Back to school fund management: What do in the first 60 days

For parents and school staff, back to school is as a logistics event. It’s also the start of the year’s collection cycle. Within the first few months, many schools will have taken registration fees, athletic and activity fees, yearbook and picture day orders, and first field trip deposits, with holiday fundraisers already in planning.

Each of those gets set up as an item: a name, an amount, an account it posts to, the payment methods it accepts, a list of students who have paid, and more. Those decisions are usually made once, in a hurry, and then reused. That is why school activity fund management is decided in the fall more than at any other point in the year.

Setup decisions get reused, not revisited

The item’s name determines whether a district can compare fall fees across every school or has to interpret each office’s own wording. The account it posts to determines where revenue lands. The payment methods it accepts determine how many separate places money can enter. The person assigned to count and deposit determines who’s accountable if the totals don’t match.

When the same field trip or fundraiser runs again, most schools copy the earlier setup. A mistake made today can repeat itself year after year.

What school offices carry

Bookkeepers, secretaries, treasurers, principals, and teachers handle this work alongside their actual jobs. In our recent study of school staff, 58% said managing funds pulls them away from the work they were hired to do. 53% said handling other people’s money creates stress. 45% worry they will be blamed if a mistake happens.

The last number points to a real gap. These staff are accountable for outcomes in a process they did not design and often cannot change. That is a system problem, and it gets fixed at the level of the system.

What districts see (and what they don’t)

If there are challenges with school funds, districts often don’t find out until it’s too late.

Most district leaders (96%!) say they can see school payments and transactions in one place. But this creates a false sense of security. Because only 29% have a real-time view. This means they have a complete picture….of last month’s numbers.

Districts can see a complete picture of school funds. But it’s usually out of date.

Fall items get reconciled at mid-year and tested at audit. By then, the year’s setup decisions are already in the books, and correcting them is much harder.

Back to school: What to check while everything is fresh

For school offices

• Recurring items. Review last year’s setup before reusing it. Check the amount, the account, and the name.
• Payment methods. Double check that each item is set up in the right places (on your PoS, online school store, and other places the item appears).
• Responsibility. For each item, make sure there’s proper segregation of duties. The same person shouldn’t be collecting for the item, recording, and receipting it. This often happens with teachers and field trip money.
• Holiday fundraisers. Build the November and December items now, not the week of the sale.

For districts

• Naming and accounts. Confirm schools use the same names and accounts for the same kinds of items, so fall results can be compared.
• Approval. Confirm new items and fees are reviewed before families are charged.
• Reporting. Check that you can pull fall collections by school without asking each office for its own spreadsheet.
• Staff input. Ask school staff which part of fall setup took the most time or left them least sure. Their answers show where the system needs work.

And if you want a more complete checklist to make sure you’re audit ready? Read our in-depth guide.