Last year, the Ben Stelter School Fundraiser’s expenses were just 2.6% out of all the money raised. The other 97.4%, amounting to about $280,000, went directly into the cause. This year, as the BSSF aims to increase that number, the student-led finance team has to balance keeping the funds organized and the expenses low as more schools sign up than ever before.
The finance team, composed of five student volunteers, has built a well-oiled machine of systems and models that can perform a myriad of important tasks. This machine is an integral part of how the BSSF works, but it wasn’t always as well-developed as it is now.
When Zach Chia, currently Director of Finance, joined in 2024, he was the third member of the BSSF internal team. He was tasked with optimizing the finance systems already in place and developing new, forward-thinking ways to handle revenue and expenses as more schools joined.
“When I joined the team, there was no way to determine the amount of money every school raised each day”, Chia said. “Each number had to be manually entered and added”.
This was a problem that needed an urgent solution, especially with the fundraiser’s exponential growth.
“Over the years, we’ve created a system that automatically updates daily based on how many cash and online donations were received”, explains Chia. “Now, there is no manual work”.
This not only increases the general efficiency of the finance team’s work, it also improves the accuracy.
“It allows [the team] to check and correct rather than having to input every detail”
Riza Hasan, Senior Controller, is the only out-of-province team member in the BSSF. Her role focuses on tracking donations and expenses. This year, she analyzed and improved the prediction model system, a particularly interesting and innovative part of the machine.
“The prediction model system is a forecasting tool that estimates future revenue by combining fundraising patterns from the past with current activity and expected future changes,” Hasan explains.
This system allows the finance team to stay one step ahead during the especially busy fall fundraiser by taking both the current revenues and the estimated future revenues into consideration. The estimates it produces are both extremely useful and impressively thorough, analyzing past data to create accurate revenue predictions ahead of the main fundraising season in the fall.
On the other hand, how are the general expenses of a fundraiser kept so low at the BSSF?
According to Chia, the answer lies in community relationships. A major part of the team is already a part of the EPSB and the surrounding school districts.
“The board is made up mostly of people active in the community, such as principals, teachers, and city advocates.”
These valuable connections help get the word out there, drastically reducing advertisement expenses. The Ben Stelter School Fundraiser has always been community-based, and it’s interesting to see how that extends into operations internally.
As important as the external relationships is the internal leadership.
“The way I like to lead my team is to allow them to do their job and trust that they will get it done,” said Zach Chia, the director of the finance department.
This trust-based system has succeeded, allowing the team members to do their job well and focus solely on their role in the team.
The finance team is constantly working and developing creative ways to strengthen the fundraiser’s operations and communication with schools, too.
“There are many new visuals for people to view which allow them to track their progress and create goals for motivation”, says Chia on one of the team’s latest projects.
Another essential part of the finance team’s job is to arrange information so the internal team can understand the numbers as well as they can.
“We make sure everything is organized and set up in a way that is easy for everyone to view.” explains Chia. That includes everyone on the team, so they also know how to go about spending within their own departments, which the finance team verifies.
This group of students has grown into virtually mistake-free systems that keep both revenues and expenses organized, keeping the latter low and accessible to everyone, internally and externally.
By the time the fall fundraiser rolls around, all the important and creative work the finance team is putting in is on track to pay off, as the Ben Stelter School Fundraiser gears up for its most impactful year yet.
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