I think it's time for your group to have a meeting to discuss and vote on this issue. Every parent in your school should have the opportunity to decide what happens with this money. Be ready to explain how much money was brought in with your fundraiser, the funds intended use, the status of that purchase, how much excess funds there are, and the options that are being proposed for spending/distributing those funds. Have some time for open discussion and narrowing down of the options, then vote.
Our main fundraiser is called invest in a kid which is a cash donation collected by oct. 10th given by parents.They were told at the beginning of the year that 100% proceeds would be used in our school. Now to take 5000 of it and give it to the new school without all parents knowing exactly why we have an overage and why wasn't it all spent as promised I think will hurt my chances to raise money next year. I think parents will say why did we give so much, we could have used it for ourselves...Our school was built in the 1960's our children don't even have walls or doors in their classrooms. the classrooms are divided up by bookshelves...as opposed to a brand new state of the art facility.
I agree--... we only start up with 5,000 each year-- to give away so much for only 5% moving over is not practical-- I would consider 500.00-700.00 max to give.
Also, we are going to be paying 2,900 for our active boards, but they are not mounted-- they are traveling boards--, but we also are purchasing the extras to go with it-- the slate, the elbos---
I can't believe you have so much extra in overage if you are trying to purchase these boards- we are figuring it will cost about 70,000 to purchase boards for each class-- If you have so much overage and have more than 40% moving to the new school-- 3-5,000 is a reasonable amount to pass along and you would still have overage at your school.
What have you been fundraising for all year that you have so much left and what are selling to raise so much money, that you've covered all your internal costs and have so much left?
PTOKathy, that's a big chunk of money to give when only 5% of your students will be moving. It's a nice gesture to help a new school's parent group get started, but it should be done in an equitable manner(an amount calculated on a per student basis for the students moving). Would the new group consider accepting the start up funds as a "loan" which they would pay back after their first fundraiser? Are there other parent groups from the other elementaries that are donating funds to this new group? What are they giving?
We have a similar situation but yet different in several respects. We our opening our 6th elementary school. Less than 5% of our kids will move to it. The new building principal is asking for start up funds for the new PTO. When our 5th school opened we gave $1000. Our principal is moving to the 6th and is asking for significantly more.
Any thoughts?
