Business opportunities
Adopt a school | Advertise in Mesa Public Schools | Become a vendor | Encourage your employees to volunteer | Make a donation | Share fund-raising ideas
Adopt a School
If your business or organization shares its expertise and resources, you will make a wonderful investment in our children’s future.
Consider adopting a school. Each partnership develops its own goals and activities. Work with a school near you to discuss what is needed. You can make good things happen. Possibilities abound:
- Academic achievement: Provide tutors and volunteers for classes, libraries and school offices.
- Career awareness: Host job shadowing opportunities; help conduct interview skills workshops; participate in career days and the Principal for a Day program.
- Student incentives and motivation: Sponsor awards for bringing up grades, most improved students, students of the month or perfect attendance; host or cater an academic awards banquet; be a mentor or lunch buddy for a student.
- Arts enrichment: Sponsor a visual arts or music festival; help fund visits by performing artists; provide scholarships to local cultural events.
- Improving the school environment: Donate equipment; assist with landscaping; participate in campus clean-up days and beautification projects.
- Faculty support and recognition: Host a welcome-back reception for faculty and staff; fund a classroom project; recognize educators during American Education Week and Teacher Appreciation Week
- Parent support: Contact schools to find out how you can support activities and fund raisers sponsored by Parent-Teacher Organizations and Booster Clubs.
- Families in need: Supplement the emergency clothes closet at school; furnish school supplies and personal hygiene items; donate to holiday toy and food drives.
Here are a few examples of how school-business partnerships are making a difference in Mesa Public Schools:
- Target and Heart of America Foundation worked with Lowell Elementary on a library make over. In addition to the renovation, the school received 2,000 new books, and every student received seven books to take home.
- Dr. Ted Dietrich, medical director of the Arizona Heart Institute invited Health Science High School students to watch surgeries through an observation dome, while medical personnel answered their questions.
- Fiesta Mall employees volunteered to help Guerrero Elementary students learn reading, writing and math. They funded the school’s Fiesta de Mayo, Junior Achievement BizTown, Christmas Angel program, field trips, special classroom activities, backpacks and school supplies. Fiesta Mall employees were honored by the Governing Board as Volunteers of the Month in October 2008.
- SAE International and retired engineers from General Motors propelled Taylor Junior High teens into A World in Motion. The volunteers funded the project and helped students make toy gliders and motorized toy cars. They taught students core scientific and consumer-relations concepts.
- Home Depot employees volunteered time and materials for school beautification projects.
- The Boeing Company paid for Crismon Elementary’s Janece Larson, sixth-grade teacher, to attend Space Camp in Huntsville, Ala., this summer.
Advertise in Mesa Public Schools
Contact a high school to speak to the athletic director for a referral to the Booster Club parent organization. Inquire about advertising opportunities at sporting events. Booster Clubs raise money by publishing ads on banners and in programs, primarily at football games.
Do you have a discount or special promotion for employees who belong to the Mesa Education Association and the Mesa Education Support Personnel Association? Call Kirk Hinsey, MEA president, at (480) 833-8400, to propose an ad for the association's Web site.
Some student newspapers and/or annuals accept ads. Contact high schools to speak with yearbook and journalism teachers.
Only nonprofit organizations that sponsor youth activities may send flyers home with students. This opportunity is limited to elementary schools.
Become a vendor
We welcome new businesses to the growing team of vendors who serve MPS. If you wish to sell products or provide services to MPS, please acquaint yourself with the district’s purchasing procedures.
Encourage your employees to volunteer
Volunteers work directly with students and behind the scenes — in classrooms, lunchrooms, libraries, school offices and sports programs.
Apply at the elementary, junior high or high school of your choice. Some businesses allow employees flexible scheduling, or time off work, to support their volunteer efforts.
To ensure our students' safety, prospective nonparent volunteers undergo free background investigations and must be cleared by the Human Resources Department before they begin. All volunteers who work with students do so in the presence of school personnel.
Volunteers of the Month are honored at Governing Board meetings, where they receive books and gift certificates from the Mesa Foundation for Educational Excellence. We treasure our volunteers! Read about our Volunteers of the Month.
Make a donation
Individual and business contributions of goods, services and financial support benefit students in many ways throughout the school year. The need is great. So is the appreciation of students and staff for your generosity. Consider our suggestions on how you can donate to the schools. Gift and Donation Forms for tax purposes are available at schools.
Share fund-raising opportunities
Call the school of your choice. Ask how to direct your proposal to the Parent-Teacher Organization or the Booster Club. Call the Mesa Foundation for Educational Excellence, at (480) 472-0220, or send an e-mail to the executive director.