Fundraising

Money is the most solvable barrier between a student and this weekend. Start in the fall and every family can say yes.

Set your group price first

• Add registration, lodging, food, and travel, then divide. That's your real per-student number — publish it once and hold it.

• Decide early how leaders are covered: folded into student cost, paid by the leaders themselves, covered by the church budget, or offset by a congregational offering. Any of these works well when it's settled in advance.

Fall and Advent

• Church breakfast or pancake Sunday

• Trunk or Treat concessions and hot chocolate

• Fall car wash or leaf raking for older members

• Restaurant percentage nights — low effort, real return

• Soup and chili sale on a cold Sunday

• Poinsettia or wreath sale

• Christmas gift-wrapping station

• Youth-led Sunday with a designated offering

• Coffeehouse or talent night, suggested donation

• Sponsor-a-kit for the Mission Project

Called by Name

The strongest fundraiser you can run this year is also the theme. Print a card for each student with their name on it and Isaiah 43:1 (CEB) on the back. Set them out after worship and invite the congregation to take a name, pray for that student through January, and sponsor them. It funds the trip and does something money can't: it tells a young person the church knows their name.

Make it easy to give — and easy to ask

• Set up a designated online fund and put the link everywhere. Test it before you publish it.

• Ask a Sunday school class or one family for a matching challenge. Matching gifts move people who scroll past appeals.

• Apply for an IGNITE scholarship early — they're awarded on a rolling basis.

• Give families a private, ordinary way to request help, so asking stays easy.

• Ask your church to build a youth conference line into next year's budget. Fundraising is good; sustainability is better.