The Catholic School Leaders Podcast

19 how fundraising dollars were used
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Welcome back to the Catholic School Leaders podcast. Today I want to do some follow up on a podcast episode that I did a few weeks ago about why did our fundraising come up short. And I really want to dive in deeper to one of the areas that I spoke about in that podcast. As we're coming to the end of the year, and your fundraising efforts, your annual fund efforts, your golf tournaments, your gala events, any of the big things are probably just about wrapping up and the school year is coming to a close, so it's time to put a bow on this fiscal year.

Most of our schools, I'm going to guess, end on June 30th, start that new calendar year on July 1st, and so you're probably putting a bow on everything, bringing everything to a close, so it's a great way for us to Tell our folks out there that supported our school where those proceeds went and making it very clear where those proceeds went.

So today I want to talk a little bit more about that. Making it clear where your proceeds went. Maybe giving you [00:01:00] some ideas to report what projects were funded and where all of your dollars were spent and allocated. That your advancement office did such an amazing job raising and that your donors did such an amazing job supporting.

So first off I think that Before we can get to the end, we have to really start at the beginning. And if this isn't something that you found that you were doing this year, it's a great way to start next year. And that's letting everybody know where their donations are going to be going in advance. This is such a big part because it gives everybody an opportunity to see what our goals are.

If our goal is to overhaul the technology department in the younger grades of our school, then let's put it out there. That's one of our goals. If our goal is to put a new roof on the school, then let's put it out there. That's one of our goals for this year. What I would say is that if your goal is to say, listen, our electricity costs have gone up and we really need this money to pay our electricity costs.

That's probably not going to move the bar a whole lot. [00:02:00] Now, that's something I think it's assumed in with tuition that you're going to cover. And so that's really probably not going to excite your donors a whole lot. People want to see that their projects or their hard earned dollars are being used to advance the school forward.

That's the advancement piece of things. And so, we want to start at the beginning and let everybody know exactly what our goals are for that year, and if we hit those goals, How is that money going to be used? If you give us 25, 000, we'll tell you what we're going to use the money for later. That's not inspiring to anybody.

Everybody's not going to really jump right on that and go, Yes, you know what? We'll do 30, 000 then, if you're not going to tell us what it's for. But if we're going to state in advance, Hey! If we raise 25, 000 this year through our annual day of giving or whatever the particular fundraising cause might be, it's going to lead to support to allow us to overhaul our technology department in the younger grades of our school building.

That inspires people to know [00:03:00] exactly what we're shooting for, exactly what our goal is. and allows us to really track that progress. As the saying goes, if we aim at nothing, we'll hit it every time. Give your upcoming projects a name in advance to allow them to generate excitement and support.

I think one of the biggest things I could advise a person out there that is responsible for overseeing the advancement offices, the fundraising component at your school. And I recognize for some of our schools, that's the principal. I recognize for some of our schools, it's an advancement director, a development director.

Whoever the person is that is overseeing that fundraising wing of your school, this is the one piece of advice I would give you. Mean what you say. and say what you mean. Here's where we're getting at with that. If you tell everybody that your fundraising effort or your goals are to do X and then as a result you do Y, it really lacks integrity and it really [00:04:00] hurts your integrity as a school.

Now many schools out there have a different person who oversees your advancement work. Sometimes it's a principal in some of our smaller schools. Some of our schools are blessed enough to have an advancement director, a development director. Some of our schools may have multiple people in their development and advancement office.

Whatever the case might be, one of the biggest things that I could advise you as a fundraising officer in your school is this one piece of advice. And that is to mean what you say. and say what you mean. This is going to foster integrity, it is going to foster trust, and it's going to lead to you creating that culture of giving that you're looking to achieve at your school.

When you make that deposit of trust, and when you are leading with integrity, and showing people that what you are saying is exactly what you're doing, It makes more and more deposits into that bank of trust. What I would say about trust is this, [00:05:00] doing something that you're saying, hey, our money's going to go toward this, and then we do something with this, that's dishonest.

I'm just going to say that out front. It's dishonest, and doing something other than the intended purpose of what you raised the funds for is going to lead to a really big problem within your school. Remember that trust is something that needs to be earned. Trust is something that takes a long time to build.

But you can have it undone in about 30 seconds if you're not careful. And once you lose trust, you're never going to get it back. A lack of trust is going to spread like wildfire. And so remember when we are dealing in Catholic education, we are dealing with people's faith. We are dealing with our kids.

We are dealing with their money. And people are very passionate about those three things. They should be. So, we want to make sure that we're holding that integrity and saying what we mean and meaning what we say. Now, I recognize sometimes things happen. In the event that something happens where you have to change course you want to make sure that you're being [00:06:00] extremely transparent with stuff like this.

And if you ever do need to change course, My advice for you would be it better be for a very good reason just because we say, Hey, our goal was to do this, but look, we raised double that. So now we can do this.

If we ever do need to change course, as I said, it better be for something really good. And please be transparent about that. Here's what I would mean by that. A donor maybe gives you a gift and you tell the person that we're going to use it towards this, and then the roof starts leaking.

I don't know. Something that is very drastic. And you say, listen Mr. and Mrs. So and so, instead of doing it for this, I know we talked about this, but we'd like to use this donation for this instead. Are you okay with that? Tell me your thoughts about that. If they say, yeah, no problem, and a [00:07:00] lot of donors you'll find will say, hey, no problem with that, I understand, that's what you mean, let's go forward with it.

But if they say no, then you better be prepared to find another funding source to take care of that problem that you're facing now at the school. So, integrity is such a big thing, creating that trust in the Advancement Office takes time. Those of you that are in an Advancement Office, you probably know this already, that it takes time to show people that what you're doing matters, and that what you're doing holds the integrity that Hey, we raised this money and it went towards this.

And so we're going to talk a little bit more about how to show people that's exactly what happened. Let's talk about how we can show our communities, our alumni, our parents, our faculty, our students, everybody that's associated with our school, where our dollars for our Advancement Office were raised and where they were allocated.

I'm going to give you some ideas of ways to report that some are very complicated, some don't require a lot of Planning it [00:08:00] all, and you can do them very simply.

One of the easiest ways to do this is through end of year recognition. Now this can be informally, this can be in a more formal setting. A lot of different schools will do this a lot of different ways. But something as simple as a thank you letter at the end of the year, or a phone call to just say thank you to that donor, and, hey, as a result of what you did, we were able to put that money toward this it goes a long way.

Yeah, I recognize it takes a little bit of time, and you're, trying to track down people, or maybe you're leaving messages or things like that. But just making that quick end of year recognition to somebody to really showcase where your funds went will pay off in the long run. Another way that we used to do this and something that a lot of schools do is that end of year annual report.

What did you raise this year? How did you raise it? Who did you raise it from? And when we say who did you raise it from, let's not forget our sponsors, and let's not forget our matching gifts that may have taken place. We want to recognize all those, [00:09:00] put them into one publication, and then most importantly, talk about as a result of all the success that we had, where did those funds go?

I know a lot of schools will recognize people in tears, and that's one way you can do it. Another way you could do it is just to list anybody that made a contribution to your school. Also, really putting it out there highlights who did and didn't give. And sometimes that has a little bit of peer pressure when they're among friend groups.

And I recognize that's not the end game of what it is that we're trying to do. But that does matter in certain communities. And so, putting that out there and showing people exactly who gave and where the money went is something that can be really powerful and very helpful for your school.

As again, as I said before, I wouldn't go into every little, Hey, we spent 2 on this and 3 on this and 4 on that, but overall saying we spent 10, 000 and as a result, we were able to put this playground in or redo the basketball court or whatever the case might be. And kind of keeping that at a 10, 000 foot level, I think [00:10:00] we'll go a long way to showing, listen, we raised 150, 000 and we spent 150, 000 and this is how it was spent.

Exactly how we said it was going to be spent at the beginning of the year. If you do that and you mirror, again, going back to saying what you mean and meaning what you say, You're going to see that level of trust increase with your advancement office, which is only going to lead to a greater culture of giving in the future.

Now, I've seen schools out there that will do something very fancy, like a magazine that's so many pages long and highlight everything and messages and pictures and everything like that, which is fantastic. I also recognize that not everybody can do that. Not everybody may have the manpower to do that.

Not everybody may have the funding to do that. And so we have to look at other creative ways that we can show where our money was allocated. There's different ways you can do this. You can put it on your website. It's a great way to highlight exactly what's going on. When prospective families are coming to visit your website, they [00:11:00] see that there's a culture of giving that's already in process at the school that they're considering.

They also see kind of where your priorities are. Where are you spending that money that you bring in? That Advancement Office website, which shows exactly how funds were allocated, can be a great way to do that. You can also, if you do decide to do a magazine or an annual report that's a published version, Putting a pdf file of that on the website or on the particular landing page that you have at your school is a great thing that you can do.

And by the way, too, you don't have to print out 500 copies of your annual report. But having a few of those available in the front office on a table when people come in and accessible to people if they ever say, hey, where did this go? Or how did this go? Or things like that. You can make those available to them right there and then.

Hey, here it is. Take a look at it. Let me know if you have any questions. I know a lot of schools do newsletters each week. That's a great way to highlight exactly where things were allocated, money was put toward. Now I recognize that you can do [00:12:00] that along the way too. If you hold a, I don't know, a golf tournament at the beginning of the year and you say, Hey, we raised 25, 000 toward it.

You're probably going to report that in real time. But at the end of the year, don't forget to report it again. Hey, don't forget we did this golf tournament because you'll find that people go, yeah, we did do that at the beginning of the year. That was a great time. Reporting it back again really puts a bow on everything and shows exactly what went on and kind of reminds people of the great events that happened at your school that year.

And finally, social media is something that can be utilized to report out your progress. Dropping a Facebook page or whatever social media outlet your school uses. can be a fast and easy way to get things out there to people in real time. And I guarantee you that when that goes out there a lot of people will review it, a lot of people will see it and they'll share it as well, which is a great thing, because you want to get that reporting out there to as many people as you can so that you're telling the story of what's happening at your school.

I know a lot of schools will [00:13:00] do or along the way or they'll say, Hey, we're going to fund a need. We're going to raise money for this specific thing. And when this specific thing finally gets installed, again, I keep using the example of a playground or whatever the case may be a sports field. It's always great to have.

Not only a ribbon cutting, but a blessing for that new particular thing for your school, that new area for your school. And when you have that ribbon cutting and that blessing that takes place, what a great way to invite those donors who contributed to make that new endeavor for your school possible to be present.

Maybe they don't take advantage of it, maybe they come, maybe they don't, but that invitation to show them and that remind them again, we said we were going to do this. We raised the money, you donated toward this, and now it's a reality, and we just want to thank you one more time. It's such a special thing for that particular donor to feel part of.

Inviting people to attend things and be part of [00:14:00] things on your campus is a great way to not only say thank you, but also to once again showcase exactly where the dollars that they brought to your school were allocated towards.

Now, a couple of minutes ago I brought up an end of year recognition, and this type of recognition or this type of reporting doesn't have to necessarily happen at the end of the year, but I guess it could happen at any point during the year. And that's a personalized thank you to a particular donor. I talked to a cousin a couple years ago who made a donation to his college, and he told me, he said that night, a couple months later, that A person from the college called him and he expected when he saw the number on the call coming in that it was going to be hitting him up for money.

And he said when he answered the phone the person on the other end of the phone was a student at the college and said, Hey, I just want to say thank you. And he was kind of caught off guard by that. And he said, well, as a result of your donation, I was able to do this. [00:15:00] And I just want to say thank you so much because of your generosity, I was able to do this.

And he just was shocked by that. There was no ask for money. There was no Hey, can you give us more? Hey, can I do this? Hey, can you sponsor this? It was just a thank you, and the conversation went back and forth a couple of minutes, and that was it. What do you think happened the next time that school reached out to him to make a donation?

Of course he was generous. Of course he was probably even more generous with what it was that he was able to bring to it. So those personalized thank yous along the way, That really add that personalized touch to your advancement office can go a long way. A personalized call from a teacher, personalized call from a student, if it's appropriate at the level that you're at.

Somebody in your community, just to say thank you and to recognize them for what they're doing. One of the things I always like to recommend to schools is to have your teachers, Make cards, thank you cards at the beginning of the year from the kids that you can [00:16:00] utilize throughout the course of the year.

Just put them in your desk and have them at your availability as you're going on throughout the school year so that when a gift comes in or a donation comes in that you're able to include one of those cute cards that your first graders made. With smiley faces and sunshine and trees or whatever is on the card that was in their mind.

Just including that kind of a card or that kind of a personalized letter from a child at your school who benefited from that donor's generosity really is something that tugs at the heartstrings. So you, having our kids be part of that and just having that thank you come directly from them is something that really goes a long way.

Additionally, I've seen schools that Have kids write letters to donors and maybe they're not going to say, Hey dear Mr. Smith, I recognize you did XYZ, but thank you so much. But they're telling their story. Hey, thank you for your generosity toward the scholarship fund. As a result, I'm participating in A, B, and C, and I plan to do D, E, and F this year.

And my plans are this. And so [00:17:00] thank you for your generosity. People like to see where their money's going and getting our kids or our teachers involved on that personal basis is something that could really go a long way.

Now we've talked a lot about different ways that we could report our fundraising and our advancement efforts to our constituents, to our donors, to our community. One of the things that I think kind of going back to the beginning of this is to make sure that what you're raising funds for is something that people are actually interested in.

I know I talked earlier about that, hey, we need money for it to pay an electric bill and how that's not very inspiring. If something is of interest to you, but of not really anybody else, it's probably going to not meet the expectations that you had in your mind. I think this is a great way to ask teachers, ask community members, What it is that they feel your school needs to allow you to look at those long term projects and those short term projects.

Having a list at your disposal for the [00:18:00] next three to five years of projects that you want to undertake and knowing the urgency and immediacy of which each of those needs to be done is something it's always great to have on hand. That donor walks in and says, hey, I want to contribute to 50, 000 to your school, what would you use it towards?

Be ready for that answer. Have those goals in mind and things that are going to take your school forward, not just for the short term, but for the long term.

I mentioned earlier about having that plan at the beginning of the year so that you can really show what your goals are. And I know it's crazy to think about it because this year is coming to an end. But next year is going to be here before you know it.

I mean, just blink your eyes and you know summer will be ending. There's no better time to think about what's going to be happening next year than over the summer and starting to think that advancement plan forward for next year. So at Elementary Advancement Solutions, I help Catholic schools grow their advancement offices.

Our goal is to maximize your potential. It's a great [00:19:00] time to start thinking about next year now. There was an old saying that we used to use. The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago, and the second best time is today. So a solid intentional advancement plan is going to help take what your school is doing and make it even stronger for years to come.

So if you think you may have left some money on the table this year regarding advancement, Set up a time with me. Let's have a virtual cup of coffee. Let's talk about what your needs are and hear about, you know, what you're looking to do next year, because personalizing that experience for you and what I do can help your school exceed its fundraising goals for next year.

I only work with a limited number of schools each year, and I want to make sure that you have someone that's going to be able to walk with you on this journey. of Growing Your Advancement Office. So if you want to sit down, if you want to talk with me, if you want to talk through what your last fundraiser was, I'm happy to sit down.

I want to hear what you're doing. I want to hear how you're doing that at your school and see if I can help you growing Catholic education and growing your advancement office. I [00:20:00] mean, that's the name of the game here at the end of the day. is growing and advancing Catholic education. So visit me elementaryadvancement.

com, set up a time with me, book a session with me, let's have a virtual cup of coffee. Let's talk about how things went last year and where there might be opportunities for you to grow things in the future. Love to hear from you. At the end of the day, the name of the game is all about Catholic education.

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