Many organizations depend on fundraising to get the things they need. People fundraise to get a new swimming pool for their town, or to get special facilities for their school. Sometimes people fundraise to get money for people who need special health care or to help disabled or disadvantaged people. Fundraising is always for a good cause and helps people or organizations in their hour of need.



Once you take on the role of fundraiser, the first thing to do is set a specific goal. Whether it's a large goal or a small one, it needs to be phrased in a way that people can relate to before they will get involved. Naturally the fundraising is to raise money, but what is the money actually for? Does the school need 10 new computers? How would this change the lives of the children attending that school?

The children won't just learn how to play games on these computers, but they will learn skills that they will need all through their working lives. It will benefit them because they will be more employable if they are computer literate. They will learn to do things on their school computers that they would never learn just by having one at home.

Once people can see exactly how they - or their children - would benefit from these computers, they will get behind the project and offer help wherever possible. This goal will benefit teachers by making their work more interesting and easier. It will motivate the children to learn since most children love using a computer.

The next goal - or the sub-goal - will be to find out the amount of money that is needed to achieve our goal. To do this, we need to know how many computers are needed and what sort they will be. Will there be printers and scanners to go with them? Should they be networked? Who will install them and see that they are running properly? There may even need to be blinds installed to reduce the screen glare. The money raised will need to cover all costs, not just the purchase price of the computers. Each sub-goal should be itemized with an approximate cost.

Other questions that need to be addressed for your fundraising campaign are what specific activities you will use to will accomplish your goal, and when they will take place. A timeframe needs to be established, too. If there is no time frame, the fundraising could drag on until everyone is sick and tired of hearing about it. To have specific goal of raising a certain amount of money by a certain date gives people something to work towards and a sense of satisfaction when it is accomplished.