Hello parents,
Please download the results from the 2016 Fundraising Survey here and the Fundraising Calendar here Parent Council here created based on those results, which were approved at the Tuesday January 17, 2017 Parent Council Meeting.
Fundraising Survey notes:
- 57 respondents
- By the time the survey was conducted in November, between Parent Council and IRC initiatives, we had already asked families for donations (either cash or goods) 6 times. Seems we may have exhausted donors!
- QSP was the only major fundraiser complete by the time of the survey - may have contributed to the negative response about the QSP program versus other fundraisers
- Comments were varied - many suggested removing at least one other fundraiser if we included the Cash Donation Campaign
- One suggestion that we should host events instead of selling things -parent council agreed, but this is the most laborious of fundraisers and volunteers can be scarce
- Suggestions to remove toy incentives from QSP - Agreed by Parent Council
- Various suggestions for new and different fundraisers - fantastic! It would be most helpful for people who have experienced successful fundraisers to bring forward details and contact numbers, and perhaps volunteer to assist or run them. Everyone is welcome to participate, we love new faces at Parent Council!
Fundraising 2016/2017
- Calendar created based on survey feedback and approved at Parent Council meeting (attached)
- Movie Night in March, Fun Fair in May and Acorn cards will run in March ONLY if a volunteer (or two) comes forward
Fundraising 2017/2018
- IRC Parent Council can't vote on the entire 2017/2018 fundraising calendar because a new Executive Committee may be in power and new parents should have opportunity to weigh in
- The only vote we conducted at Parent Council meeting for the 2017/2018 fundraising year was for no QSP in September (this is common for outgoing councils to make decisions up to September of the following school year, just to get the ball rolling)
- IRC Parent Council decided to do the Cash Donation Campaign in September instead of QSP (Cash Donation Campaign 2016 raised less than $1000 but likely because of donor exhaustion, as noted before)
- Parent Council suggests that QSP runs in the Winter term, without toy incentives, and only if the Cash Donation Campaign doesn't raise enough money
- Interesting to note: QSP raised roughly $8,000 in sales but only about $3000 came back to IRC. If we only take in 1/2 as much from the next Cash Donation Campaign as we did for QSP, we wouldn't have to run QSP or Acorn at all next year!
- Current Parent Council suggest a fundraising calendar be created and approved early in the first term, and circulated to parents so they know what fundraisers and school initiatives are coming in the months ahead
Cash Donation Campaign 2016
As you may be aware, there was some confusion regarding Tax Receipts. We would like to thank everyone who donated and apologize for the confusion. With the best of intentions in mind, the interim Principal tried to assist by taking the reigns and directing money to an IRC/TDSB bank account which would sit in a donations budget line and allow for TDSB to issue tax receipts. This is not ideal for Parent Council, as retrieving those funds is a complicated process. At this time, Parent Council cannot issue tax receipts from our own account, but we continue to look into the best way for us to do so in the future.
Thank you to all those who participated and for your continued support of all our fundraising initiatives!
2016/17 IRC Parent Council
