PTA raffle-all 4 of the Chair’s kids won the top prizes

[PTAcoincidence]

There was a PTA raffle at school this week to win Easter egg baskets. There were 4 huge baskets with around 10-12 eggs in each along with about 30 smaller baskets with a variety of eggs in them. Some had more eggs than others so between 3 and 6 eggs per basket. Lots of prizes, lots of happy kids at the Easter Fayre.
The raffle was drawn out of sight before the Fayre began with the dad of the 4 winning kids removing one huge basket from school before the rest of the baskets were even made up. Eyebrows were raised but you don’t cross the PTA mums I’m told.
Tickets were £2 each and approx 500 tickets purchased in total so a great fundraiser for the PTA. The chocolate was donated by the kids in exchange for wearing their own clothes as is the norm.
It is usually the PTA kids who win competitions, get chosen for the main
parts in plays etc and lots of parents roll their eyes and accept that’s the way it happens.
All 4 kids winning the top 4 prizes though? Surely that’s highly unlikely to be random and takes the biscuit? Or the Easter eggs in this case!
My dc won something and is very happy about winning so it’s not a case of sore loser before anyone accuses me of jealousy.

If this happened at your school would you think it was fixed or just luck?

YANBU = Fixed
YABU = Luck

My DH is a school governor. Last year our eldest won 3 prizes. Though in front of the school they gave one to their sibling who’d been bought the same amount of tickets and didn’t win a dickie bird.

I’d imagine we got talked about too.

Who actually drew the raffle?
It should be someone independent of the PTA (school headteacher, the caretaker, local vicar etc).

Everyone knows you give up your prize if you win more than once.
Bloody rude and yes clearly a fix.

I am on the pta with a group of other mums at a secondary school. This makes me very uneasy.

As an ex PTA member and an ex Chair of Governors, I don’t think the issue here is the children that won, it’s the method of the draw. The draw should be done in front of everyone.

I thought if you sold tickets for a raffle prior to an event, it was covered by the gambling act and they need to declare when and where the draw will be and who would be doing the draw. When I was on the PTA and we did this, a member also filmed it and did it a a Facebook live thing so as people could see it if they wanted too

In our school the draw is done with pta members AND some named teachers in order to avoid suspicions.

I think your raffle was fixed @PTAcoincidence

Unfortunately there are members of the PTA who take the pi$$ and are downright dishonest.

I used to help out at all the school fairs, and noticed that one of the PTA chairs would conveniently take the best donations and anything left over.

We did a pta event today with a small raffle drawn in front of everyone, think 60 kids, and one of the pta Mum's organising had both her kids win two out of four prizes. She was mortified!

It's potentially pta mums buying more tickets? That said our head always draws the raffle. And we have to have a licence and have to be clear when the raffle is drawn and where.

I don't think Teachers are clued in at all to who the pta mums are to be honest so it should affect plays.

I don’t know who drew the raffle because it was conducted behind closed doors and after the dad had made off with the biggest hamper. It’s comic really the sheer cheek of it. The same family won last year too which adds to the suspicion.
The tickets were sold online so we didn’t get physical tickets and can’t be sure how the draw was conducted at all or even if all the bought tickets were put in.
If one or two of the 4 kids had won it wouldn’t be as suspicious. Nor if they’d all won but a variety of prizes. But the 4 top prizes? Nah.

If I were on the PTA, the last thing I would want would be for my kids to win dozens of Easter eggs.

I’d have been mortified too.
The PTA raise a lot of money for the school and provide activities and resources. They are amazing in making up for the shortfalls in funding.

Fix.

In my school today the raffle was drawn in front of the whole school by members of the PAC, the kids had physical raffle tickets too which added to the excitement.

Online takeup can be non existent and nobody really carries around cash to get caught by the gate with a ticket selling table - there's a good chance that the payment report showed about 6 tickets bought and rather than have a bunch of donated prizes with nobody to win them, the chair put in £300 of his own money so a) the raffle didn't fail and b) so it's not obvious there's sod all interest in the school fundraising and they might as well give up.

PTA are generally a right PITA, but if it's something like that - and I've done the draws before now with zero interest in staying for the event, but I'm independent/don't give a monkey's who wins, I just have to pull a couple of tickets or run a number generator - it doesn't seem too bad that he got a couple of baskets in return for the sizeable purchase.

I’d be worried what else they are nicking.

I'm saying it's not a fix, but only because I can't believe that anyone could be that much of a brazen, lying, cheating grifter - but I might be wrong!

Just the fact it was drawn behind closed doors and before the event even began is enough to think it's suss - normally it's done at the end, so they can hopefully sell more tickets at the thing itself

Could be worse though; my ex's PTA treasurer stole the entire bank balance, and not only did the idiot head not involve the police - "she's having a lot of family problems" - he actually allowed her to collect money at future events

And when I insisted on giving someone else the stall fee she threatened raise a complaint

Take a look at these rules.

https://www.gamblingcommission.gov.uk/public-and-players/guide/page/how-to-run-a-fundraiser-with-lotteries-or-raffles-at-events

It's very interesting.

No way should the tickets have been drawn behind closed doors. An online draw for what's basically a chocolate raffle? Ridiculous.
That said, back in the days when I helped run the official PTA raffles, and the head always drew the tickets in front of a crowd, it was very common for some families to win loads. They'd simply bought more tickets. I made lists of winners in case anyone wanted to question or audit it. Pain in the arse.
I think I won a car cleaning kit once. A single crappy prize in 7 years. PTA privilege. I put it back in. I like a dirty car.

The PTA have card readers at every event because so many people don’t have cash. Not having cash is never an excuse not to donate or buy some sweets on a Friday or some cakes that the kids have baked.
It’s much more fun to hold a physical ticket and be there for the draw hoping that you’ll win something. and go up to get your prize if you do. It’s gone all mystery themed now. Dc thinks the winning family of the biggest prize is chosen after a discussion by the PTA and is a bit cross that the same child won two years in a row.

Yeah, I think this is far too suspicious to be a coincidence!

The odd prize, sure, even some of the main prizes, but not all four.

My DS won an amazing Bluetooth speaker recently at an event at DD’s school - unfortunately dd was one of the people drawing out the raffle but at least it was in front of people. Then the other ticket we had bought (I only bought two as only had £2 left!) also got drawn - I said to draw again as it was too embarrassing!

yeah that’s shit. And why people won’t join the PTA. Or PC.

I am chair just now, in a rural Scottish school, for my sins.

I am the annoying one, trying to change things and make it more accessible.

I drew a raffle at a family games night this week. not in public. The night was running over, so I stopped playing, pulled the head out to draw it, another staff member to supervise and we ticketed the prizes for people to collect as they left.

I am from a raffle village, always draw it in public or as above with two individuals. NEVER take more than one main prize behind closed doors, and indeed in public most of committee would pop back in.

sounds highly against the ethos of fundraising and yes I would raise it, but I would also take it over and change it.

Whether it a coincidence would depend on many of the tickets were purchased by the family. If they stuck in £100 out of the £500 there is a high chance of winnig. It is not uncommon for most raffle tickets purchases to come from the PTA members. So many parents don't give a shit about putting anything in but just like to complain.

I bet they bought a lot of tickets, does anyone really want multiple hampers of eggs a week before Easter! It does sound a very odd set up though and should be drawn in public.

I'm a helper on our PTA. More often than not, our main committee members will have a redraw if they win any of the main prizes or if they win more than one prize at all. If they are drawn lower down the list/smaller prize they will take it (they buy tickets same as rest of us) but only one. Nor do they take front row seats or anything else preferential (for them or their kids) - they're usually too busy helping with refreshments etc

Yours seems a bit suspicious to me, and is what gives PTA a bad name.