schools and charity fundraising-what do they mean by this?

[ariadne1]

Local schools are holding a fundraising event for a charity I do not wish to support.

The letter from the event organisers says 'The entry fee for each student to take part is £3.......Students who cannot pay the £3 will have their entry fee covered using the information their school has on their student roll'

I am very suspicious about this last phrase. I do not understand why the event organissers need any details from the child's records.All the school's teachers are going to be in attandance.If the school take them for an inter-schools rounders tournament for example, the organisers don't need the childrens details.
I do not want mine or my childrens details to be shared with this charity or the event organisers, and I certainly don't want them claiming Gift Aid without my consent it sounds as though they might be trying to do?
The letter has no contact details on it , it's just stapled to a school newsletter

I think the school is making an assumption that all parents will support the charity and pay the £3 if they can. My reading of "using the information etc" is that if the pupil is on Free School Meals that the school or somebody else will be covering the cost. I don't think the school have considered that some parents may have a fundamental objection to the charity.
To be clear there is no way that the school should be sharing any personal information with the charity and the school needs to be separating the collection of the £3 from the charity, so that the charity is not aware of those children that are on free school meals, if my assumption on the wording is correct.

I too think it would be related to free school meals. The school may have extra funding available for the children in this group and so take the £3 from this. The remaining children who don't pay may be funded from a different part of the school budget.

I would write to the Headteacher and explain that although you agree with the principle of schools supporting charities, you do not support this particular charity and do not wish to make a donation or for your families details to be passed onto them in any way.
At the end of the day, giving to charity is supposed to be voluntary and I am sure that the school would understand.

admission should the school be using it's funds for charity donations do you think?

It does depend which pot of funding they are using. If it is the main school budget then the answer has got to be no officially, but it happens I am sure. There is however what is called the school fund. If you pay for a trip or sweet shirt or anything like this, it will be paid into this account. Many schools do have a small amount of available funding in this account for helping where families cannot pay.
It is also possible that they have got a grant or something like this that could be used.
I don't think anybody would begrudge the school utilising any available funds to ensure that all pupils are able to access all parts of school life so I don't see where the funding is coming from as an issue but where it is apparently being used is a bit of a grey area.