New software to be used to track items at Blaine auction
To help facilitate this weekend's fund-raiser auction for Catharine Blaine Elementary, the school's Parent Teacher Association has invested in Auction Pro auction software.
"We've always done it the old-fashioned way, keeping track of everything with a pen and paper," said auction chair Jane O'Neal. "There will be a lot less scrambling around in making sure bidders get information for their tax records."
Funds raised by the auction help pay for physical education and art staffing, music department supplies, counseling and school supplies. This year there are direct fund appeals called Fund a Need that provide P.E. and library departments with immediate funds, said O'Neal, who is in her first year as the fund-raising chair. The library department, headed by Barb Barden, has asked for $10,000, which would pay for two new books for each of the 500 students at Blaine.
The P.E. department, meanwhile, wants funding for yoga kits, stilts, waveboards (bigger and wider skateboards), and a Dance Dance Revolution video game.
About 200 guests are confirmed for the event, and PTA leaders expect to at least match what was raised last year.
Tickets are $65 and include a sit-down dinner and music. Pricing the event has been a balancing act, O'Neal said, because the PTA wants to generate funds but not set the price so high that people are dissuaded from coming.
An even greater challenge, O'Neal said, was illustrating to parents the significance of these fundraisers.
"Unless you really pay attention, you don't realize that we are funding things like staff positions," she said.
The auction and dinner will be presided over by D.J. and auctioneer Troy McVicker, a Blaine parent and owner of Event Source NW Inc. Some of the items for bid include a weeklong stay at the Sheraton Maui, lunch with Seattle Schools Superintendent Maria L. Goodloe-Johnson, a two-night stay at the Salish Lodge, a flight in a glider and a learn-to-make-sushi lesson. There are also a handful of student projects including a watercolor of Venice made to match the theme of the night, "An Evening in Venice."
[[In-content Ad]]