SHABONEE PTA Committee Report

2012-2013 School Year

Committee name: Shabonee Night FUNdraiser /Spring Carnival

10 committee members- moderate time commitment (Jan thru event) needs approx 20 volunteers for night of the event.

What activities did your committee plan this year? Please note dates or time frames future committee chairs should know about.

Spring Carnival Friday, Mar 15th, 6:30-8 pm

(April time is too late- too many spring conflicts.)

This year we were told it could not be a ‘fundraiser’.

If you had a budget, how much did you spend? Would your recommend any changes to this committee’s budget?

The budget was lowered from $4000 to $3000

We had expenses of $2500 +$1000 for airbrushing/shirts + kids raffle/other supplies, totaling around $4000

(Carnival games, Airbrushing, kids raffle, postage, Costco supplies )

Keep $4000 budget to run same type of event.

We decided to charge $5 admission for activity and raffle tix to cover much of our expenses as well as offer a very small silent auction and kids rafffle. Our net expense was only about $500.

Please list any contact info (example-vendors) for activities coordinated this year (name, address, phone, email, etc.):

Jiggles and Giggles- Jonathon Schoenberg 847-922-5466

Airbrushing t-shirts: Lance Gustafson 314-723-3437

What worked well for your committee this year?

The committee met in January to delegate responsibilities. Team worked great together. Lots of communication via email. We set up a volunteer form on line and emailed link to everyone for signing up. (signupgenius.com) We decided not to offer food this year since it was not a money making event and food donations/coordination takes so much time. We offered just desserts and cotton candy, which was a big hit! We had a kids raffle with about 18 prizes. I spent about $180 on kids raffle prizes (outdoor sprinkler ball –big hit, airbrushed headband and beanie hat popular, remote control car ( Walmart items)

What would you do differently or change for next time?

Silent auction final announcement needs to be clearer. Auction closed as soon as persons name is highlighted. There was an issue about closing announcement but name wasn’t highlighted for another few seconds.

We used kids raffle numbers for back of tickets instead of kids writing their names. It was a good system except the numbers should be numbered differently, so that teacher raffle drawing can be done quicker. Maybe all 3rd graders names started with a 3, 4th with a 4.

Airbrush- labeling system needed to be done so that siblings were given their own label. offer tank tops and grey colored hoodies, see air brush notes

Hall monitors- kids were running around halls- needed some supervision in hallway

Who were your committee chairs?

Laura Birt, Debbie Kamensky, Kim Resnick

DETAILS:

The night was a success. We had a tremendous turn out and all had a great time.

Committee-

Committee member’s assignments: Creating Flyer-posted in school (Karen Serra) PR (communication), Volunteers , Bake Sale (Tricia), Silent Auction (Laura) Teacher Raffle (Tracy Yedlin)

PR-Getting the word out

a few months earlier- we had announcements in blog to hold date for event

few weeks prior- blog had info on event, pre-order form, volunteer link to sign up

The week of event: morning announcements announced event and activities, flyers posted in school. PTA emails went directly to parents.

We did not plan ahead for broadcast club to add to announcements but should for next year.

Attendance-

We only invited Shabonee kids and siblings- parent supervised event. We decided not to invite Hickory Point due to the potential 700 kids in the gyms.

Volunteers:

The volunteer form was designed online- Laura Birt. It worked out great. We sent many reminder emails and additions to principal blog to have people sign up. The committee each sent out emails to all friends to recruit people for working the event. The website was created on signupgenius.com

Pre-order Form

Pre-order Form approved by Mr. P first then office made copies on color paper. It was sent home with kids 3 weeks before event. Deadline for pre-orders was 1 week prior. We ended up extended deadline to Wednesday of that week because orders so low.

We did not send home the pre-ordered tickets- instead we had a separate line at the registration desk for all who pre-ordered

Tickets Wristbands-

We charged an entry fee of $5 (Parents thought this was fabulous price for event) Kids received 1 wristband to be used for all inflatables, tattoo, 1 photo booth picture, and 5 tickets.

Tickets could be purchased separately for .50 cents each. Tickets used for desserts (2 tickets), kids raffle or teacher raffle

To make sure the children only had 1 photo taken, we marked the wristband with an X. For cotton candy, we marked a C on the wristband and for the Carnival Games we marked a G for games because we had little prizes to give kids (these were donated from Kidsnips – Jill Hamacheck.

Bake Sale-

We asked all room moms to bake as well as committee members - nut free individually wrapped. We had a perfect amount of desserts. They were asked to drop off that day in the office or up to 6 pm. We emailed reminders the last couple weeks.

Air Brush- see Notes for more details

only pre-ordered shirts were allowed for painting that nite.

All pre-orders were put on an excel spreadsheet- paid $350 for Lance – 2 artists, 2 hours

plus he painted 2 items for bucket / kids raffle ($9 x 2 air brush)

plus he ordered the t-shirts for us- lead time was so short- we ordered shirts that week Monday. The brand we had ran small and many didn’t want the size they ordered.

We sold grey t-shirts, white hoodies and headbands.

next year offer tank tops and grey hoodies.

Whip Cream Challeng big hit!!

We bought 6 cans of whip cream

Principal did game at 7 pm and 7:30Pm—attracted a lot of kids

We made an announcement in gym to buy tickets to participate.

We took a picture of Mr. Panozzo with whip cream and make a flyer for kids to see that week.

Games

see contract from Jiggles /Giggles

Electricity:

I met with Ted and Doug to review all the power voltage needed.

Microphone

Make sure microphone for both gyms. Announements needed silent auction closing, teacher raffle closing, whip cream challenge starting . Even though we had signs posted , there has to be an announcement for 10 minutes or so before closing.

Flyers Posted

We posted flyers in school the week to promote the event. We posted signs at the event that silent auction closes at 7:45 (15 min. prior)

Silent Auction-We sent a mailing 5 weeks prior. Most places need at least 6 weeks prior. We had a very small silent auction to help pay for the event, not to fundraise.

Cash for Cash boxes

The pta closet has cash boxes to use. We had $500 start up cash ( 2 desks – each had $250 Make sure start up money has lots of $5 and $1’s. )

bucket raffle/ kids raffle:

used containers from hickory point. We needed a few more and so I used brown lunch bags.

Teacher Raffle –

We sent a note to teachers a few weeks before asking for teacher prizes for the Teacher raffle.

We used Hickory Point plastic containers to hold tickets. We pulled names at 7:45. Make sure gym teachers don’t specify winner in teachers’s class because hard to know if child has that teacher for class. for example Rebecca won but didn’t have Mr. Driscoll’s class. She didn’t realize she needed to be in his class. And if pulling tickets with numbers, make sure that the number matches childs name before end of event. Some numbers were not clear and the tickets were brought home to figure out.

Costco-

We bought 6 bottles of whip cream, 5 cases of baby waters (350 bottles of water)

pta closet had napkins

we brought our own paper towels, paper plates

we didn’t have food and so we didn’t need forks/plates

Grocery

Bought 3 packages of gummy bears

Halls Monitoring

There was a lot of kids running around the halls – maybe we have parent hall monitors for volunteer sign up.