Teachers may receive project or list donations from their school's community account when a donor gives to a specific school. Teachers or principals may also receive notifications that funds are available at their school if there is no active project or list at the time of the donation.
We distribute funding from a school-level donation in the following three ways, depending on the recent DonorsChoose activity at the school:
1. School has live projects or lists
When a project is or list is already posted and live, our system will apply the donation automatically to the school's most urgent project or Essentials list. Urgency is determined by a combination of the amount needed to fund and expiration date.
If you're a teacher whose request was funded through a school donation, you'll receive a standard donation email, and the donor on your project/list will be listed as your school's community fund.
Note: There may be a delay of up to 24 hours between transaction and project donation
2. School has registered and active teachers, but no live projects or lists
If a donation is made to a school that has no active projects or lists, we will email an active teacher with a notification that there are funds to redeem. We define an “active teacher” as a teacher who has posted a project in the last 12 months.
Funds are available to any teacher on a first come, first serve basis for this circumstance. While we only email one teacher at a time with the notification to redeem funds, the donation may be applied to a different teacher's project or list if that teacher posts a new project or list first.
3. Schools has no registered or active teachers or projects
If a donor gives to a school with no active teachers and no live projects or lists, we will email the principal to let them know there are funds available for a teacher at their school. The first teacher to create a new project or list will receive the donation.
FAQ
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Are there restrictions on school fund donations when a teacher redeems funds?
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Beginning 3/17/26, there is a $200 limit per teacher for Classroom Essentials list applications from school fund donations. Prior to 3/17/26, the list cap per teacher was $50.
There are no funding maximums when applied to projects. A teacher can claim the full amount of funding available for their project.
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Teachers who have the “hide school details” feature on their account are not eligible for school level donations.
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Can donors opt out of the suggested donation to DonorsChoose when making a school fund donation?
No. Because this kind of donations is applied from the school’s community fund page, the suggested donation is always included in the donation that is ultimately applied to a teacher's project or list.
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Do we list school level donors publicly?
No. We do not share a list of school donors on the school or the project page.
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Can teachers check a school’s community fund to see what funding is available?
No. Funding amounts are only listed in notification emails, and may not be accurate past the time of send (if funding is applied to projects/lists).
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Can a teacher receive multiple donations from a school’s community fund across multiple projects?
Yes, but only if there are no other active teachers at the school, or if no other teachers create a project or list.
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If my project expires or is archived without full funding, can I still keep the school community fund donation for my next project?
Not necessarily. If a project with a school fund donation is archived or expired, we will return the funds to the school community account and make it available to other teachers, where it can be re-claimed on a first come, first serve basis. If there are no other live projects or lists at your school, and you create the first new project after your first project is removed, the funds will be reapplied to your new project.
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What if a donor wants to give directly to my classroom instead of the entire school?
Donors can give at the project, teacher, or school level at their discretion! If a donor prefers to give to a specific teacher (like you!) instead of a school, they should purchase a gift card through your teacher page. You can find your unique teacher page URL in the Tools & Resources section of your account homepage.