Planning for Homecoming

It's that time again! Homecoming events are right around the corner and we wanted to offer some helpful tips and products to make your Homecoming a success!

Get Started Early
Help your Homecoming Committee hit the ground running by holding a kick-off meeting as soon as school starts. Establish sub-committees to handle decorations, entertainment, favors, food and drink and tear-down.

Choose Your Theme
Choose your theme first in order to incorporate it into all aspects of your event. Some of our favorite theme ideas are:

Under the Big Top
Wild Wild West
Hollywood Nights
Disco Fever

Create a Timeline and Budget
Establish deadlines for planning activities working backwards from your event date. Establish a basic budget to track expenses and to figure out how much money you will need from fundraising.

Create a Shopping List
Create a list of all products you will need to purchase and be sure to order them at lease 2-3 weeks ahead of your event. Here are some examples of products you may need:

Banners, Locker Magnets and Save the Dates to advertise your event
Megaphones, Foam Fingers, Pom Poms, etc. for Pep Rallies
Tiaras, Crowns, Sashes and Scepters for your Homecoming Court
Spirit Tees
Decorations
Favors
Tickets - Use branded silicone wristbands as admission tickets

Get some ideas here.

Back to Football Friday Contest!

PTO is inviting you to share your NFL pride and build some serious school spirit by signing up for Back to Football Friday! If you haven’t already registered your school to participate, be sure to register now at www.NFLRUSH.com/contest.

Here’s how it works:
Once you’ve registered, start planning a Back to Football Friday celebration for Friday, September 9th! Invite your school community to get creative and show their NFL team spirit at the celebration… and get those cameras ready!

After the celebration, submit 3-6 photos of your awesome event and answer the 3 questions in the entry form (each 100 words or less) to complete your submission before the contest closes on Thursday, September 22nd.

Here’s the really cool part: the schools that showcase the most NFL pride have a chance to be one of 34 NFL PLAY 60 Super Schools. These grand prize winners will receive a $10,000 NFL PLAY 60 health and wellness grant* and an NFL team celebration that will include a NFL PLAY 60 ultimate gym class at your child’s school. Check out these photos of one of last year’s winning schools at their NFL team celebration. Read more about this contest here.

Here are some products we think could help showcase your NFL spirit at your event.

What Makes a Booster Club Successful?

A successful Booster Club can mean increased revenue, parent involvement, school spirit and brand awareness for your school. But, how are schools building those successful Booster Clubs? Taking a closer look at some of our customer's more established Booster Clubs, we noticed a few things they had in common.

Experienced Board Members: Rather than selection based on seniority, Board Members are chosen based on their experience with event planning, finances, communication and fundraising. We also noticed that one very successful program uses parents of Seniors as mentors of the Board rather than executive members. They will be challenged during their son or daughter’s senior year with helping to prepare for college, scholarships, senior party, and a host of other activities that will take precedence over administrating the Booster Club.

Financial Plan: The Booster Clubs have established a basic financial plan that details not only their income and expenses for the current year, but includes estimated expenses for programs and projects planned for the next two to three years.

Communications Plan: A clear strategy for regular communication with parents and students is key to the success of these programs. They coordinate communications schedules for the year and are utilizing websites, social media and newsletters to get the word out.

Annual Membership Program: An Annual Membership Program can be a great way to build revenue and parent involvement that spans the course of the year. By paying a $30 - $50 annual fee, parents are granted access to all home sporting events as well as events at other district schools. Not only will this increase attendance at events, but it will also increase your concession sales.

Strong Apparel Program: Booster Clubs that have done the research to find out what apparel items are popular with students today, and get help from their vendor to find quality items and create a strong design are seeing increased sales for their spiritwear. Many of our customer's Booster Clubs have a Director of Spiritwear.

Regular & Unique Events: Frequent unique events are also a common thread among our customer's Booster Clubs. Schools are thinking outside the box to host fun, unique events that draw interest from parents and students. Some examples are fashion shows, team reunion parties, weekly coaches breakfast with parents and garage sales.

Be sure to use the following resources when starting or growing your Booster Club program:

http://www.boosterclubs.org/
www.ptotoday.com
http://www.pta.org/

Expanding Your Uniform Policy to Boost School Spirit

We recently read about Atlanta's Bay Minette Middle School's (BMMS) effort to enhance their uniform policy. The school The school added Spirit T-shirts in five colors: black, orange, kiwi, light pink, and camo, all with BMMS Logo. BMMS is selling the shirts along with their embroidered polo at registration.

We think this is an excellent idea to boost school spirit, allow for some flexibility in the uniform policy without straying from the school brand or undercutting the goal of the policy and raise funds for your school. This idea would be easy to implement and manage by administration or PTO/PTA/Booster Clubs at your school.

Having the right design is the key to the success of a spiritwear or uniform program like the one at BMMS. While we think student involvement in spiritwear programs is essential, we also recommend working with a spiritwear vendor to create a design that will both reflect your brand and appeal to the student body. Your students can help you focus in on some popular design ideas and your spiritwear vendor can help translate those ideas into a logo that fits your brand.

You can read more about BMMS and their Spirit T-shirts here.

Follow Us on Twitter!

CSI just joined Twitter in an effort to share news, tips, specials and new products with our customers. We are also following industry professionals to learn more about the challenges you face every day in your schools as well as your successes. If you are on Twitter, we would love to follow you!

Right now on Twitter, we are seeing a lot of posts on the Save Our Schools March on Washington, budget cuts, back-to-school prep and Chicago Charter Schools.

Follow @SchoolPromos

Welcome to the Cranley Scholastics, Inc. Blog!

In an effort to provide added value to our customers, we decided to start a blog where we can post timely tips, articles, links and ideas that can help you to promote school spirit & acheivement in your school or district.

Check back from time to time to get new ideas for your school activites and events. We will also post special offers for products offered through our company. Please feel free to offer us suggestions on what you would like to hear more about on this blog. We look forward to hearing from you. You can also follow us on Twitter by clicking the link below and sign up for our newsletter here.

Follow @SchoolPromos