Easy school fundraiser idea with up to 110% Back!

If you are looking for an easy school fundraiser idea for Elementary or Preschool (Pre-K) children. Take a look at our Reach For the Stars, easy school fundraiser idea, where every participating child or the entire graduating class receives books!

  • What other school fundraiser idea rewards children so well?
  • What other fundraiser promotes literacy?
  • Plus we have a bonus to help parents prepare for federal financial aid for college!

5 Benefits of Our Read-a-thon School Fundraiser

The Reach for the Stars school fundraiser is a read-a-thon idea. It’s a program designed to:

      1. Give children an incentive to read,
      2. Keep children reading by establishing good habits over time
      3. Reward children for reading with fun educational books
      4. Act as an easy school fundraiser idea to raise books and/or cash for an organization, charity, church, boy scouts, team, youth groups, schools (including: elementary, preschool, middle, day care), etc.
      5. Give parents information on saving for college and preparing for financial aid

Children directly benefit from participating!

Reach For the Stars Steps:

    1. Choose your fundraising option
      • 110% Return for Books!  Provides only free books for the school, books for every participant, plus a copy of How You Can Maximize Student Aid for participants in your school’s Highest Grade Level.
      • 105% Return for 15% Cash, plus books! Provides a mixture of free books and cash for the school, plus books for every participant, plus a copy of How You Can Maximize Student Aid for participants in your school’s Highest Grade Level.
      • 100% Return for 20% Cash, plus books! Provides only cash for the school, plus books for every participant, plus a copy of How You Can Maximize Student Aid for participants in your school’s Highest Grade Level.
      • Graduation option for 30% Cash, plus books! Provides only cash for the school, plus a copy of How You Can Maximize Student Aid for EVERY STUDENT in your school’s Highest Grade Level..
       PROGRAM OPTIONS 110% Return 105% Return 100% Return Grad Option
      Cash to School 0% 15% 20% 30%
      Books for Your School 30% 10% 0% 0%
      Books for Kids 50% 50% 50% 0%
      Prizes 10% 10% 10% 10%
      Participants in your school’s Highest Grade Level receive: How You Can Maximize Student Aid 20% 20% 20% N/A
      All Students in your school’s Highest Grade Level receive: How You Can Maximize Student Aid N/A N/A N/A 60%

      (N/A = not applicable)
      *ALWAYS FREE SHIPPING*

    2. Ask Children to Read: Children are asked to read (or be read to if very young) for a minimum of 300 minutes (150 for young children – preschool) over a ten day period. Children choose 10 out of 14 days to read. (The idea behind four days off is to allow for extracurricular and other family activities.) Children collect pledges from sponsors on reading journal logs.
    3. Ask Children to Find Sponsors: Sponsors are asked to pledge the child at a flat rate amount for their Reach For the Stars: reading efforts. Sponsors are encouraged to give their fundraising pledge money when signing, but they may also ask the student to return after the reading period to collect the pledge.
    4. Let Children Choose Their Own Book(s): Students will receive FREE BOOKS with the pledge money collected!!!
    5. Close out the Program: Order, receive, and distribute books.

Three Opportunities for Student Prizes:

    1. Participation Prize: All participants will receive a book (with the exception of the Grad Option program where every student in the graduating class receives a book)
    2. 10-10-10 Challenge: Every student who completes the 10-10-10 challenge receives an additional prize book. To complete this challenge the student collects $10 from 10 different sponsors and reads for 10 days.
    3. Three Individual Prizes: Three individual school prizes are given for
      • the most minutes read,
      • the most pledges collected, and
      • the most sponsors pledged

School Fundraiser Example

Example #1: 100% Return

      A school with grades K through 6 collects $1,000 and chooses the 100% Return option:

      • $200 in cash is given to the school (20% of $1,000 collected)
      • $500 is used to purchase books for students (50% of $1,000 collected)

        A student who collects $20.00 pledge money receives $10 in FREE BOOKS!!!
        ($20 total pledges x 50% = $10.00)

      • $100 is used to purchase prizes (10% of $1,000 collected)
      • $200 (20% of $1,000 collected) is used to purchase copies of How You Can Maximize Student Aid for parents of 6th graders (the highest grade level in the school) who participated in the read-a-thon

Example #2: Graduation Option
A school with grades K through 6 collects $1,000 and chooses the Graduation Option:

    • $300 (30% of $1,000 collected) is given in cash to the school.
    • Students in a lower grades do not receive a book (unless a prize is won).
    • $100 is used for prizes (10% of $1,000 collected).
    • $600 (60% of $1,000 collected) is used for books for all 6th graders (the highest grade level in the school). Often, the books are presented at a send-off celebration.
    • As the program is repeated each year, eventually every student will be in a “Graduation Class” and receive their own free book at that time!

Application Form

Since we have run this program since 2003, we rarely have any issues and are able to work almost entirely through email communication.

Please complete as much information as you have available. This reduces time and emails.

[contact-form-7 id=”1364″ title=”Read-a-thon Inquiry”]

Door-to-door note: Students may, but are not encouraged to go door-to-door. Please use these sponsor ideas: friends, parents, aunts/uncles, grandparents, cousins, extra-curricular instructors, doctor, dentist, parent’s work friends, parent’s golfing or bowling friends, church friends, out of state relatives, and babysitters. We have some of the best educational books available. What a wonderful way to reward children for reading! Our easy read-a-thon is most popular with elementary and preschools but our books range from infant to adult and can be used by both public and private schools, school clubs, christian schools, preschools and more! The Reach for the Stars idea is one of the best school fundraiser ideas for elementary and preschools because it requires so little preparation time and is so EASY to do!School Fundraiser Program Overview Subsribe to our email newsletter.