5 Great Resources for Teachers: How to Get Supplies, Materials, Funds, and Support for Your Classroom

Every teacher has a wish list. Every teacher gets great ideas, but then can't fund those ideas. If you know what is out there, there is no dream too big! The world wants to support schools, but teachers just need to know where to go.

Donors Choose

This is by far the best teaching resource available to teachers today. It is a website where you can post projects that you would like to have funded. This can be anything from basic supplies you need, like papers and pencils, to an extravagant field trip idea you need funding for, as long as it directly benefits students. Potential donors browse the site and donate to projects that they want to help fund. In addition, philanthropic foundations and major corporations provide support for projects as well. For example, The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has several major grants dedicated to funding projects that align most closely with their goals for supporting American education. This is usually for projects in high poverty schools or projects that support college prep programs.

In return, all they ask is that you write a thank you letter, take pictures of your students using the supplies, and have your students write thank you letters as well. In the year and a half that I have been using DonorsChoose, I have had 7 projects funded. I have been able to get everything from colored copy paper to microphones. Sign up at donorschoose.org

Target Field Trip Grants

What teacher doesn't want to be able to take his/her class on a field trip? However, these days, field trip budgets are not common practice. The answer? A Target Field Trip Grant! Applications are accepted each Fall for trips in the Spring. It is only a few hundred dollars per teacher, and there is no guarantee that you will be accepted, but it is a great starting point and definitely worth applying.

Last year, I was able to take my Honors English class to a real professional theater to see a classic Ibsen play. The experience meant a lot to the students, and Target even sent out a special field trip kit full of goodies to make the trip special.

Freecycle

Most major cities (including the suburbs) have a Freecycle program. Just Google "Freecycle" along with your city to find the closest one. Most of them are Yahoo Groups that operate through a list serve. People post things that they no longer want. The goal is to keep things out of landfills. While you cannot necessarily always find specific things that you may want or need, if you diligently check the posts, you can easily scoop up great resources for your classroom. You may find yourself creatively finding ways that you could use, well, almost anything!

In addition, although it is not constant, it is also a good idea to check the "free" section of your local Craigslist website. One colleague of mine found a free classroom set of captain style rolling computer chairs. He rented a truck, picked them all up, and replaced the chairs in his classroom with these computer chairs. Although I laughed the first time I walked in and saw that his classroom now looks something like a corporate board room with all those big chairs, I have to admit that the students seem to adjust their attitudes to the atmosphere. This is just one great example of the randomly wonderful stuff you can find by searching the internet for free stuff.

Local Businesses

A lot of local businesses will happily cough up their leftovers as a tax write-off by donating them to schools, or even just to do the right thing. I have a few different businesses that give me all of their photocopy paper once it has one side copied on. For example, the park district doesn't reuse fliers once the date of the advertised event is passed, so they give them to me to make copies for my students on the back of them. Another business gives me their training worksheets and their faxes for the same purpose. I have also heard of other teachers getting donations of computers when a company upgrades to newer models. The possibilities are endless; you just have to get the word out there. Start with your friends and family. Just mention that you have no budget for supplies, so if they can think of anything that they might be getting rid of that could be of use to you (paper, office supplies, electronics), it could be go great help to you. You would be surprised what you might get. By just talking about the things you are doing at school, you will find that people want to support you.

Local Library

Okay, this might sound like an obvious one to teachers, but let's think about something- how many times have you realized that a certain book or a certain movie would perfectly into your curriculum, so you rush to Borders to buy it or click to Amazon and order it online. Why not check the library first, to see if you can get it there for free? Sure, it might be a good investment to just have it for your curriculum permanently, but if funds are low, you might as well just try it temporarily for now. If the lesson goes well, then you can put in a request when supplies are ordered for the following year, and hope it gets ordered. If the lesson doesn't go well, at least it didn't cost you any money.

The other great resource at local libraries is the library bookstore. Although not all libraries have them, many public libraries have a used bookstore where you can buy books, movies, and audio books for very cheap. This past Winter, our English department decided to give every student a book for Christmas. In order to accomplish this task, we sought donations of books and money from other teachers and friends. The money we collected went so much further at the library bookstore than it would at a traditional book store. For $100, I was able to buy over 200 books!