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Let’s host a community Back To School Bash! This great event not only celebrates the start of the school year, it’s an opportunity to share the love of God while meeting needs in the community by giving away free backpacks, passing out free school supplies, and offering free haircuts to students. Keep reading for tips to help you plan and have your own Back To School Bash in your town.
This Back To School Bash can make a positive impact on your community members in more ways than one!
- Meet needs in the community by handing out free backpacks and school supplies
- Build a sense of community between your church and local businesses
- Gives your small church a visible presence in your town
- Provides opportunities for local businesses to “give back”
- Introduces potential attendees to your church and congregation
A good way to make sure this event is a success is by promoting the Back To School Bash as a community event. By promoting the event this way, community involvement is maximized, and it’s easier to get people to help out! Many businesses could have “give back” funds built into their budgets! Also, people like community events. It’s their community, too. Many want to be involved, support, and help their community to be better.
Please keep in mind that this type of event requires proper planning. Follow these steps to do it with almost any small church budget!
A Great Opportunity For Small Churches With Small Budgets
If you only have a few congregational volunteers, that doesn’t mean you can’t do this event!
- If you have few congregational volunteers, try reaching out to local businesses or service organizations to join you.
- If you have little funds, ask local businesses to be event sponsors.
- If you don’t have extra money to purchase school supplies, do a school supply drive with your congregation, ask a local coffee shop if they could host a big box for a drop-off, or ask local businesses to contribute.
- If your budget is lacking and you don’t have enough to purchase chips for lunch, ask the local theater if they could donate bags of popcorn.
- If you have lots of supplies and only a few backpacks have been donated, then give out the backpacks with supplies first. After the backpacks are gone, you can still offer school supplies. It’s a win!
First Things First
The best way to start is to gather a few friends or teammates to help with the initial planning. Consider your small team as the Back To School Bash Committee. Then, as time progresses, add others into the mix to help with all of the back-to-school activities you want to include!
While this isn’t a comprehensive list, it is a great list to get you started. When your team is planning, remember to consider your community’s needs and your congregation.
Start with three things:
- Pray and ask the Lord’s direction.
- Identify your purpose.
- Ask someone on your committee to take good notes and keep all notes in a binder or in a Google Doc. Keep this for your ideas and planning. Be sure to note who is doing what and when they will do it. Highlight all deadlines.
Identifying your purpose helps you stay on track while you’re planning. Think about the purpose of your event. Every decision that follows should be made to revolve around that purpose.
What is Your Purpose? What Do You Want To Accomplish?
Everyone’s purpose and goals will vary depending on your small church and the community you’re in, but I want to provide you with some ideas to get you started! If your sole purpose is to provide school supplies, you may not want to include a bounce house, face painting, or free haircuts because this would probably be a waste of money and resources. Defining your purpose leads to a more enjoyable experience for everybody!
If your purpose is to create a fun community event that sets families up for the start of a new school year, you might want to provide backpacks, school supplies, and haircuts. You could offer lunch, and add fun elements such as face painting, balloon artists, and caricatures.
List Of School Supplies Per Back Pack
This is not an exhaustive list. It is extremely doable for small churches. Work within your budget. Tweak this list as necessary.
- Spiral notebook – wide ruled
- 3 two-pocket folders without prongs
- 3 #2 pencils
- Pink eraser
- Pack of wide-lined, loose-leaf paper
- Hard pencil case
- Box of 24-count crayons
- Pencil sharpener
- Pair of blunt kids’ scissors
Don’t feel like you have to completely fill the backpacks, just try to do what you can. Most likely, parents might still need to pick up extra supplies, but what you distribute on the day of your event can still be a huge blessing to parents who are trying to prepare for the start of school!
Need to restock your children’s ministry craft supplies? Take a look at the list below!
- 8 x 10 artist canvas
- Decoupage glue
- Foam brush
- Glitter
- Hot glue or craft glue
- Ribbon or Jute twine
- Acrylic paint and Paintbrushes
- Felt
- Sheets of 8 ½ x 11 White cardstock
- Wide popsicle sticks and standard Popsicle sticks
- Acrylic paint
- Brown craft gift bags
- Sharpie permanent markers
What To Do With Extra Supplies
It’s great if you have extra supplies! Keep these separate and give them away to those who arrive after the backpacks have been given out. Parents and children will be thankful for the supplies. Ask a local store for a supply of plastic bags for these extras. It can be much quicker and keep the line moving faster if you hand out bags rather than pass out individual items. Also, providing bags is thoughtful so kids or parents aren’t carrying around loose supplies at the event.
Back To School Bash Community Event
Any or all of the following can be a part of your Back To School Bash. Work with the gifts, talents, and resources you have. Check your congregation members for hidden talents. Find support in local businesses. Reach out to community organizations.
- Free backpacks, while supplies last
- Free school supplies, while they last
- Free haircuts for students
- Free box of bandaids from the local hospital
- Bouncy house
- Face painting
- Caricatures
- Balloon artistry
- Free hot dog, chips, and water bottle for lunch
- Community organization giveaways
- Selfies with the local sports team mascot
Try This Event Plan Overview
When guests arrive, they form a line at the registration table. (The line should form away from any other event stations.) I want to encourage you not to open the registration table or accept forms until the start time of your event. Opening early can cause hard feelings for attendees who arrive at the proper time and find the backpacks are already given out.
Parents complete the registration forms and give forms to the volunteers when they arrive at the registration table. At the registration table, parents will receive free lunch tickets for themselves and their children. They are then directed to continue to the backpack giveaway station.
Once guests have their backpacks, they may visit any other station in the event. If they go to the haircut station, there will be a sign-up to keep track of the order of children receiving haircuts. Have someone with a loud voice or a microphone at the haircut station call out three to five names of students who are next in line for haircuts.
It’s A Good Idea To Start Your Planning In January
Get together with your planning committee and choose your date and location. Before you randomly pick a date, consider when the first day of school is. Set the date for your Back To School Event 2-3 weeks before school starts. That gives parents time to pick up the extra supplies their kid might need.
Choose a location that has visibility and is easy for many people to navigate. You’ll also want to make sure that there’s enough room for all of your fun activities! This can ensure that families and volunteers have a better time.
Set the time. For an event that includes haircuts, balloon artists, food, and other stations, set the time to be 3 hours, 4 at the most. The primary reason we’re having this event is to give backpacks and school supplies to those who need them. Those could potentially be handed out within the first hour. Excitement can wane after someone gets their backpack, a hot dog, and a fun balloon animal. People will stay for a while, but most likely not for the entire time. Because of this, a three to four hour event is sufficient.
Also, consider any upcoming events in the community that may already be on the town calendar. You don’t want to compete with any big-town events.
Reach out to big sponsors, hospitals, and local tourist attractions. This is important to do in January, or as soon as you can. Often, these larger corporations distribute their funds in January, so waiting until closer to the event may cause you to miss out on a large donation.
What To Do 5-6 Months Before The Event
During this time, make a thorough event plan with your team so that you’ll know how and what to plan further. From this plan, make a timeline on what needs to be done and when.
Make A General Plan For The Event
- Confirm your event time
- Write a list of what you are offering families at your event.
- In addition to backpacks and/or school supplies, what other elements might you add for fun? Think about bouncy houses, carnival-type games, caricature drawings, balloon artists, face painting, and photo booths.
- Think about music and a microphone. Music, whether live or on a playlist, helps keep the event alive and fun.
- Think about local barbers, salons, or cosmetology schools that may be willing to donate time and services to give free haircuts to children. (You’ll want to get this on their calendar now so they can plan.)
- Consider reaching out to some local food trucks to see if they would want to participate!
- Reach out to the local sports team and ask if their mascot can come and hang out for selfies at the event. This would even spark school spirit!
- Start planning your registration area, event set up, and clean up. If you have enough volunteers, schedule your clean-up crew to arrive at the event just before it’s over.
- Make a list of local businesses to contact and if you have a specific “ask” for any of them.
- Reach out to any people, outside your church, for schedule availability and what they can do to participate. (balloon artists, community volunteers, etc.)
Create A Plan For Backpacks And Supplies
What exactly are you passing out? I want to encourage you to make a list of the school supplies you’re going to be giving away. Be intentional about including things for both younger students and older students!
If you end up making drop-off boxes to place in local businesses, be sure to have proper signage on the box and in the stores! I would also encourage you to create a nice ‘Thank You For Your Donations’ fly to post at the businesses AFTER the event. This is a great way to let everyone know how many people they were able to help!
Decide On What’s For Lunch
Offering free food is a great way to connect with the whole community! Deciding on what to have for lunch can be hard, but I’ve found that the simpler it is, the better! Try going with something like hot dogs, chips, and water bottles. (don’t forget to include the condiments!) Try to get as many donations as possible, and be sure to serve food that doesn’t need plasticware.
Plan Your Back To School Bash Location
Be sure to choose and reserve the venue in advance. And remember that If you choose a local park, be sure to have a contingency for rain, whether it’s another date or another location indoors. One of the best ways to be prepared, is to make a list of everything you need for your venue space and when it will get done.
Keep in mind that you will probably need access to electricity if you’re going to have a microphone of any kind, offer free haircuts, set up bouncy houses, or even give away warm food.
What To Do 3-5 Months Before The Event
One of the best things you can do is print out registration forms and purchase 5-7 clipboards. Registration forms, at the very least, should ask for a child’s first name and grade, and parent’s names. You could also ask for emails if you plan to send a follow-up email to thank them for coming to the event and invite them to church.
Clipboards are super beneficial. Two volunteers could spend the 20-30 minutes before the event greeting guests, and allowing parents to complete the registration form. Once their form is complete, take it off the clip onboard and give it to the parent to hold on to until they reach the registration table. Then, move to the next person in line.
Be sure to reach out to all local businesses for support. If you have prearranged plans with them, be sure to go over them just in case! This will also be a great time to start your donation drives for the supplies! You should also develop a list of desired supplies so that you know what you have to buy after the donation drives!
I’ve also found that creating an event map helps with the flow of traffic and keeps everything organized for your leaders and volunteers. Take this opportunity to talk with everyone and assign them positions and tasks! Find out how many volunteers you need for each station, and start asking the people you think would enjoy it!
SUPER IMPORTANT!! If you create signage or flyers thanking and promoting business or private sponsors… Proofread it at least three times before making it final! And then proof the final! Do not display or pass out any signage with misspelled names.
4 Weeks Before The Event
This is going to be the time to start confirming attendance with outside guests. You’ll also want to start promoting the event on social media! Be sure to include a phrase similar to “while supplies last” on each promotion!
This is also when you’ll start confirming your volunteer attendance and list of stations. You might want to have a team meeting dedicated to talking about this as well as what they need for the success of their stations!
One Week Before The Event
The week before the day of your event will filled with a lot of last-minute prep. In the midst of all of that, it might be fun to host a Stuffing Party with your volunteers and community leaders! This will be a great time to put the supplies into individual backpacks and have fun doing it! Make sure you have your registration forms printed and ready to go too!
At this Stuffing Party, be sure to go over the details of the event and make sure you have everything ready. Take the time to make sure that all of your contacts are lined up, and that you know who to call when you need it!
Don’t forget to send a reminder to your volunteers about the event! Include the times they need to be there and any other important information they need to remember. (Some churches have church shirts they want their volunteers to wear. Others pass out lanyards with the church name on them when volunteers arrive.)
The Day Of The Event
Before The Event
- Arrive early with your map to set up
- Pray before you start
- Bring coffee (or your favorite morning church snacks)
- Give final instructions to your team leads
- Set up
- Breathe and enjoy the event
- Take pictures or a FB Live video
- If you have sponsors at the event, take pix with them
After The Event
- Before the clean-up, gather everyone together for a QUICK meet-up. Thank everyone for all their help and support. Ask for everyone to share a quick win or something that went well “moment” with the group. (Have one of your leadership team take notes; you can use these highlights for the future.)
- Everyone cleans up their station and then helps someone else
- Walk the area and pick up any remaining trash on the ground
Looking for a step-by-step guide to starting or restarting your children’s ministry?
Check out the Children’s Ministry Bundle For Small Churches!
Within One Week After The Event
- Write and deliver or mail thank you cards to ALL sponsors, vendors, and guest volunteers.
- At the next church service, share with the congregation some of the “wins.”
- Meet with the planning committee to debrief. Make a list of things that went great and things you would change next time.
- Return anything you borrowed for the event.
- If you have leftover backpacks or school supplies, reach out to a local school to donate to them for needy students.
- Post “Thank You For Your Donations” flyers in businesses that hosted collection boxes
This event can work for small churches. All it takes is some planning and the willingness to reach out and find community partners. It’s a great way to show the community you care and help meet some of their needs.
You can definitely do a Back To School Bash with your small church! Grab a friend and start praying and writing down your thoughts for this event. Post a comment below to share one of your WINS!
Read More:
Prayer Stations To Celebrate Back To School
