How to Get a School Involved in Box Tops for Education

Money is tight when it comes to running a school, and the budgets are tight. In some cases, even services and teachers are being cut due to money constraints. One thing parents and educators can do together is to enroll and support Box Tops for Education. Box Tops for Education are little cut-out tickets on many popular grocery items, including Betty Crocker and Pillsbury. Each ticket cut out and sent in is worth ten cents to the school. It may not seem like lots of money, but if your school works together to collect them, it could mean thousands of dollars. Collecting Box Tops for Education should be a part of every school's fundraising effort. Get your school involved in collecting Box Tops for Education today, and here's how.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderately Easy

1. Search the Box Tops for Education website to see whether your school is already enrolled. On the home page, click on "Join Now" on the upper right corner of the site. The site will take you through a series of questions to determine whether your school is already enrolled in the program. Unless your school is new, there is a good chance that your school is already enrolled but that the membership has been inactive.
2. Get your principal or an administrator at your school to call 1-888-799-2444 and officially enroll your school in Box Tops for Education or to reactivate your school if it has an inactive account. Your principal will need to pick a person to be the coordinator of the Box Top campaign. For the purposes of further explaining how to get your school involved, let's say that the principal picks you. He will give your name to Box Tops for Education. He will receive a membership number that he will pass on to you. If he forgets to give you the membership number or if you lose it, you can call the main number and they will give you the number again, providing your name is the one listed as the coordinator. In addition, Box Tops will send you a coordinator packet with lots of valuable information to get you started collecting.
3. Do not wait to receive the packet. Once you have your school's membership number, you can start looking through the website. Decide how to promote Box Tops in your school. From the website, you can print fliers and letters. You can also print a list of the items that have Box Tops. How you promote Box Tops will have a lot to do with your school's budget and resources. Even if you have no money to use, at least access the school's copy machine. You can download and print material and send it home with students. You can also make a collection box for Box Tops for the front office. If you have more resources, you can be more creative and come up with contests to offer the students.
4. Coordinate a group of parents or students to regularly collect the Box Tops from around your school, cut them out and get them ready to send it. Look at the Box Top website or the coordinator packet Boxtops sent you for details. Basically, you will need to put the Box Tops in stacks of 50 to send in. Box Tops for Education has two collection deadlines per year--one at the end of October and the other at the end of February. You will receive Box Tops checks at the end of December and in May for your efforts.

Tips & Warnings

• Use open house and school events to promote Box Tops for Education.
• Use morning announcements or the school news to occasionally remind students to collect them and bring them in.
• Keep an eye out for expired Box Tops and do not send them in. Box Tops will not accept them and if there are too many of them, they may not give you credit for what you turned in or send what you turned in back to you.