District approvers: how is your approval chain set up, and what do you ask organizers?
Jesse Myrick
SuccessFund Team
Every district on SuccessFund reviews campaigns before they go live, but no two districts route them the same way. I read a lot of approval setups, and the ones that run smoothly share a few habits. I would like to hear how yours works and what you would change.
The pieces you control under Approvals, then Settings:
- A first approver per school, plus an org-wide fallback reviewer for schools with nobody assigned.
- Approve and Forward versus Final Approval, decided by role permission. A "review only" role can forward but never finalize.
- Instructions for Approvers, shown to a reviewer right before they act. This is where the routing rules live ("athletics goes to the AD, everything else to the business office").
- Your own approval questions and closeout questions, and a campaign disclaimer that prints on every campaign page and flyer.
- For booster clubs and PTAs, sanctioning: an annual application your district reviews, with a set term or a fixed renewal date.
What I would like to learn from you:
- Who is your first approver, the principal or the bookkeeper? Does it change by school?
- Which approval questions have earned their place, and which ones do organizers skip or answer badly?
- How do you handle a booster club that runs a campaign under a school's name?
An earlier thread asked how districts track their booster clubs and PTOs. If that is your world, both threads could use you.
Jeannie Harris
Dexter Consolidated Schools
Ideally, the person entering the campaign sends it to our Activities Director who approves and then sends it to the Business Manager for final approval. However, many times, they choose Send for Final Approval.
It would be so very helpful if we could set up approval routes. For example, depending on location, it would route to the building principal, then to the Activities Director and then to the Business Manger.
Cameron Cox
Norman
For the school sites, It goes to their book keeper and then their Principal. After that, it goes to an admin department and then finally Finance to input the correct coding. We deviate from this simple chain when food is involved, which adds an additional approver. Also, if it is booster club, it just needs to go to the principal. If it is athletics, it needs to go a completely different route and also our AD. It seems complicated, but most of the time, the principals know how to forward their approval after them. If they miss something, someone at district will correct it. Would be great to automate it though!
Lance Hatch
Iron County School District
First, we have a policy that governs how we approach fundraisers. In that policy, it states that all fundraising must be approved by the superintendent. Additionally, each organization should have only one fundraiser per year to limit the burden on the community.
Approval Process
Teacher, Coach, Advisor
Finance Secretary of the School
Principal of the School
Superintendent
Because the system is so easy to use and we receive an email anytime there is something in the queue to approve, it is pretty seamless.
Brenda Groo
Jordan School District
Fundraiser Approval Process:
Teacher, Coach, Advisor
Assistant Principal over fundraisers
School Administrative Assistant (to add the account number)
District Administrative Assistant, Administrator of Schools
Administrator of Schools
Camps & Clinics Approval Process:
Teacher, Coach, Advisor
School Athletic Administrative Assistant
Assistant Principal over Camps & Clinics
District Administrative Assistant, Administrator of Schools
Administrator of Schools
Both processes run smoothly.
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