winner’s library.

Each nominee must be a librarian with a master’s degree from a program accredited by the ALA in library and information studies or a master’s degree with a specialty in school library media from an educational unit accredited by the National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education. Nominees must be currently working in the United States in a public library, a library at an accredited two- or four-year college or university or at an accredited K-12 school.

Nominations will be accepted online at www.ilovelibraries.org/ilovemylibrarian. No paper nominations will be accepted.

You can also download/print these flyers to encourage someone to submit a nomination.

General Flyer for All Librarians (PDF)

Public Librarians (PDF)

School Library Media Specialists (PDF)

College, Community College and University Librarians (PDF)

Thanks to GrantsAlert.com for the tip!

Today is Teacher Appreciation Day. Those of you who are parents, were you able to do something special for your child’s teacher? If not, don’t fear, until Friday you have time to participate in Teacher Appreciation Week.

We celebrated the week by sponsoring a blog writing contest on the theme of “My Favorite Teacher.” All of the entries into the competition were wonderful. I love hearing stories of special people, especially those who pour their hearts into something they love, like teaching.

Six months later, or Time goes by so fast by Ana at My adventures through life
My Favorite Teachers by Angela at Mommy Bytes
My Favourite Teachers by Veronica at Sleepless Nights

Check out the entries and then you can vote for your favorite here.

Our staff writers also enjoyed writing on this topic…
Jim Berigan’s Favorite Teacher
And here’s my contribution – Teaching Math More Than About Numbers

Thank You, teachers — current, retired and future – you are making a difference!

The Burlington High School Student Council is holding a raffle to support the Great River Hospice in Iowa, with a very unique prize that makes local football fans quite comfortable indeed. Winners have the opportunity to sit in a comfortable sofa during Burlington High School home varsity football games. They will also enjoy free snacks from the concession stand.

Raffles are sold for $2.00 each. Tickets are sold at the gates of the stadium and also in the stands. There is information about Great River Hospice available at a table next to the concession stand.

The student council hopes to raise $2,000 with their fundraiser. Upcoming games on October 5th and October 19th will help them reach this goal.

Source: thehawkeye.com

Harry Potter mania has hit a new high with the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7). Many bookstores planned midnight sales events to celebrate the final J.K. Rowling book in her popular Harry Potter series.

A popular Canadian bookseller also turned Pottermania into a fundraising event. The Harry Potter Midnight Bash at Bryan Prince Booksellers in Hamilton, Ontario benefited The Hamilton Literary Council. The fun family event included a scavenger hunt, costume contest, a Hogwarts sorting hat and free pizza.

Approximately 200 – 300 adults and children attended the bookstore event. The Hamilton Literacy Council from the last Harry Potter bash raised $1,000 and they are awaiting the final fund-raising results for this event.

The Hamilton Literacy Council is very grateful to Bryan Prince Booksellers, which completely organizes the event. The charity is then given $2 for every Harry Potter book sold, which is a donation straight from Bryan Prince Booksellers. They have done the event twice to benefit the charity, and Bryan Prince Booksellers has hosted Harry Potter bashes for at least four of the books.

Valerie Sadler, Executive Director looks forward to the Harry Potter events tremendously. “The excitement in the air, people waiting for the Harry Potter book to come out. When I was on my way home I could see people sitting on the sidewalk, reading the book. Once they got it, people immediately started reading it. It was a sight to see,” said Sadler. “The books have brought so many young people into reading, especially boys.” Sadler believes the event has a wonderful connection to literacy.

The Hamilton Literacy Council is an adult literacy program and they provide one-to-one tutoring with trained volunteer tutors and also offer small group instruction with paid instructors. They serve people with low-literacy levels. “Next year we celebrate our 35th anniversary of serving adults in the Hamilton community,” said Sadler.

The Hamilton Literacy Council serves 180 people a year and has served thousands over the years.

While this was the last of the Harry Potter books, there will be two more film adaptations. There is still the potential for Harry Potter movie fundraisers to be held. Non Profit organizations can benefit from latching on to this and other popular films and entertainment events when planning fundraising events.