Updated October 2025
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December is the biggest fundraising month of all, and your PTA’s last push to meet your financial goals before the new year arrives. But with so many fundraisers happening in the weeks leading up to the winter holidays, you’ll need to get creative if you want to engage your school community and attract donations.
We’re here to help. The FutureFund team has listed our best December fundraiser ideas below, along with tips on how to run them successfully with our platform that’s 100% free for schools. Consider it our present to you for all the good work you’ve done this year!
Our platform is full of tools your school group can use to fundraise more effectively. These include:
These campaigns encourage parents and volunteers to donate directly to your school group for a specific cause or event. FutureFund makes it easy to collect money online during the campaign, but you can also include an in-person event if you want to make your fundraiser more meaningful.
Learn how to run a donation campaign with FutureFund here.
Tip: Use FutureFund’s messaging system to announce the fundraiser and include a link to the online campaign so that people can still donate even if they can’t attend the event.
| Ease of Implementation | Moderate – requires instructor and supplies |
| Time to Implement | 2–3 weeks planning |
| Expenses Required | $$ (yarn, needles, instructor fee) |
| Volunteers Needed | 2–3 to supervise and assist |
| Ideal For | Craft-focused students, indoor winter activities |
Collect donations to purchase knitting or crocheting supplies and hire an expert to teach a special workshop. You can either host this as a lunch-and-learn or an after-school event. Students will love learning how to make their own hats, scarves, socks, or anything else they can think of!
| Ease of Implementation | Easy – just need space & movies |
| Time to Implement | 1–2 weeks |
| Expenses Required | $$ (licensing if needed, snacks, seating) |
| Volunteers Needed | 3–5 to manage setup, concessions, cleanup |
| Ideal For | Family-friendly evening or pajama day event |
Collect donations online, where the students get to watch one holiday-themed movie for every fundraising milestone reached! To make this extra wholesome, provide popcorn, cookies, or some other holiday treats and let the students wear their comfiest pajamas for the event.
| Ease of Implementation | Easy – just collect and redeem recyclables |
| Time to Implement | 1–2 weeks (or ongoing) |
| Expenses Required | $ (bins for collection) |
| Volunteers Needed | 2–4 to transport recyclables |
| Ideal For | Eco-conscious schools, community engagement |
The holidays can produce a lot of waste, but this is an amazing way to recycle and reduce the community’s carbon footprint! Send out a message letting students and their parents know you’ll be collecting empties during the holidays—then run a donation campaign alongside the drive so that people can lend a helping hand even if they don’t have bottles to contribute.
FutureFund is FREE for schools, PTAs, and school groups. Start your fundraiser today!
Get Started| Ease of Implementation | Very easy – run like a donation campaign |
| Time to Implement | 1–2 weeks |
| Expenses Required | $ (collection bins, flyers) |
| Volunteers Needed | 2–3 to sort and distribute supplies |
| Ideal For | Stocking classrooms for January |
Collect donations for new school supplies so that students will have everything they need to succeed in the new year. You can even make this one a friendly competition by setting up different campaigns for each classroom and throwing a pre-holiday party for the class that raises the most!
| Ease of Implementation | Moderate – coordinate with local provider |
| Time to Implement | 3–4 weeks |
| Expenses Required | $$$ (sleigh ride fees) |
| Volunteers Needed | 3–4 for supervision and logistics |
| Ideal For | Creating special holiday memories for students |
Raise donations to take students on a beautiful horse-drawn carriage or sleigh ride! Most cities have a service offering these kinds of experiences around the winter holidays.
An “A-Thon” fundraiser is a special kind of pledge campaign you can run in FutureFund. Once you create the campaign for the event, students who sign up to participate each get a link they can use to collect donations from family and friends.
Find step-by-step instructions for successful pledge campaigns here.
Tip: The link you’ll share when you create the campaign is what you’ll use to sign up student participants. When they register for the event, they’ll each get their own unique link that they can use to raise money.
| Ease of Implementation | Moderate – need wreath materials and space |
| Time to Implement | A-thons require 8–12 weeks planning |
| Expenses Required | $$ (supplies, decorations) |
| Volunteers Needed | 3–6 to supervise and assist with decorating |
| Ideal For | Creative seasonal event with resale potential |
Have students sign up to decorate wreaths during a special event and collect pledges from their families and friends to support them! The finished products can also be sold through your school’s online store as part of a purchase campaign afterward.
| Ease of Implementation | Moderate – needs gifts, space, wrapping supplies |
| Time to Implement | A-thons require 8–12 weeks planning |
| Expenses Required | $$ (paper, tape, ribbon, tables) |
| Volunteers Needed | 5–8 to wrap and manage pledges |
| Ideal For | Partner events with local businesses or charities |
Find a local business willing to sponsor the event by donating toys or needed items to charity—then have students collect pledges to wrap as many as they can during an event, and provide prizes for the winners!
| Ease of Implementation | Easy – requires snow and open space |
| Time to Implement | A-Thons require 8–12 weeks planning |
| Expenses Required | $ (props, prizes for winners) |
| Volunteers Needed | 3–5 for supervision and judging |
| Ideal For | Schools in snowy climates, winter break kickoff |
If you get snow this time of year, this is a great opportunity to put it to good use. Just use any snowy field to organize a snowman competition! Have students collect pledges to participate in a snowman-building contest, and give prizes out for the best dressed, most creative, or largest number of snowmen created!
Any kind of fundraiser where you sell physical items or event tickets is a Purchase campaign. Add each item type to your online store in FutureFund by creating a specific Purchase campaign for it.
Learn how to run a purchase campaign here.
Tip: Always run Purchase campaigns alongside physical events like bake sales, since this allows you to make sales 24/7 and lets people make purchases even if they can’t attend the event.
| Ease of Implementation | Moderate – needs space, food, and volunteers |
| Time to Implement | 3–4 weeks planning |
| Expenses Required | $$$ (food, décor, Santa performer) |
| Volunteers Needed | 8–12 for cooking, serving, cleanup |
| Ideal For | Family engagement and community tradition |
Set up breakfast where the kids get to meet Santa Clause! A traditional spread of pancakes, eggs, bacon, oatmeal, muffins, and anything else that your community loves is usually a big hit. Your PTA can charge an admission fee at the door, but it’s also easy to sell tickets to an event like this with FutureFund.
| Ease of Implementation | Easy – needs Santa setup & photographer |
| Time to Implement | 2–3 weeks |
| Expenses Required | $$ (backdrop, photographer, costumes) |
| Volunteers Needed | 3–4 for check-in and photo assistance |
| Ideal For | Family keepsakes, PTA revenue boosting |
Give families in your school community lasting memories by selling vouchers to have their pictures taken with Santa! You’ll just have to decide whether you want a full Santa and Mrs. Claus scene or the big man by himself.
| Ease of Implementation | Easy – design & print calendars |
| Time to Implement | 3–4 weeks (to allow for production) |
| Expenses Required | $$ (printing costs) |
| Volunteers Needed | 2–3 to distribute and track orders |
| Ideal For | Ongoing fundraising through the new year |
Selling calendars for the upcoming calendar year is a great way to keep students and their families organized. You can either sell calendars with a specific theme or come up with a few different ideas so that there’s something for everyone in your school community.
| Ease of Implementation | Moderate – gather, format, and print recipes |
| Time to Implement | 4–6 weeks |
| Expenses Required | $$ (printing costs) |
| Volunteers Needed | 3–5 for editing and compilation |
| Ideal For | Community-building, schools with culinary programs |
Send out a call to your school community for recipes, or have the home economics students submit them—then put the results together in booklets and sell them through your school’s online store.
| Ease of Implementation | Easy – sell pre-made wreaths or student-made ones |
| Time to Implement | 1–2 weeks |
| Expenses Required | $$ (materials if making from scratch) |
| Volunteers Needed | 2–4 to manage sales and distribution |
| Ideal For | Add-on to wreath-a-thon or standalone sale |
Those wreaths you created earlier? It’s easy to sell them online! Create a single purchase campaign for general wreath sales or specific campaigns for different kinds if they’re organized in special ways (major holidays, etc.).
| Ease of Implementation | Easy – recruit student volunteers and find auction time |
| Time to Implement | 1–2 weeks |
| Expenses Required | $0 |
| Volunteers Needed | 2–3 for organization and communication |
| Ideal For | Small schools or close-knit communities |
Find some student volunteers to help the community with whichever holiday chores need to be completed! Then, hold an auction where the highest bidder gets the students’ help for the day. They can shovel snow, help decorate a house for Christmas, or whatever else the patrons need!
| Ease of Implementation | Moderate – needs childcare space and supervision |
| Time to Implement | 3–4 weeks |
| Expenses Required | $$ (snacks, activities, babysitter fees if not volunteer-based) |
| Volunteers Needed | 5–8 to supervise children |
| Ideal For | Schools with many young families |
Who needs a break around the holidays more than the hard-working parents in your school group? You can either raise money through a donation campaign to help fund babysitting fees and give your parents a rest, or sell tickets for the night to parents through your online store and use the proceeds to support your group’s overall fundraising efforts. There are lots of ways to structure this one—but trust us, your parent volunteers will appreciate it no matter what!
The fundraisers above are easy to run without any special tools, but FutureFund can give them a big boost. Learn how to use our free platform to promote and run your fundraisers so you can meet your targets for the year, and get started today with a quick discovery call.
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