School fundraising can be a challenge year after year. You want to raise the funds you need to help your students make the most of the school year, but it takes a lot of your time and resources to host events, communicate your needs, and ultimately ask for donations. That’s where choosing one of the best fundraising platforms for schools can help you.
We’ve selected seven fundraising websites for schools so that you can start narrowing down your search for a fundraising partner. These sites (listed alphabetically) are designed to help smaller fundraisers like school clubs as well as schools themselves to reach their fundraising goals.
Please keep in mind that platform prices and other details shift frequently: visit each of these school fundraising software vendors for the latest information.
99Pledges
This platform makes it simple to let your team or participants start collecting pledges from family, friends, and the community. Each participant gets their own pledge page they can share out to leverage online and mobile pledges. Leaderboards show how individuals are working towards the school, class, or team’s fundraising goal. Perfect for runs, walks, rides, and other -thons.
Highlights
- With 99Pledges you can still accept and track cash and check donations with this fundraising software for schools.
- 99Pledges allows you to bulk upload participants via a CSV file, for faster setup.
Price
99Pledges claims to be free, but really it is supported by optional donor tips (like many fundraising websites for schools). It also charges processing fees of 3.49% plus 49 cents per transaction.
BetterWorld
BetterWorld isn’t purely a fundraising platform for schools, but it does serve sports teams and clubs as well as schools and PTAs, and it offers alumni engagement solutions. With this platform you can run pledge, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer, ticketing, giveaways, and auctions, to name just a few of their fundraising tools.
Highlights
- BetterWorld makes it easy to integrate videos into your fundraising pages.
- With a library of stock images, BetterWorld makes it easy to setup attractive fundraising pages quickly.
Price
Like many school fundraising platforms, BetterWorld claims to be free, when really it is supported by optional donor tips. This platform also charges 2.9% + $0.30 processing fee per transaction (something your donors can also choose to cover).
Bonfire
This t-shirt fundraiser may not be exclusively for schools, but it’s a great tool to have in your kit. Bonfire makes it easy to upload designs to sell your own fundraising swag, or to leverage peer-to-peer fundraising and allow people to sell tees on your behalf. T-shirt fundraisers are a great way to engage students as you decide on a design, and people will enjoy getting something for supporting your school, class, or team.
Highlights
- Bonfire integrates with other platforms like Classy, so you can keep and maintain donor information.
- Bonfire can help expand your reach by putting your t-shirt in its marketplace where interested buyers can see it and donate to your cause when they buy one.
Price
Your profits are determined by the price you set for your product minus the base cost to make it. Bonfire offers different t-shirt options and pricing guidelines, and you can offer the option for buyers to donate additional money to your cause. Bonfire has a helpful calculator tool that will give you an idea of your profits based on your desired design and projected amount sold.
GiveCampus
GiveCampus can help streamline your donation pages and buttons as well as leverage peer-to-peer, crowdfunding, volunteer management, and events and in-person giving organizational tools. Additionally, GiveCampus can help you increase the efficiency of your gifting leadership and their approach to major gifts.
Highlights
- GiveCampus can help you with text, video, and email communications, to maximize open and response rates.
- GiveCampus offers robust tracking and analytics, so you can leverage data on donor retention and even volunteer engagement.
Price
GiveCampus plans start as low as $1,000 per year. As a one-stop shop for school and higher education fundraising, it makes sense that this platform and its suite of tools comes at a higher price point.
JotForm
JotForm might seem like a niche offering when it comes to fundraising platforms for schools, but we feel the ability to optimize your online forms is crucial. If you maintain a website and need a donation form for it, JotForm offers templates and the ability to make your own. If you know that potential donors are bouncing out of your donation flow, it’s time to fix that issue with a tool like this one.
Highlights
- JotForm has more than 100 donation form templates, including fast donations, item donations (great for organizing your silent auction), blood donation, church donations, and more.
- JotForm integrates with more than 100 partners to help you keep track of your donations and data with ease.
Price
JotForm has several pricing tiers, starting with “Free.” This tier limits the number of forms, form views, and account users, among other things, but might be just what your small team or club needs. Other plans range from $34-$99 dollars per month, with a custom Enterprise plan also on offer.
PledgeCents
This crowdfunding platform for schools can help teams, clubs, classrooms, and parent-teacher organizations raise money with custom fundraising pages. Designed specifically with K-12 education in mind, this platform can help you quickly raise funds for classroom supplies, team apparel, and other important initiatives for your school’s students.
Highlights
- PledgeCents has team members who will help you set up your fundraising page for success.
- PledgeCents will mail a check to you at the close of your fundraiser. This sets it apart from some classroom supply fundraising sites, which send you items (specific to their brand) rather than the money.
Price
PledgeCents has no platform fees, only processing fees of 3% of your total amount raised (as opposed to a certain amount per transaction).
Snap!Raise
Snap!Raise, or Snap!Mobile, is designed to help high school arts and athletics programs fundraise with ease. Anyone running extracurricular activities can see if Snap!Raise is a good fit for them. You can crowdfund on this site by creating a customizable fundraising page. Gone are the days of going door-to-door: instead share your team or club’s page to fund that trip, jerseys, or scholarship.
Highlights
- Snap!Spend can help you keep track of your budget even outside your 28-day fundraiser. You can even connect your bank account and skip making in-person deposits.
- Snap!Connect offers each donor a selection of languages, so every family in the community can stay connected and involved.
Price
Snap!Raise keeps 20% of each fundraiser they host. This covers platform and payment processing fees. Simple to understand, and you keep 80% of what you raise.
Final Thoughts
There are a lot of online fundraising platforms for schools out there. You might have noticed we didn’t include any of the usual candy, wrapping paper, or popcorn vendors. We don’t have anything against them, of course, but they aren’t digital solutions the way the platforms above are.
As a fundraising platform, we of course believe that your fundraising efforts should include digital pieces. Even if you go old school with a yearly gala or homemade bake sale, offering people an online donation form or page can meet people where they are: on their phones, tablets, and computers.
Leverage technology to boost your profits. As with our fundraising auctions, you might find that you raise even more than you have in the past by taking advantage of fundraising platforms for schools.
