Many of you have asked and SCRIP cards are coming back in a new fundraising format! As most of you have heard, Upbeat is no longer able to offer individual student accounts. This is in order to maintain our 501c3 status and affects non profits district wide. At the last Upbeat meeting parents expressed an interest in fundraising to defray trip costs for families. This can be done within a few boundaries. First, the primary function of Upbeat is to ensure the financial success of the band program. Any fundraisers that are already budgeted as income to the band program are not eligible for these purposes for this reason because they will be used to cover planned costs. (Kroger cards, Jazz ‘N Cakes, split the pot, etc.) We need to keep those programs alive and growing.
Assuming those needs are covered, we can provide a new account that defrays the cost of a trip equally for all club participants. Unlike individual student accounts, this kind of account is allowed because it provides equal benefit to all members. We are going to do this with the SCRIP program and its proceeds. Since the original SCRIP program USED to be a student account program it never figured into the general band budget. As we bring it back we will put the money earned into this “trip account” and the money will be used to defray the cost of Macy’s as the first trip.
Judy Donley will be leading this program for us again! Please watch the web site and your email for information very soon on how to participate. It’s great timing with Christmas coming and if you shop at these merchants anyway it puts “free money” into the trip account to bring the cost down (similar to how the “old” Kroger program used to work).