30+ Fundraising Incentives Students Love

What Are the Best School Fundraiser Prizes?

After working closely with thousands of schools since 2007, here’s something we’ve learned: fundraiser incentives that drive the highest participation rarely come from a prize catalog.

Candy bars, stickers, and cheap toys all get a polite “thanks!”, then end up at the bottom of a backpack by Tuesday. So what actually gets kids talking and donations rolling in?

Incentives they can’t stop thinking about.

With over a decade of watching what works (and what doesn’t) across schools of every shape and size, we’ve gathered the best student fundraising incentives all in one place. Ready for your newest prize ladder playbook? Let’s go!

Privilege Incentives: Give Students an Unforgettable Experience

Privilege incentives might be the most underrated category of school fundraiser prizes: they cost next to nothing, and deliver HUGE results. Privilege incentives work because they feel exclusive, earned, and genuinely special.

The trick is tying these to donation milestones or top individual student fundraisers, so there’salways something to work toward. The more you raise, the bigger the privilege!

Examples of privilege incentives:

1. Principal for a Day | Lake Mary Elementary raised $35,770 against a $30K goal on their 7th event with Get Movin’. Their top student fundraiser got to be Principal for a Day, and every student who raised $600 got to silly string the admin. Lake Mary called it “one of their best motivation strategies yet”!
2. Pancakes with the Principal | Summerfield Elementary PTO‘s 3rd Annual Bulldog Bonanza built an awesome prize package around principal access that inspired participation across the whole school, including classroom pizza parties, a live human car wash, and Tigers baseball tickets.
3. Homework Passes | Allow top earners to skip the after-school studying for a day (or two) with an exclusive homework pass!
4. Free Dress Day | Especially powerful at private and uniform-only schools, this one is an easy, uplifting way to motivate students to raise more. Top earners gain the ability to dress in anything they want for the school day.

More great family incentives:

• Extra recess
• Line leader
• Choose your seat for a week
• Sit with a friend/teacher at lunch

Family Incentives: Get the Whole Family Excited to Fundraise

Because parents are usually the ones sharing the donation link, a prize strategy that only targets students can leave a lot on the table.

Family fundraising incentives give parents a reason to get involved, too: sharing on social media, landing a business donor, or hitting a family-wide donation milestone together.

When families work toward a goal as a unit, everyone wins!

Examples of family incentives:

1. Family Zoo Membership | Providence Preschool in Jacksonville crushed their $20K goal, raising $36,200 and keeping 97%, with a family zoo membership as the top prize for first-time FundHubusers. Parents were motivated from day one!
2. Sibling Incentives | Padre Pio Academy encouraged whole-family participation by offering free dress day for siblings when a family hit their $300 donation goal, PLUS a pizza and drink coupon and a homework pass for every family that secured a business sponsor.
3. VIP parking/Pickup Line Pass | Parents and students both win big with VIP parking passes, which could look like a designated parking spot at busy school events, or a fast-pass to front-of-the-line at pick-up and drop-off.
4. Family Movie Night | Host a family movie night at the school auditorium, complete with inexpensive, yummy snacks like popcorn, pretzels, soda, and box candy. Hosting your reward event around the holidays? Don’t be afraid to theme it, too!

More great family incentives:

• End-of-year field day
• Disney raffle/local amusement park tickets
• Family bowling or game night
• Special seating/early access to events like a holiday gift shop or graduation ceremony
  
  

Memorable Experiences: My Teacher/Principal Will Do WHAT?!

If there’s one category of school fundraiser prize ideas that consistently outperforms everything else, it’sexperiences. Specifically, experiences that involve staff doing something students would, uh, probablynever expect to see!

The formula is simple: announce the wacky experience at kickoff, tie it to a school-wide goal, and let the anticipation build throughout the entire donation period. Students will talk about it every day. Parents will share it on social media. And on event day, you’ll have awesome content that brings awareness to your school’s fundraiser for years into the future!

Examples of memorable experiences:

1. Kiss a Baby Goat | Eisenhower PTA set a $50K goal, raised over $70K, and kept 96%. Students watched their school admin smooch baby goats as the ultimate reward…and this one went viral!
2. Principal as a Human Hot Dog | St. Christopher Parish raised over $22K on their 2nd Annual Color Run, keeping 95%. The reward? Students got to cover their principal in ketchup and mustard for blasting past their $20K goal!
3. Principal Sleeps Outside | When Green Elementary PTO raised $97,607 and kept 98% profit, their principal spent the night outside in school colors, Padres PJs, and a custom bed in the courtyard.
4. School Carnival | Spring Creek Elementary raised over $24K — more than twice their goal! — with a spring carnival that doubled as both the fundraiser and the reward.
5. Staff Camps on the Roof | Laketown Elementary PTO‘s Move-and-Groove-a-Thon raised over $51,000, keeping 97%. Their rockstar principal camped out on the school roof with a tent, stuffed animals, and pajamas, while staff hosted a live virtual storybook reading for students at home in bed.

More hilarious experience rewards:

• Pie the principal (a classic for good reason )
• Inflatable costume race
• Classroom silly string fight
• Staff vs. students dodgeball game
• Principal shaves head/dyes their hair school colors

Collectibles & Trending Items: When the Prize Does the Marketing for You!

There’s a noticeable difference between a cheap toy and a trending collectible, and your students know it immediately. When the prize is something kids are already buzzing about, they literally recruit donors for you.

The advantage of working with a Get Movin’ coach is having access to an updated list of what kids are actually excited about right now, so you’re never guessing or showing up sporting last year’s trend.

Examples of collectibles/trending items as rewards:

1. Theme-Matched Prizes | Wegienka Elementary raised over $18K with a Toy Story Fun Run! Students earned a sheriff badge sticker at registration and a space bracelet at $50 in donations. The theme-matched prizes were fun, adorable, and kept kids engaged from start to finish.
2. Physical Items kids are already collecting and talking about!

• Squishmallows
• Labubus
• Pop Its
• Trading cards
• Funko Pops
• Slime kits
• Mini Brands

What to avoid: Cheap, bulk-ordered toys that feel generic. Trust us: students can tell the difference, and so can their motivation levels!

Ready to Build a Prize Ladder That Actually Works?

Whatever incentive strategy your school chooses, the right fundraising platform makes it easy to track milestones, celebrate progress, and reward students every step of the way.

Book your next event on FundHub and your Personal Event Coach will help you build a customized prize ladder that fits your school and budget, so nothing is left to guesswork.

Schedule your free FundHub demo today and meet your coach!