Financial Help for Middle School Athletic Programs

A new middle school athletic director may be introduced to many challenges. No challenge will be greater than running an athletic program on limited financial resources. Some may even find their inherited budget is functioning at a deficit. If your school faces either of these scenarios or you just want to ensure that your program operates efficiently and effectively in the black, then consider these five tips for managing your athletic funds.

Find out where you can buy on consignment.
Payment Plans

In most communities, there are sport apparel and equipment providers that will work on variable payment plans. Some larger corporations will do the same. Do your research and find the best fit for your school, your budget, and your projected income. Will monthly, quarterly, or lump sum payments suit you best? Is having name brand equipment worth the extra money? Know your students, your school, and your community and make the best decision for your unique situation. You do not have to sacrifice quality just because the money is not currently available, but you should invest in something that is safe, durable, and that the kids will be proud to wear.
Use school Spirit Wear to your advantage.
The Cash Cow

To make spirit wear work for you, first, use a company that is reputable and knows which designs and fits are popular and will sell. Next, use the digital age to your advantage. Rather than have merchandise sitting on the shelves, buy the minimum to make the order and try to push as many online sales as possible so that you get your cut from the sale without ever having to really "pay" the full price. Lastly, to get the best bang for your buck on spirit sales, negotiate it all! Figure out how to get your unit cost lower, your percentage back higher, and feel the market for what your clients can and are willing to pay.
Make sure your Administration is on-board with you!
Do they have your back?

Having an administrative staff that believes in you, believes in athletics, and will support you is key! From day one, athletics should keep all gate and concession money. While this might seem like a given, it definitely is not and you and your administration need to agree on this now! This is the money that you can count on making no matter what else is going on, and without it, climbing out of the red or just staying afloat will be very difficult. Next, ask for your administration's blessing to sponsor athletic fundraisers during the school day. Some of these are outlined in the next tip, and they are a huge boost to the bottom line. Unlike having a handful of parents or kids stay around for a game after school, a captive audience during the school day will send sales through the roof! Lastly, solicit help from your administration to market athletics throughout the school year. Aside from the typical homecoming week during football or winter sports Spirit Week, request that athletics be mentioned on the morning and afternoon announcements, featured under the school's headlines on the main webpage, or promoted via Facebook and Twitter too. Any administrative team wants the students to feel proud of their school, and buying into athletics can be a huge source of pride for the entire school!
Fundraise
Whenever and Wherever

Whether it's a $1 "Hat Day", Sucker Day (the kids really do buy fancy lollipops), hot chocolate sales on a few of the cold mornings before big basketball games, or just having the cheerleaders go around to home rooms selling tattoos and ribbons, every little bit adds up. However, this is chump change compared to what you can do if you have administration's blessing (see tip #3).

On the day before a school holiday or long weekend (Friday before Labor Day; last day before Thanksgiving Break, Winter Break, and Spring Break; even the Friday when state testing ends - it is like a holiday to the teachers and kids!), plan special events during the day. Some events can take place during the student's elective classes (Art, Music, PE, etc.) and be grade specific while others can be school-wide events that everyone will attend at the same time.

The events that work well as grade-specific entities are dodgeball or 3-on-3 basketball tournaments where teams from the same grade level sign up with a PE teacher or athletic coach during the week leading up to the event for an entry fee (usually $15). Then, on the day of the event those students who are not part of a team but who want to watch pay a $1 admission to the tournament. Just watching the tournament is a blast to most kids because they get out of class, get to hang out with their friends, most music teachers double as an awesome Emcee and have a great playlist, and concessions are sold. Yes, fill kids up with sodas and sugar and then sent them home for the break; You will not believe the profit that a concession can turn on one of these days! Remember, you have a captive audience - the crowd for most of your in-school events will likely exceed attendance at your actual varsity athletic events.

For the school-wide events consider hosting a Powderpuff football game or a Student-Faculty Basketball Game. On these days, run an amended school schedule with the last hour and a half of the day being devoted to the main event. Run marketing videos hyping the Faculty team, organize a boy's cheer squad for the Powderpuff game, really sell the event to get more students to attend, and to make it that much more fun! It is important to note, however, that students who do not want to participate or even watch these events should be supervised in another room where they can read, talk, listen to music, or watch a movie. Never make students feel like they are being punished for not participating because a) you would never want to do that to a child, but also b) having in-school events is a big deal and you do not want someone's mom coming up to the school and complaining and ruining these days!

Other big fundraising events are some of the typical ones that you see at most schools - pizza discount cards, candle sales, cookie dough, etc. You can turn a decent profit on these but for the time and effort that many of those take, a few strategically placed Spirit Nights throughout the year can be just as beneficial. On a Friday when the local high school teams do not have a big game, consider hosting a Spirit Night on campus from 6-10. Students generally pay around $10 to come hang out in the gym where they can play pickup basketball, use some of the other PE equipment, sing karaoke in the music room, or watch a movie with their friends and, of course, buy concessions. Most parents are more than happy to let their child attend because it is way cheaper than letting your child actually go to the movies and because there is adult supervision at all times. This can take a toll on the athletic staff because of the time involved as chaperones and most coaches want to be at home on Friday night if they don't have a game. However, if you plan wisely, rotate duties, and entice support through projected income, most coaches are great about pitching in on these.
Set up different accounts for each sport.
People work harder when they are working for themselves!

Regardless of what you currently do or what has always been done, if you have all athletic funds dumping into one, common account there is no ownership to the financial successes or failures of the department. Coaches, athletes, and definitely boosters and parents want to know where their financial efforts and contributions are going. Create an account for each sport where they keep their gate, assign each sport at least one of the "special" event days at school to run, and allow any other fundraising or donations they receive to stay with them. For Title IX purposes, though, do not subdivide basketball and track into boys and girl's, but rather urge the coaching staffs to align their fundraising efforts.

The exception to this rule is to maintain a subaccount for athletic administration that is funded solely through concession and spirit wear sales. Since it is too tedious a task and too time consuming to keep records of which sport bought which pack of Gatorade or whose box of snickers these are, you should run and maintain the concession stand and use those funds for general department expenses. This differentiation makes coaches accountable for the success of their program and alleviates some of the headaches that come with one, combined account.

While operating at a deficit or lacking financial resources is never a position that an athletic director wants to experience firsthand, knowing how to right the situation is valuable information. These are merely some tips that proved useful to a new middle school athletic director and helped a novice in the industry navigate some very unfamiliar territory.

Bio:

Dr. Lauren Duplantis is an Assistant Professor of Sport Management at Shorter University in Rome, GA. Prior to her role at Shorter University, Dr. Duplantis was a middle school Health & PE teacher, girls' basketball coach, and athletic director in Cumming, GA. During her tenure as athletic director, the school successfully paid off debt incurred upon start-up and made many capital improvements to the athletic facilities.