Getting Free Dinners and Other Gifts for Teachers

Every time we had a faculty meeting, a lot of effort went into checking off everyone on an attendance list to make certain every teacher attended the meeting. Even though very few meetings seemed to provide information that you could have received by email or by written notices, there were a few times that really vital information was given out that really was better to tell everyone in person. Some principals have long and frequent meetings while other have short ones and they are even rare.

Principals however discovered that if they awarded prizes for attendance it seemed that more teachers attended and were on time for the meeting, especially if several prizes were given out. As far as I know there was no scientific study of how effective giving out prizes were at increasing attendance, but it was a nice idea. To get the prizes, a few people were assigned to call local businesses about wanting to give gifts to teachers for a variety of things. A teacher might get a price for getting an award, promotion, or a mention about something good in the newspaper.

Teachers assigned to make the calls to get the gifts called both large and small local businesses. Most jumped at the chance to do something for teachers. Typically they would give out a meal for two at their restaurant totally for free, but often limited to about $20.00. They would sometimes limit the total number of such gifts to two per year or in some cases as many as 4 such gifts per year. They usually wanted a letter on school stationary that gave the basic information. In general they wanted a statement that the gifts would be used to reward teachers at the school for recognition of their commitment to education. Although they might not be so fond of the idea that some of the prizes would be used to increase attendance at faculty meetings which teachers were required to attend. Still it made an exciting end to an often faculty meeting.

Other prizes were awarded also, like an free oil change, a free tire rotation, a free sandwich, a free lunch and many others. We even got a free weekend at a beach resort. Many gifts were actually awarded for real reasons that we should recognize a dedicated teacher and this was also done at the faculty meetings. As teachers entered the meeting they were given a number on a piece of paper and an identical number was placed in a large hat. At the end of the meeting a few numbers were pulled from the hat and those selected received their gift and then a few gifts were awarded to teachers that should be recognized for other reasons. Teachers that won one time, would not be eligible the very next time, but could win again later. If a teacher was not present when the number was called (they may have left early) they did not get their gift.

I had just come back to school from a summer job where I tried to be a telemarketer and I wanted to see just how good I would be at getting businesses to provide gifts. I asked if I could try it with the group assigned to the task, but only wanted to try it for one day. I spent about four hours calling and out of 20 businesses 15 said they would participate. It is easy to see that this is just the start of how we could involve the community even in a small way with the school.

I was amazed how easy this really is to do. It wasn't that I was so good at it, I made a poor telemarketer, but this was different because I came away with the feeling that every business that we called would participate if they could. Some of the ones that said no also added simply that they wanted us to call back in a few weeks.

My suggestion would be to write the sample letter, get it approved, write a phone script and get that approved and when you call keep a record of the calls and the contact names. You may have to drive to the business to pick up the gift which in some cases is just a letter on their stationary about their gift. The school had each one receiving a gift sign for the gift and on that signature line it also stated the value of that gift. We were told to check with our tax accountant about how to report such gifts, which we all did (of course).