Summer has arrived! Schools are officially out of session, and while some might still have virtual activities, it tends to be the slower time of the year. 

Much of the summer for educational professionals (teachers and administrators alike) is spent recharging and preparing for the next school year. However, this is also a great time for you to emphasize your fundraising campaigns and to boost your communications with your donors.

A good general rule is to send out messages to your donors at least once a month, including over the summer. Just because school is out of session doesn’t mean the fundraising stops.

Below are a few fundraising strategies you should consider implementing over the summer months.

Wrap up the year

The end of the school year is a great time to send updates to your alumni and donors about how the school year went, as well as to create a roundup of any special achievements your school earned or events that occurred. Ideally, you will have been keeping your alumni updated about these occurrences throughout the school year, but the end of the year is a great time for a wrap-up to showcase everything you accomplished over the course of the school year.

Give thanks

The summer is also a great time to show appreciation to your alumni for all of their contributions. Send handwritten thank yous, or get creative with thank you videos or artwork. You might even consider having a special event specifically for donors to honor them.

Build relationships

You can use the warm weather as a way to get your alumni involved and focus on relationship building over the summer. This is a great time to have cookouts and other outdoor gatherings that bring people together, as long as the situation surrounding COVID-19 allows it. Create meaningful connections at these events so you can establish relationships that you can maintain throughout the school year, even when things get busy.

Update your communications

The downtime associated with summer is a great time to analyze the communication tools you’re using and figure out how you can improve them. If you have a newsletter for your alumni, figure out what you can do to make them more interesting and informative. Spend some time analyzing your online presence and try to find more opportunities for engagement. 

Keep the information coming

Finally, just because school is out for the summer does not mean there won’t continue to be important information and updates to share. Continue to send updates about goings-on at the school, local policies or issues like referendums your alumni will be interested in knowing about and opportunities for them to get more involved.

For more information about the steps you can take this summer to stay in communication with your alumni donors and to keep them plugged in to what’s happening at your school, district or foundation, contact us today.