What kids don’t need.
Competition that allows parents to get involved: These include science fairs, best costume contests, poster contests and anything else kids do in a home where winning becomes the goal at the expense of the experience. Halloween is a huge day for kids, but turning it into a competition changes the focus and provides another opportunity for some kids to feel uncomfortable, some victorius and many left out of the experience. Kids don’t need any help loving Halloween and let's face it...nobody likes science fairs except the kids with the cool experiments that involve explosions, something gross or candy.
Contests: If there is a contest, there is a parent who will do just about anything to win it. It becomes every contest they never won or yet another in a long string of victories. This can involve milk caps, labels, box tops and other things corporations have suckered us all into in attempts to increase their profits. These items become desired, or we adjust our shopping habits to help our children “win”. This also goes for the sales of things. October brings a slew of merchandise children are asked to sell, create, or push in order to raise money for the school, a trip, or who knows what else. In every employee lunch room you will find open order forms with a pen laying across it, trying to guilt people into buying stuff they would never buy otherwise (I’m talking to you, scented candles). How do you tell a fellow worker that you won’t buy a candy bar to help her child get to Italy to be in a concert, even when you are working two jobs to be able to afford a few more frozen pizzas?
I remember my father, who was a doctor, taking my Girl Scout cookie sheet to the hospital, and came back with a couple hundred dollars worth of orders. He signed up for 60 himself. I knew it was he who deserved the patch for most cookies sold to immediate family. I think we cold just be honest and make these contests for parents.
External incentives: Children don’t need awards to do good works. Children can get extremely excited about doing something good for others. They like to keep track of how many cans they bring in for a food drive, but have no idea who brought what. Children have big hearts and don’t yet realize that people think they should get some kind of reward for everything they do. Adults screw everything up when they take what could be a perfectly altruistic, goal oriented event and cheapen it by turning it into another contest. Kids aren’t the ones who need them. “But,” you will say, “they LOVE contests!” That’s because we have them. Kids also love accomplishing a goal or doing something just for fun. Children don’t need stickers on math papers, stars, points, or prizes. They just want to learn stuff and think of themselves as a smart kid. You might say, “But kids love to get little rewards!” That’s because we give them.
We have made them important.
There are schools that give parents the option of forgoing the fundraisers and pleas for contributions by just writing a check for some block amount. If not that, then really go for it. Send out emails every few days asking for donations of even 5 bucks. Mid-year start asking for $25. Do this for the whole year. It has worked pretty well for politicians. I would bet after a year of this, parents would gladly do the block check thing.
While some fantastic and important things have been done through fundraisers (many of which I have benefited from), I can’t help but think about the big city school I left many years ago. It didn’t even bother having fundraisers. Few people had funds. The playground there was a slab of blacktop with hints of bases painted on. Fences were high and every staff member on duty had a walky-talky in case a fight broke out. I left when we started doing safety drills to get kids into the school quickly in the event that gunfire broke out in the neighborhood. I think about that place every October when the fund raising starts. Maybe sometime, schools will have fundraisers for other schools. That would be a great service project for anyone fortunate enough to be looking for one. The reward would be intangible and unforgettable.
