For many schools, summer brings a natural pause in day-to-day activity—but that doesn’t mean fundraising should stall.
A seasonal dip in activity is common for educational institutions, but it doesn’t have to mean a lull in donor engagement. Summer presents an opportunity to strengthen relationships, lay the groundwork for future donations, and set your school up for a strong fundraising push when fall arrives.
In this guide, we’ll share four strategies to help your advancement team stay connected with donors and keep fundraising efforts mission-aligned during the summer season.
1. Maintain Your Newsletter
Throughout the school year, you should maintain a regular newsletter that goes out to your school’s community at least once a month.
When summer hits, this newsletter should keep going to ensure your school stays in the back of supporters’ minds.
Your newsletter is not only an opportunity to continue making donation appeals but also to keep supporters looped into any summer activities they might otherwise not know to look out for. Use your newsletter to:
- Promote events. Market summer events your school has planned, whether they’re fundraisers, summer classes, or community events. Additionally, look for other activities in your community that might interest students and their families. For example, a museum might have a new exhibit coming, or there might be an art fair at the local park.
- Share school updates. Share new developments with your supporters. This might relate to fundraisers, construction projects, summer programs, or preparation for the upcoming school year.
- Provide summer tips. Include educational content so supporters always have valuable information to look forward to when they open your newsletter. For instance, you might provide a list of recommended summer books for students, tips for planning fun and educational family activities, and strategies for ensuring students have a productive vacation.
Newsletters are a simple way to stay in touch with all of your donors. Create a newsletter template so you can construct these messages smoothly every month to stay connected throughout the summer.
2. Host Summer Events
Don’t let the time off from school stop you from meeting up with donors.
In fact, with the time off from regular school activities, your staff and PTA can devote more of their energy and resources to planning an event calendar.
Host a mix of activities so all of your donors have a way to get involved. For instance, you might plan:
- Volunteer activities. The summer is an opportune time to improve your school and community. Be conscious that just because your school has time off doesn’t necessarily mean all of your supporters will. Encourage them to check if their employers offer volunteer time off (VTO), which allows eligible employees to take time off specifically to volunteer.
- Fundraisers. Some school fundraisers do better in the summer! For instance, you might host a community fun run or picnic in the nice weather. Additionally, consider planning fundraisers specifically for your major donors, like galas or dinners. Continuing to meet with major donors helps keep these valuable relationships strong.
- Summer classes. Use your school’s buildings and resources to continue serving your community with a range of classes and activities. For example, you might host a summer art class for students, arrange for your school band to continue meeting and practicing together, and host game days for summer sports that the entire community can attend.
Events help you overcome one of the biggest challenges of keeping donors engaged during the summer: a lack of contact. By bringing your supporters together, you can reinforce their relationship with your school and eliminate donor fatigue by giving them fun, new activities to participate in.
3. Check In With Major Donors
Staying in touch with your donors is essential for building a supportive environment, but some of your supporters can help your school more than others.
Use summer as an opportunity to assess your supporter base and look for prospective major donors.
Major donors will most likely begin their relationship with your school like any other supporter. This means you’ll need to search your donor database and use prospect research tools to find clues that a supporter has the potential to make a major gift. Double the Donation’s prospect research guide advises nonprofits and schools to look for:
- Philanthropic indicators, which are a sign supporters are inclined to support organizations like yours. These indicators include: previous donations to your school, donations to charitable organizations, and involvement in philanthropic causes.
- Wealth indicators, which indicate a donor’s financial capacity to make a major gift. These indicators include: real estate ownership, business affiliations, stock ownership, and political contributions.
Once you identify prospective major donors, use the summer as an opportunity to reach out to them. Have your major gift officers arrange meetings with current and new giving candidates to form relationships. Building connections strong enough to secure a major gift takes time, but strategic schools can pack the summer with meet-ups, events, phone calls, and other relationship-building activities.
4. Focus on Low-Lift, High-Impact Opportunities
Summer can be a challenging time to sustain engagement–your donors may be traveling, focused on family, or simply less attentive to school communications.
That said, it’s still possible to keep your community connected through fundraising efforts that are easy to participate in but still aligned with your school’s mission and values.
Here are a few simple ways to maintain momentum:
- Promote matching gifts. Many donors are unaware their employers offer matching gift programs—an easy way to double the impact of a gift without spending more. Consider sending a summer reminder encouraging supporters to check their eligibility and take advantage of this often-overlooked opportunity
- Invite recurring gifts. Summer is a great time to encourage monthly giving. A small recurring donation can fit more comfortably into summer budgets and ensures your school receives consistent support year-round. Position this as a way to stay connected even when school is out.
- Use light fundraising initiatives strategically. While not a primary revenue driver, lighter-lift options—such as merchandise sales or online shopping programs—can serve as supplementary engagement tools for supporters who are already inclined to give in these ways. The key is to connect these activities back to your mission, so supporters understand how even a small purchase contributes to lasting impact. For more examples of easy-to-launch tools that schools can use to diversify their summer fundraising mix, explore 99Pledges’s guide to fundraising platforms for schools.
The goal is to keep engagement open without relying on transactional fundraising. Even during quieter seasons, reminding donors why your mission matters can spark meaningful, long-term relationships.
Use Summer to Build, Not Just Maintain
Summer may be slower, but it’s far from idle time for your advancement team.
Use the season to thoughtfully engage your community—whether through casual events, mission-centered communication, or meaningful one-on-one conversations. It’s also an ideal moment to lay the groundwork for larger gifts by identifying and cultivating relationships with prospective major donors. With a little planning, your summer calendar can do more than fill the gap—it can position your school for long-term fundraising success.
Editorial Note: This article is a partner-contributed piece and does not necessarily reflect the views or strategic recommendations of the Winkler Group. We believe in engaging with a wide range of sector voices and encourage readers to consider this content as one of many perspectives in the philanthropic landscape.
