Sooool Fundraiser

LT's preschool is a cooperative. Co-ops generally have lower tuition but require significantly more direct involvement from parents. For example, just in the last week Kari and I have spent as much time at the school as LT has - Kari helped out in the classroom today and last weekend we all went as a family and cleaned the whole school (ok, it's basically a one room school house but it still took a couple hours).

I like the idea behind the co-op. The parent involvement not only help keeps costs down but also helps build a sense of community among the families and reinforces to the kids that education is something we value.

Unfortunately the nature of the time commitment required by a co-op means that, for the most part, the kids come from families with a stay at home parent which, in turn, sort of self selects a particular socioeconomic group to the school.

The last parent requirement of the co-op, which is fundraising, along with that socioeconomic situation is where it gets a little hard for me. I mean, it's a good and legitimate cause - his school is a licensed non-profit and I think you'd be hard pressed to argue that education, even the earliest years, isn't important. But it's certainly not a needy cause and I have a hard time asking people to contribute to a school where most of the families find themselves comfortably in the middle class.

All of that is a long way of saying that I'm not *asking* for anything but am letting all you loyal readers out there know that we are selling raffle tickets for LT's little school (we've even got a quota to fill!). If you'd like to buy a ticket or two, that's be wonderful and we'll be thankful, but I didn't want to put anyone in the position of feeling bad about saying no.

Lucky for me, Kari was the one in our family who did the hard work and managed to scrounge up some great donations for the raffle. She got a gift card to Tenn Street, our local coffee shop, a massage from her cousin Cierra who is amazing, and her mom knitted a couple of cute baby hats.

Other prizes include $1000, $500 and $250 cash as well as "restaurant and spa gift certificates, sports items, and a wide variety of goods and services from local merchants."

Tickets are $5 each and the raffle is on March 13th at Gumbo's downtown but you do NOT need to be present to win. Please let me know, if you'd like to get in on the action!

This kid clearly needs school but he doesn't have a job to pay for it yet.