Just out of interest...how much is too much?

[kara0811]

I have been the vice treasurer at my pre-school for a term. I also have two children who attend, one funded, one not.

Over the past couple of weeks, I have been gobsmacked at how much fundraising has been going on, and how much pressure there is on the parents to give, considering it's Christmas. I just wondered if anyone had the same at their pre-school?

In the past 3 weeks, all parents have been asked to make cakes for a cake sale at the connected primary, donate items for raffles and tombolas at a Christmas bazaar, then support the actual bazaar itself and a stall at the connected primary school's bazaar the following week. There has been a Pampered Chef evening, an afternoon to buy personalised bags for life and aprons, the children have had to get sponsored to decorate Chistmas characters, all parents are now being asked to donate items for Christmas hampers that will be raffled off on last day of term, so also being asked to purchase tickets for said raffle. Then yesterday I had 3 letters home, one a bill for my non-funded child's fees, one a bill for my funded child's snack money, and one asking me to donate Early Learning Centre vouchers instead of buying the teachers Christmas presesnts this year.

Knowing that the pre-school accounts are quite healthy, it just seems like a LOT of fundraising at this time of year! Obviously everything IS volunarily, but there is quite a lot of pressure on for parents to be involved and donate, and for children to raise lots of sponsorship etc...

I'm not really moaning, just more interested to see if it's the same everywhere else!

[ChopsTheDuck]

i think charging for snacks is OTT personally! That would annoy me more than the fund raising.

It sounds a bit like my older children's schools, they operate a similar level. After a while I jsut developed a thicker skin and donate to only half of what they ask for.

[Fennel]

I would give parents a choice, via a newsletter. More fundraising (including support) or higher fees.

You have to break even, in the end, if you;'re running a preschool, no need to feel guilty about that.

[kara0811]

What's the norm for fees? Does anyone know? It's £8 a session at ours.

[Fennel]

Ours is £7 or £8 a session. Because our preschool does full day sessions and wraparound care it can be used as childcare though and is half the price of local nurseries, so parents can't really complain.

We had a preschool fundraising evening the other night and hardly anyone came, it was a cold rainy night. I did think that it would be easier just to charge higher fees.

[cktwo]

Too much, and the parents are going to get fundraising-fatigue.

As a member of the committee surely you have some say over how much fundraising is going on? It does seem a bit excessive at Christmas time.

I'm the treasurer of a small village pre-school and since September we have had one large fundraising event and four or five small ones (Body Shop party, Xmas fayre stall etc). This seems tolerable from our parents and I wouldn't want to increase on that.

[kara0811]

I've only just become a member of the committee, so yes, I do have some say, but before I raised anything, I just wanted to find out what the 'norm' was re. fundraising!

Next committee meeting isn't until the end of Jan, so will poss raise something then.

Thanks for all your comments.

[maggi]

I have a similar issue with school which has just done loads of fundraising including:

We had to buy cakes for them to sell to us.

They made £1.20 on 6 cakes which I originally bought for £1.49. So I spent £2.69 in order to give them £1.20.

Personally I'd much rather they gave out begging letters each term with a suggested donation amount. I know education is by law free but giving money directly to them would mean they would get 140% more money!