What to do when you lose support from your school?

[Pauline Tasci]

If I were in your position, and the budget did not pass, I honestly would start fundraising ASAP. Become a club outside of school, become your own non-profit. Get a 503 code. Go get some corporate sponsors. Telling people around your area and possible sponsors that you just lost over half your income will encourage people to help you. Work in a parent's garage. Teams like 772 have lost support of teachers and are still one of the top teams. It's not impossible, it just requires a lot of passion and dedication.. which I am positive your team has.

And in the worst case scenario you can move down to a cheaper program, possibly FTC.

[mega900997]

Originally Posted by pfreivald

That's not quite true. If the budget doesn't pass the third Tuesday of May, then the district has the option of submitting a revised budget to the district, or may choose to immediately adopt a contingency budget. If the revised budget doesn't pass, then they'll go to contingency -- so if it doesn't pass today, the team can help get out the vote for the second go-round.

Furthermore, contingency budgets do not have to include the raze-and-burn of extracurricular activities--indeed, extracurricular activities are specifically called out as an authorized contingent expense under the law. There are a few requirements, but they aren't as dire as some administrators and board members claim them to be. See here for more details.

Really? That's good to know, thanks for this.

We have been filed as a non-profit organization years ago(around 2008) according to our oldest mentor so we have to check up on that, and we are technically separate from our school money wise as the district has no control over how we spend money as that is handled by our booster club. We have some corporate sponsors but none that give the amount of money our school district gives us.

[pfreivald]

Originally Posted by mega900997

Really? That's good to know, thanks for this.

You're welcome.

The trick is (a) convincing your school board that you're too important to cut even in a contingency budget and (b) convincing your community of the same.

Please keep in mind that the legislation governing such things is state-specific, and I only know what I'm talking about when it comes to New York.

[Chris Fultz]

we receive exceptional support from our school and school district, but the only direct funding is through a stipend to the teacher.

We have a great build space and tools within the school. Some were given to us, but we maintain them, buy spare parts, and buy our hand tools.

You can run a team with community and corporate support. Each student on our team gets $250 in community sponsorship. We make presentations to businesses and organizations to get their support.

You can make it happen. It will be easier if they let you stay in the school, but you can make it happen.

here is a presentation we did at the 2010 Championships about sponsors -
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/papers/2380

[PayneTrain]

I have worked with teams where corporate sponsorship and community support are the backbone of the organizations. It is not only possible to function without major financial input from the school, I would almost say it's preferable. It encourages your team members to go out into the community to drum up awareness and support instead of taking a check from the school board and moving on. In my time raising money for 422 as a student through grants, presentations to corporations, and petitions to booster organizations that work in parallel through the school, we were able to significantly increase our budget over a span of the two years I worked with the marketing division and in turn allowed the team to diversify its activities and greatly improve on outreach activities, which in turn can result in even more funding, higher goals, and more cool stuff to do.

Don't get me wrong, you never want to turn down money, and some long tenured and well known teams receive a lot of financial support from both their school district and community sponsors (11, IIRC), and it is important to fight to keep what you have or at least reach a compromise to continue allowing use of an in-school facility. But also realize this could open a door for your team to continue and maybe even thrive.

[Jimmy Nichols]

We we lost our space two and a half years ago. What partnered with our local community foundation to use their 501 c3 umbrella for nonprofit status. And all the taxes all the thank you letters, and all we have to do is worry about spending the money. What's also allows us to find our own space can have the ability to sign a lease. Which is exactly what we did we found a local mall that was hey go small I was able to lease a unit for about 75 percent discount what normally cost. Which works out really well because then what are tied to a teacher schedule or School schedule. Wasn't easy but we make it work if we think we've grown and prospered for it.

Funding wise we never really received anything from our school. Actually we did receive some funding in the first couple years but that quickly stopped since then we have relied on Grants in corporate sponsors and travel fees charged to the students and mentors.

Feel free to PM me or have your mentors email me and I can go into more detail on the steps we chose and the direction we went.

[runneals]

Originally Posted by Billfred

1902 and 1501 both formed as 4-H clubs after they lost the ability to work with their local schools and have made it work for nearly a decade now. Those numbers weren't the numbers the schools used, but the people transferred over (and that's what counts, isn't it?). Look up your county extension agent to start the dialogue sooner rather than later.

YES! This happened to us last year and it was a MAJOR blessing, and I ENCOURAGE you to break away from your school!
1) By becoming a 4-H Club, you are able to gain members from across the county, think a larger member base to draw from. If it wasn't for my team doing this, I would have NEVER gotten to experience FRC!
2) County 4-H Programs are looking for programs like this! County 4-H Programs offer a solid backbone for any FIRST Team through the curriculum and trainings offered to leaders/coaches/mentors/parents. The National 4-H Program is also a
3) 4-H offers OPPORTUNITIES! See the photo of me above (my "Who am I" photo), I was invited to attend the White House Science Fair in April through my previous 4-H experiences. While I was there with the National 4-H HQ STEM programs director, I met Bill Nye along with directors of all the other programs that 4-H is involved in (Team Rocket America, InvenTeams, & many more!)
3.5) We have OVER 70 teams involved in FRC, many more in FTC, and ten times more in FLL
4) 4-H offers a solid brand name. When you promote yourselves as being a '4-H' team, you turn a LOT of heads, but you also get the trust that comes from being part of the International Organization. I believe that with the name comes a lot of opportunities to connect with business partners or find some of our partners on the State or National level (such as Lockheed Martin)!
5) I also forgot to add that you automatically get 501(c)3 status from just being a 4-H club!

Sorry if I made you read all that, but from my perspective (being a 10 year 4-H'er), being a 4-H team is so much better than being a school team mostly because it allows students from around your county to join in (how I got involved in my team) that otherwise wouldn't be involved in FIRST!

[mega900997]

Thanks for all the suggestion and help guys, but the budget vote for our district did not pass. We hope that the budget revote in June will be the same budget, but we have lost all support and funding from our school as of right now.

[electroken]

Originally Posted by mega900997

If the budget does not pass, all afterschool clubs and district wide teams such as marching band, cheerleading and our dance team get eliminated along with the robotics team and only varsity sports stay(all middle school and JV sports are eliminated).

The Shelton High School robotics team is considered a varsity sport, and team members can even letter in it, resulting in some unusual looks from the football players. Perhaps getting the team reclassified as a varsity sport is the answer?

[Clem1640]

1640 lost school support in stages. First funding, later space. What we did was:

1) Develop adequate fundraising capabilities. Fundraising comprises soliciting donations from corporate sponsors & grants and fundraising events which everyone participates in.

2) Incorporated so that there was en entity to control assetts, contract liability insurance,...

3) We open enrolement to students outside our school district

4) We maintained close connections to the school board, district administration and teachers.

All of this takes dedicated adult leadership. It cannot be executed otherwise.

[JohnBoucher]

If you have existing outside funding and you want/need to breakaway from the school, be mindful of how that funding feels about that. Our funding has made it clear that they believe this program belongs in the school.

If you do not have outside funding, then find space that works for you.

[pfreivald]

Originally Posted by JohnBoucher

If you have existing outside funding and you want/need to breakaway from the school, be mindful of how that funding feels about that. Our funding has made it clear that they believe this program belongs in the school.

If you do not have outside funding, then find space that works for you.

Amen to that. B+L has a policy that they will not sponsor non-school teams -- an issue that I hope will never come up when it comes to B+L-sponsored teams!

As for the statement that "as of now" you [the OP] don't have a team, that shouldn't be true, either. The school's fiscal year hasn't ended yet, so you're still operating on last year's budget... Which will carry through the second vote at the least.