Beyond bake sales

I recently went to an excellent Learning2 (@learning2) conference in Milan. I got a great deal of knowledge and inspiration for this experience and over the next few posts I would like to share some of those ideas with you.

First idea:Moving on from the bake saleIn this quick inspirational video Warren Appel (@warrena)talks about a common issue for us all. How do we move the pupils away from bake sales?[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UoYiWHVJnNk]I really connected with this message. I have thought of different ideas to raise money, but ultimately they have all ended in my groups selling "stuff" at school. That "stuff" is mostly baked goods, lets be honest, we can make a lot of money for our charities with surprisingly little effort. However, I think that Warren is right, we need to be attempting to work outside of the school. We need to be looking for real audiences. It might not be as "quick" to set up as the bake sale, however we can create the possibilities to make money for a longer period of time and from a larger audience. We can also allow the pupils to interact in a genuine sales environment.So these are his ideas, if you have any others I would love comments and lets see if we can move on from the bake sales!The main take outsKindle Author (3:13 in the YouTube clip) - Pupils could publish their written work. This could be a novel, poetry a collection of pieces. This could be bought by anyone and it is a lot easier to upload to Kindle than it is to iTunes. As far as I can see you keep control of the rights, pricing etc of your publications (different to the iTunes). However, pupils should always read the conditions first. What a great idea - selling their creative work!Google Play ($25 initial fee) (3:13 in the YouTube clip) . Pupils can publish their music (you would need to check about the copyright limitations) onto a public forum, for where it can be downloaded, streamed and listened to. There are other sites that could be considered such as bandcampShapeways  (4:34 in the YouTube clip) Create a 3D model file. Upload this to Shapeways and they will print and mail it to you - not that exciting when you already have a 3D printer. However, excitingly, anyone else can order this from Shapeways and will have it created and sent to them. A cut of this profit will be sent to the original owner. Another great thing is that it can be printed in a variety of materials from sandstone to gold!Etsy - (5:18 in the YouTube Clip) Selling art work to a larger audience. Digitalise it and it can be sold over and over again, great for visual art, photography, needle work, wool work!Zazzle or Cafe Press (5:39 in the YouTube clip) Digitise pupils work and you can add it to t-shirts, phone covers, mugs. These sites will make and post the product, with the creator getting a cut of the profits.Real audience. Authentic products. They may sells loads and make great money for the charities. They might sell none, but at least they will have undergone an authentic process and tried to engage with real audiences.Exciting right!?The other site that interested me wasKiva (0.48 in the YouTube Clip) Through the site you loan money to a person for a specific purchase. This loan is repaid and then the money is re-loaned to another activity. The people on the site have chosen what they really need so the audience and need is real.

We are a non-profit organization with a mission to connect people through lending to alleviate poverty. Leveraging the internet and a worldwide network of microfinance institutions, Kiva lets individuals lend as little as $25 to help create opportunity around the world - Kiva