Dear ACS Families,
By now you should have received a letter in the mail from Debra Marsh outlining the host family’s responsibilities the night of the Fund Raising Dinner. I have had several questions asked, and I realize now that I have not done a good job painting a picture of how the event will flow. Let me do that now.
Each family at ACS will be the host of their own table. You are responsible for filling that table with guests. Please turn in the names of your guests to the office on Monday, Oct. 22 making sure all names are spelled correctly (our seating cards will be taken from your lists). If you were not able to fill your entire table we will fill those spots for you.
Let me remind you of the 3 kinds of people we are interested in you inviting:
1. Those individuals that would be interested in partnering with us financially or giving a one time donation.
2. Those individuals that have children and are interested in what Christian education has to offer.
3. Members of our community that have heard about ACS but need to know more about what we are doing.
The night of the dinner, we would like the host couple to arrive at 5:30 to set their table and be available to help with any last minute preparations as well as be there to greet your guests as they arrive.
In the letter you received this week, Debbie requested that you bring 8 place settings from home to set your table with. When Debbie researched the cost of renting enough tableware and linens, it was going to cost almost $1,000. She and I felt that we were not being good stewards with the money God was giving us to spend that kind of money on plates and napkins. We got the idea of bringing place settings from home from Cornerstone Church that recently hosted a fund raising dinner. It worked very well for them. We are suggesting that you bring 8 of the following: dinner plates, bread plates, glasses, forks, butter knives, spoons, and an additional utensil based on the dessert you are serving. If you do not have 8 of each of these items, let us know and we will ask someone else to bring in a set for you. Bring them to the ROC that night in a cardboard box. We will store the boxes in a classroom and you will bring them home in that same box.
We will be decorating the table that night for you. Each table will be decorated with brown paper covering, raffia, and pumpkins. Each person at your table will have a place card. Feel free to move these cards around your table when you get there that night so that each guest is comfortable where they are seated.
Against the wall we will have 3 tables set up. Please encourage your guests to check out these tables.
1) A WallBuilders table, where our speaker will have books, posters, etc. available for purchase.
2) A curriculum table, where we will display all the books ACS student’s use.
3) A question & answer table for people to get more information about ACS.
We will open the evening with a welcome and a prayer for the meal. Students in grades 9 – 12 will serve the tables with platters of chicken, rice, and green beans, and baskets of rolls. At your table, pass around the food “family style”. We will have pitchers of water and ice tea at each table as well. Be sure to “visit” with your guests and introduce the people on your table to each other. You are to bring a dessert to share. If you don’t bake, that’s fine, just pick up a pie at Perkins or cupcakes from The Cake Lady. Place them on your own serving plate and viola! You have a dessert. Feel free to serve your dessert when you feel your guests are ready.
After dinner, Mrs. Leon and her drama class will be presenting a wonderful presentation that will involve black lights, florescent paint and the body of Christ. Immediately following, one of our alumni will talk briefly about their experience at ACS and how our school shaped their future. The alumni will then introduce the speaker, Gabe Allen.
Following the speaker, the MC will mention that at each place setting there is an envelope for each guest/couple to prayerfully consider. In the envelope will be a card with the following for them to fill out:
o I would like to talk to someone about partnering with Applewood financially. Please contact me. *
o I would like to give a one time donation enclosed to ACS.
o I would like to give a love offering to WallBuilders enclosed.
o I would like more information about sending my child to ACS. *
Comments about this evening’s event. __________________________
______________________________________________________________
* Please fill out the contact information on the back.
There will be no pressure to give and there will be a chance for everyone to write something so no one should feel uncomfortable. Do not worry about whether your guests will give or not. If you have prayed about whom you should invite and you invited the people God laid on your heart, then let Him do the rest. If He invited them, then He has a plan for them being at the event, and it may have nothing to do with money.
We will have a closing prayer and farewell. We hope the entire event will not take any longer than 2 hours. Once all the guests have departed, the host couple can scrape their dishes off and put them back into their cardboard boxes to go home and be cleaned. We do not plan on washing them at school for fear that plates and silverware will get mixed up. Then will all clean up the ROC and put everything back in order for Maplewood to have Sunday school the next day. Once that is accomplished parents are free to go home.
The following are some of the questions I have been asked so far:
“Why aren’t children allowed?” Our speaker will be talking for 30 min. on the importance of Christian education in America; we do not want people distracted by children who will not be able to sit through a speech of this kind. The only students that will be attending will be grades 6 – 12 as they will be either performing or serving that evening. Once they have completed their tasks, they will be sent to the AWANA room and pizza will be provided for them.
“Why don’t we use paper plates and utensils?” This may seem to be the easiest option but I believe it sends the wrong message to our guests. We are there to show off Applewood Christian School, we want the evening’s event to be a “nice” one. Not fancy, but nice. Some of the people who will be there that evening will be considering whether or not to partner with us financially, we want them to know that we are professional at what we do.
“Won’t the different plates at each table look odd? What if my plates don’t match with the brown paper?” I have been a quilter for 23 years and if there is one thing I have learned, it is that all of God’s colors blend marvelously with each other. Just one look at nature or at one of your grandmother’s scrap quilts and you can see that is correct. The tables will look just beautiful!
“Why are we doing this fund raiser anyway? What is the money going to? ” Let me clarify a few things about the ACS budget. The sports program and all the social events of ACS are all self sustaining (they raise their own money). Curriculum comes from book fees. Approximately 90 percent of the incoming tuition goes towards paying teacher salaries. Last year (2006-07) the school budget had a deficit of $4,000.00 for teacher salaries. The Family Club made up for that difference by the card fund raiser we did last year. This year (2007-08) the school budget began the year with a deficit of $10,000.00 for teacher salaries and we had decreased from three administrators to one. This year the card fund raiser brought in $2,000.00. Praise God, He already knew where the money would come from. The Board found enough money in a non designated fund to cover the difference. The point is, we can not count on the Family Club and surprise slush funds to finance our teacher salaries every year. As it is our teachers are only making about $7.00/hr for the time that they are in the classroom. If we want to keep quality teachers, if we want to have enough teachers to cover each class, and we don’t want to have to raise the tuition $400/family/year to cover the deficit (with no additional money for improvements), then we have to do a fund raiser of large proportion. I, for one, do not want to have to sell stuff all year long to cover this cost.
The School Board is asking each family at ACS to do their very best for this one night to help them balance the budget for next year. Applewood has been turning out Christian leaders for 20 yrs, don’t you want to help us make sure Applewood is still here so that your children and even your grandchildren can say they graduated from Applewood Christian School?
If you still have a question, do not hesitate to email me at yngheart@charter.net and ask away!
Family Club Fund Raiser – The fund raiser raised over $2,000.00! Congratulations to the following students who sold their 10 items: