Struggling

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Mangy_Donkey

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My wife and I send our son to a small Catholic school that is really struggling financially to stay afloat. Most of the parents have large families and can’t afford the tuition that would be required to make the school viable without outside assistance. The teachers are already vastly under paid but do so out of their love for the Catholic faith. My question is this. Is anyone out there in a similar situation that may have any ideas that have worked for them as far as fund raising goes? Most of the events that we have been doing only seem to bring money in from the families themselves which really doesn’t make sense.

Thanks in advance.

waysideacademy.org
 
I don’t know how big a parish you have but our small Catholic School is pretty much like yours and the parents that do have large families mostly can’t make the tuition payments. We live in a farming community and money is tight for most. Our Parish has what is called an “Adopt a Student” program and the whole parish donates what they can when they can to this fund and it in turn is used as a grant for part of a child’s tuition or in some cases all of it depending on the circumstances. For fundraisers we do have the Catholic Schools Marathaon and a magazine drive sales and the usual bake sales and raffle fund raisers. Just a few ideas maybe for not only your school but your parish to consider.🙂
 
I took a quick look at your school’s website and it looks as though the school already has planned giving and maybe an alumni list going? Schools in our diocese are now being advised to go that route rather than constant fundraisers so it looks like you’re good there…

Is your school using scrips? That’s a huge moneymaker if you can get someone to organize it. Go to www.glscrip.com to learn all about it.

Our small school credits most of the earnings directly to a family’s tuition and it greatly reduces each family’s tuition. I earned over $2,000 last year alone. We live in a rural area and don’t even have a lot of those stores. We’ve recruited some local businesses to jump on board.

Good luck!
 
I am a big user of glscrip and use the PrestoPay feature. I go to the school (not ours) that sponsors this for our school (a sister school, our local Catholic girls’ high school) to pick up on Thursdays after 11 AM. It’s there ready to go.

We have Race for Educaiton, on which I’m not too keen- not because it’s bad but because the company that teaches people how to do a race for education charges too much in my opinion.

We just had a draw down, made $16,000 at a very small school. Draw down dinner, catered, games of chance, split the pot, cash bar, a couple gambling games, auction and silent auction. Big donations from various businesses.
 
OutinChgoburbs said:
I am a big user of glscrip and use the PrestoPay feature. I go to the school (not ours) that sponsors this for our school (a sister school, our local Catholic girls’ high school) to pick up on Thursdays after 11 AM. It’s there ready to go.

We have Race for Educaiton, on which I’m not too keen- not because it’s bad but because the company that teaches people how to do a race for education charges too much in my opinion.

We just had a draw down, made $16,000 at a very small school. Draw down dinner, catered, games of chance, split the pot, cash bar, a couple gambling games, auction and silent auction. Big donations from various businesses.
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We do the auction/reverse raffle/silent auction thing as well - in addition to raising funds it’s a good time. People that don’t have anything to do with the school go year after year. We have 400 attending the event with only about 70 families at the school. It takes a lot of organization the first few years but then isn’t too bad afterwards.

The big question - do you have willing parents to volunteer?
 
Try to get the public involved.

Car washes, and other things of the sort.

If your school sponsers Boy Scouts, try a pancake breakfast, and split the money between the school and the troop. Also try a Christmas tree/wreath sale. Those should help. Even if there is no Boy Scout troop, your school can still do it, with kids voluntaring (sp) their time.
 
This is worth a try. Go to a wealthy parish and ask the pastor if there is a professional fundraiser who can help your school. Make it clear to the professional that you cannot pay him, that this is a volunteer project. Hopefully, he/she can step up and help, even with no fee, because they love the Church and believe in Catholic education.

It’s amazing what the professionals can do. We asked a professional (retired) to raise funds for our parish theater group (newly-formed)–he came up with $10,000 in a few weeks. These guys are GOOD at raising funds.

My kids attended a private prep school that relied on professional fund raisers. They did a Car Show that raises $100,000 in one weekend. (Silent auction, bar, band, etc.). Like I said, the professionals have access to ideas that amateurs never dream of.
 
Excellent!

Thank you so much everyone. I think that part of the problem is that here in Canada we have a two part school system, both are fully funded by the government. We have a pubic school system and a Catholic school system. A lot of Catholics have a hard time understanding why we need a private Catholic school when a funded public Catholic school is available. Some consider us as maybe a little too Catholic or perhaps that we think we are holier than others which couldn’t be further from the truth. I try and explain but its difficult.
 
Can you explain here the advantages of this school as opposed to funded catholic schools?
 
The “Catholic” schools in Canada- the public ones- are completely funded by the government and, thus, managed by the government. They have to meet the curriculum standards set forth by each provinces’ government (in this case, Ontario).

One person related a story to me of a fourth grader from a very devout Catholic family coming home from her public Catholic school one day and announcing that her teacher had told her all about what sex was, and that even men and men and women and women could have sex.

A few years back a homosexual teenaged boy sued the Catholic school board in a large town outside of Toronto because the school board told him couldn’t bring his male date to senior prom. The boy won the suit and the Catholic school was accused of discriminating against homosexuals.

From what I understand the teachers do not have to be Catholic (since government-run organizations cannot discriminate against employing someone due to their religion.) They do not have to believe anything the Church teaches.

Basically the difference between a public school and a Catholic parochial school in Canada is that you have a crucifix on the wall and have a “religion” class in the Catholic ones. From what I understand there is not much beyond that.

Wayside Academy was founded by homeschooling Catholic families who refused to send their kids to the public Catholic schools. They started out as sort of a co-op or charter school in a parish basement. Now they have enough students that they purchased an old school building from the governement and are becoming accredited. Their curriculum standards are much higher than the public school. The teachers are all (as far as I understand) practicing Catholics. The principle is a graduate of my alma mater- Franciscan University of Steubenville. It is an all around excellent school for a Catholic family to send their children to. It is entirely privately funded, though, and they are trying to make it affordable to everyone, so they are having a rough time.
 
That’s the problem with Canada. (Not to insult the country or anything, I’m just commenting on the school system).

In the U.S. there is seperation of church and state. It’s worked pretty well for about 230 years.

When the government gets involved with religion, it all goes down hill. It would be nice, sometimes anyway, for Catholic schools down here to get government funding, but that is unrealistic. Look at what happens in Canada.

If only Canada had seperation of church and state…
 
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