In recent years, many independent schools have adopted the concept of a “Giving Day.” Largely inspired by Giving Tuesday — a dedicated day of philanthropy on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving — these time-sensitive campaigns are meant to drive support and raise funds for important school initiatives.
The Rashi School is a PK-8 Jewish day school located in Dedham, Massachusetts. They started hosting giving days in 2021 as a way to boost parent participation. Learn about the secret behind their success and how they utilize both Veracross and GiveCampus to reach their fundraising goals.
History of Giving Day at The Rashi School
Prior to implementing a Giving Day campaign, The Rashi School was exploring how to increase donor participation in the spring. The school typically focused on major gifts in the fall, balancing their appeals around various Jewish holidays throughout the season.
“When we looked at doing Giving Tuesday in November or early December like a lot of schools, that didn’t quite work for us,” says Amy Klotz, Director of Development Operations and Stewardship. “We were trying to figure out the best way to capture people who didn’t give in the fall… for us, it was ideal to do it in the spring.”
Now, they concentrate on early givers and major gifts during the fall before transitioning to parent gifts in January. Giving Day typically happens in early March, which has proven to be an engaging time for the school’s parent community.
Defining a Giving Day Concept
In order to run a successful Giving Day, Karl Vela from GiveCampus recommends establishing a fun theme, or concept, for the campaign. “What is the type of experience you’re trying to create for donors on Giving Day?” he asks. A great theme creates a sense of “philanthropy FOMO” that will capture donors’ attention and engagement.
Over the last few years, The Rashi School has experimented with several different concepts for their Giving Day campaigns. Their first Giving Day coincided with the school’s 36th anniversary. They hosted a 36-hour campaign with the goal to raise $36,000 in honor of the anniversary. More recently, they’ve branded Giving Day as a way to “show your geneRASHity” which has been popular with the school’s community.
On the day of the campaign, The Rashi School involves students and faculty to help build excitement and momentum. They greet parents at school drop off with fun signs, stickers, and postcards with information about Giving Day and how to participate.
Choosing Distribution Channels
After establishing a central concept, it’s important to create a promotional strategy for your Giving Day campaign. A successful fundraising campaign uses a multi-channel marketing approach to maximize engagement across different platforms. “Not everyone is in the same place and will respond to the same type of messaging,” says Vela. “Multi-channel is the answer because it increases the odds of capturing and holding attention.”
Vela recommends leveraging different mediums for different purposes. For example: while email remains the top channel for marketers, SMS, or text messaging, has a higher click-through rate and immediate engagement rate. You might send an email to announce your Giving Day campaign with supplementary text messages for time-sensitive events like a power hour fundraising challenge.
At The Rashi School, they’ve used a variety of channels to promote Giving Day, including:
- Peer-to-peer
- Text
- Social media
- Website
“Peer-to-peer works really well,” says Klotz. “That’s where we see the biggest bang for our buck.” The Rashi School relies on their large volunteer base and alumni leadership council to spread the word and connect with donors.
In 2024, they experimented with texting via the GiveCampus platform to connect with their alumni base. Since The Rashi School is a PK-8 institution, they hypothesized that their former students would be quick to engage via phone since they trend younger. They were right! Bonus: this texting experiment helped the school identify which alumni they had incorrect cell phone data for and allowed the school to clean up their donor database.
Scheduling Your Cadence
Now that you’ve established the “what” and “how” of Giving Day, you need to identify the “when,” aka the cadence of your campaign promotions. “How are you building anticipation and the ramp up to Giving Day?” asks Vela. “It’s really just thinking about the donor journey from their perspective… Think about the experience you want to curate for that donor from ramp up to the thank you and everything in between.”
At The Rashi School, they focus heavily on pre-campaign communications to drive early support and excitement. They typically send an email a month or so before Giving Day to announce the campaign. Using the drag-and-drop email builder within Veracross Composer, they can customize the email to include elements like a promotional video, images, and links to the campaign’s online giving form. This save-the-date style email is helpful for building excitement and collecting early gifts from eager donors.
“The early save-the-date was very helpful,” says Klotz. “When we went live, we already had some gifts. If you logged on right at the beginning of Giving Day, it showed that we already raised $10,000 from 32 people… the excitement was already there.”
Ahead of the campaign, they also schedule a few social media posts leading up to Giving Day. On the morning of, they send another email to announce the official start of Giving Day. Klotz posts live updates throughout the day to keep the community informed and engaged about the campaign’s progress.
Following the campaign, they send an email to wrap up Giving Day and say “thank you” to everyone who participated. This email includes a fun video, Giving Day total, message of support, and another opportunity to contribute to the campaign for anyone who missed out.
Planning a Successful Giving Day
By defining a thematic concept, promoting it via multiple channels, and using a strategic cadence, The Rashi School has met their Giving Day goals several years in a row. As you look ahead to your next fundraising campaign, we hope you’ll be inspired by their story and keep these tips in mind.
For more information about running a successful Giving Day, watch our on-demand webinar to hear directly from Vela and Klotz.
