Children collecting tzedakah for prize

amother

Saddlebrown

Sat, Mar 13 2021, 11:18 pm

amother [ Saddlebrown ] wrote:

There are a few times especially over the summer when I can get 20-30 kids coming to my house in one day. Each of them $3 times a few days? That adds up to hundreds of dollars lol.

I misread, but still 2 for each kid when I live in a development with about 600 kids, at least half of which collect for chai lifeline every summer 😖😖😖 great tzedakah and all but it isn’t in my budget to give them specifically $500. I usually give $1 or a quarter if have it.

I agree with what others said about collecting for their yeshiva. I’m in Lakewood we have dozens of chedarim. I give my close friends sons and my own kids schools but I don’t want to end up giving the bulk of my maaser to schools I’m not affiliated with.

amother

Copper

Sat, Mar 13 2021, 11:44 pm

My 6 year old had terrible anxiety all purim about needing to gollecting. He was begging to go door to door or stand in the street. I havent said no so many times in a day ever.My husband gave him a nice amout on the condition that he doesnt collect. The whole mood of the day was saved. This is not ok to put this on our kids.

amother

Sat, Mar 13 2021, 11:46 pm

amother [ Copper ] wrote:

6 years old!?
What is that a first grader!?
Why are they exploiting our children like this?
This is NOT chinuch!

amother

Black

Sat, Mar 13 2021, 11:53 pm

I went to a public school and they had magazine sales as a fundraiser. Kids who sold more magazines got more (chances) for prizes. I always hated it. It always made me feel bad & jealous because I could never sell very much and get the “cool” prizes like my friends. Fundraising with $ prizes for kids I think is just wrong. And I honestly don’t let my kids do this at all.

amother

Salmon

Sat, Mar 13 2021, 11:58 pm

amother [ Lime ] wrote:

What is it about this that bothers you?

Because it goes against my chinuch that I try to impart:
I teach my children to give because we want to give, not because we want to get.
I tell my children that if you pressure someone to give to your tzedakah, you can be taking away from another tzedakah; people have obligations and charities they support, we don't think it's correct to solicit funds for the purpose of earning a prize.
I explain to my children, that taking a prize for collecting can diminish the amount that goes to the cause.

amother

Powderblue

Sun, Mar 14 2021, 12:12 am

I do not let my kids collect for the magazines that come. We discuss that a child getting a luxury item that is 30% of the money he is collecting for a family that is starving is wrong. They get it.
My son did collect for high school on Purim. All boys got the same prize regardless of what they brought in. But we’re encouraged to bring in a minimum amount. In their case the prize was sponsored and I think it was a tremendous benefit to my son.

amother

Scarlet

Sun, Mar 14 2021, 12:46 am

I live in a large building (around 40 families) and on a block with a lot of families with kids. Even if each child only collected once a year it would be a lot (most of the families have at least a few children). I work full time and get home when my kids do, and it's those few hours that kids come around (since it's when they are home from school). It makes me crazy when the door rings with children collecting (especially during times of the year that it's more often like before Yom Tov). I have to stop whatever I'm middle of, go to the door, go look for change to give....its really disruptive. A few times I just told everyone to be quiet so it will seems like no one is home Can't Believe It

but I feel guilty about it since I feel like I'm teaching my kids that's it's annoying to give while they learn in school what a great mitzvah it is (plus I want them give happily) so now as their getting older I never do that anymore even though I feel like it somtimes. Plus somtimes I do need to answer the door since it may be somthing important like a delivery so I need to make sure it's not.

I guess one solution would be to keep a whole stack of change somewhere that my kids could just give when children come - eliminating the problem of searching for change, but I'm not comfortable with my kids opening the door for strangers (I don't know if it's kids unless I look and my kids arent yet tall enough yet to look through the peephole ) so I'd still have to stop what I'm doing to get the door....

amother

Gold

Sun, Mar 14 2021, 1:06 am

What I hate is kids standing in stores holding $ in there hand all they have to do is open there hand for a 1\2 second and the bills will go flying all over the parking lot.

I do not let my kids collect in stores for a bunch of reasons one day my 10 year old's friend called him to come collect in Kosher West with him- Why was that boy collecting in Kosher West his mother had to go away for about an hour and she did not trust him home by himself. I was like why is Kosher West your babysitter?

seeker

Sun, Mar 14 2021, 4:44 am

amother [ OP ] wrote:

There's a few points.
Not all children are old enough or mature enough to go out collecting on their own. So a parent has to make time to take them.
Teaching a child that it's OK to shnorrer from others for their own benefit. And yes, it's for their own benefit because they are ONLY doing it for the prize.
The competition between the children. "I'm getting prize x because I collected $x but you only collected $y"
They don't teach the children the responsibility behind collecting. Keeping track of the money, being careful with it, not losing or spending it... Kids have no concept
And many of them don't understand the value of money and are being pushy to get more.

I'm sure there's more that I can't articulate at the moment.

ALLLLL THIS. How can we as parents band together to find a better solution? WHY are principals letting this go through the schools? How are they not realizing how this is not good chinuch?

One year I did let my kids do a bake sale to raise money for their prize-y thing. I said I'm not letting you do the begging thing but if you are showing that you're investing effort to support this cause then you can get the benefits. And I did a bunch of supervision to see to it that they learned from the experience how to plan and execute the operation, track and divide the money between the kids who did it, etc. I don't always have the wherewithal for that, though, and in this case they teamed up with another family or two (don't remember) so it wasn't that bad. I still didn't like the whole contest thing as a whole, and I think that the kids would have been just as motivated if they just played up what a wonderful mitzvah it is, without the prizes. They can be inspired by stories of how other kids have done chessed and tzeddakah, and that would be much more impactful than this prize situation. It is very shortsighted.

southernbubby

Sun, Mar 14 2021, 9:32 am

I remember when one cause sent day campers asking for people to sponsor them swimming laps for a cause but the small print said that they could jump up and down instead of swim and the kids would come thinking that they had raised more than the giver intended. I don't know how many fell for it and paid up but most people got smart and offered a penny a jump or capped the amount that they would give.
If numerous kids come collecting for the same thing, it's ok to just give the first one who comes and tell the rest that you gave already. It's also ok not to answer everyone who knocks on the door.
It's different than giving to adults who are collecting because they themselves need tzedukah.
It's also ok to just take the information and send in a donation of the giver's choice.

amother

Sun, Mar 14 2021, 9:33 am

Another big thing for me is who's responsible for the money?
A kid gets $10. Decides he wants to go to the store and buy himself a treat so takes $3 off that.
It's certainly not the kids fault. He doesn't have a concept of the responsibility of collecting and protecting tzedakah money.
So then it's on the parents? Is that fair? No one asked the parents permission before asking the kid to collect. That means the parent has to really be on top of the kid.
That leaves the yeshiva. I wonder if they would even agree that they bear the responsibility or push it onto someone else.

amother

Sun, Mar 14 2021, 9:38 am

southernbubby wrote:

Your last paragraph is 100% true. The problem is these kids are incenitivized to bring in x amount so you telling them you already gave upsets them.
But really my issue is more from the collecting end than the giving end. As adults, we can be sympathetic to the kids and figure out what works for us to give and when.
But when the kids are sent collecting without the proper understanding of what their doing, and being taught to be pushy to get even more than the next kid and they don't have a concept of the responsibility.....
I can go on and on. I'm so frustrated!

amother

Magenta

Sun, Mar 14 2021, 9:47 am

amother [ OP ] wrote:

I believe I heard in the name of R Yaakov Kamenetsky that children under bar/bas mitzva should only collect in an enclosed pushka that the school breaks open so they don't feel the tayva to use that money.
For that reason, my guidelines are:
Children under bar mitzvah without a pushka- a dime
Children under bar mitzvah with a pushka- a quarter
Boys over bar mitzvah (usually only Purim time) 2 or 3 quarters.
I get a roll of dimes and a roll of quarters a few times a year, - before Purim, the summer, before Rosh Hashana, Chanuka time and keep the money in a container. When it runs out, then I tell the kids I can't give.
It comes out to $50 a year.
Personally I hate the constant bake sales and carnivals that happen in my neighborhood all summer. My kids pressure me and it's not just saying no to a neighbors kid, but my own who wants to buy a cookie for 25 cents EVERY DAY.

southernbubby

Sun, Mar 14 2021, 9:49 am

amother [ OP ] wrote:

As upsetting as it is to small children to either be turned down or be given a nickel, if they see that people are not giving, eventually the homes of non-givers get a reputation of not giving and the kids stop coming. I hate to disappoint kids but I also can't buy lemonade from them because my body can't handle the carbs. Non Jews who sell non kosher candy in front of shopping centers also can't expect me to buy.
Maybe it's better to have lots of small change so that each kid gets something but what's wrong with a sign in Yiddish telling kids that there will be no door answering at certain times?
The more we feed the problem, the bigger it gets. People should offer their own kids a prize for not collecting and then give the cause a check at their own discretion.