Mansfield SS smashes fundraising target

Mansfield State School’s LCC raised double their fundraising target simply by setting up a page in the Champion Your Chappy portal and sharing it in their network.

With an original “ambitious” target of $4500 to build towards their yearly fundraising target for Chappy Verrity Smith at the rapidly growing school, the campaign, held throughout February, pulled in $7931 in online donations.

LCC chairman, Michael Petersen, said they hadn’t usitilised CYC before but found the process quick and easy – and effective!

The campaign is really easy to set up, and it takes a lot of the labour out of fundraising and enables the call for support to reach more people in a way that is easily actionable by them,” he said.

“You pretty much just add a photo, a few paragraphs about the service and your fundraising goal, and you’re away. The fact that the site is easy to donate to on mobile is a big plus.

“It was a great campaign that was able to engage a broad supporter base.   Teachers, past students, parents, business owners, local youth group members and more all pitched in to make a large difference.”

Michael said the extra funds were a blessing for a school with more than 1100 students.

“Our school is growing rapidly at the moment and we’re in the final stages of determining what extra programs we can run this year,” he said.

“A big priority for us is to take the day to day pressure for raising funds away from Chappy Verrity so she can do what she is called and blessed to do – have impactful positive interactions with the children, staff and community at Mansfield Primary School.”

And Chappy Verrity, who has been the chaplain at Mansfield State School for six years, is thankful for such solid support from the LCC and her community.

“What happens in the Chaplaincy program at Mansfield SS is not possible without the commitment of the LCC,” she said.

“As a team they seek to support the role of the chaplain in a variety of ways, including working alongside the chaplain to raise awareness and financial support of the program within both the school and local community.

“This wonderful group of volunteers give many hours of their time to our always going program, including organising large events, to washing dishes after our Friday morning breakfast program.”

Michael said other LCCs said the key to any fundraising success comes back to relationship.

“Speak to your supporter base often and professionally, work with your strengths, and look for ways to leverage your time and resources, but don’t be too KPI focussed that you miss out on the joy of building a community and brand around the chaplaincy program in schools.”

Tips – How to set up a Champion Your Chappy page:

  1. Go to https://championyourchappy.everydayhero.com/au/get-started
  2. Log In if you have an account already (top right of the page).  
  3. If you don’t have an account, click on Log In (top right of the page), then click on Sign Up (top right of the page, where it used to say Log In).  You can sign up with your email address or with your Facebook account if you choose.
  4. Then simply fill out the boxes and follow the Everyday Hero prompts.
  5. Share it around social media, far and wide!