Online fundraising is a growing area in K-12, and crowdfunding has exploded onto the scene over the last decade. While many students, families, teachers, and schools have embraced this new type of fundraising, school districts are facing unintended liabilities from these types of campaigns. EdSurge collected research on crowdfunding in K-12 over the last year, and just recently published a report of their findings. Among the seven crowdfunding platforms that EdSurge compared, Livingtree Give was effectively highlighted as a platform to:
– “Ensure that money raised through crowdfunding goes directly to the school or district, but that administrators can allow teachers to spend the money wherever they’d like in a secure and trackable way”
– “Maximize district oversight by providing administrators with full reports for campaigns in the district and ensuring that all campaigns have been approved before they’re published”
In the full downloadable report, Austin Independent School District was featured as one of the two “Districts Paving the Way.”
This section of the report uses Austin ISD (pictured below) as an example of a district that has developed strategies to support crowdfunding and boost teachers’ efforts. The district provides Livingtree Give accounts to teachers, boosters and parent organizations across their district. Once campaigns are approved, they feature these campaigns in their Livingtree Give public portal, which donors can access through the district’s website.
Under the Integrations section of the report, EdSurge mentions Livingtree’s integration on Austin ISD’s website which links donors directly to their Give portal. The integration option is offered to all of Livingtree’s customers as part of the district plan.
The report also profiled the Livingtree Give platform, where Chandler Unified School District in Arizona was featured as a “highlighted project.” After going on a nation-wide search to find a crowdfunding platform that met all of their district’s needs, Chandler started their first year with Livingtree Give this fall and had garnered more than $50,000 in donations as of December 2018.
Livingtree is pleased to be recognized among the top crowdfunding platforms, and as one that truly helps districts manage the complexities and eliminate the liabilities of crowdfunding. To learn more about how the Livingtree Give platform can help your district, visit learn.livingtree.com/products/give.
To further understand the process of crowdfunding in K-12 schools, the liabilities that districts are facing, and how to develop policies and procedures around it, visit the EdSurge Report page and download their full report.
