Time was, schools held bake sales to raise money for uniforms. Or to pay a team’s travel expenses. Or to hold a science fair.
But Ninilchik School has something that exceeds the same old same old — a raffle for the “Alaskan Dream Trip,” an 11-day adventure for two that includes airfare, accommodations, sightseeing, halibut and king salmon fishing and bear viewing.
“The whole idea comes back to my wife making cookies, me carrying the cookies to school, my daughter buying them, multiplied throughout the households here in town,” Ninilchik School Principal Terry Martin said of typical fund-raising efforts that repeatedly involve families in this small Kenai Peninsula community of 800. “How could we get past that? What was the grand slam going to be? For us, (the raffle) is it.”
Tickets began selling for $25 each in 2005; the winning ticket will be drawn April 3. In addition to round-trip airfare, the vacation package includes fishing with Lucky Pierre Charters in Homer; Ninilchik charter businesses Captain Steve’s Saltwater Charters and Lodge, Chihuly’s Charters and Butt Chasers; fishing on the Kenai River with Harry Gaines Kenai River Fishing Guides; fishing, accommodations and fly-out bear-viewing with Timber Wolf Lodge in Soldotna; and processing of catch at Deep Creek Custom Packing in Ninilchik. Other support has been donated by Ninilchik Traditional Council, USA Fishing, Fish Alaska Magazine and Tesoro Alaska Company.
“(Ticket) sales are starting to wind down and the odds are way better than they should be,” Martin said, referring to the learning process the school has faced in sponsoring the event.
Originally, plans for marketing the raffle included a Web site to advertise and to sell tickets, an e-mail address and fax number the public could use to order tickets and Web casting of the ticket draw. However, Alaska’s gaming rules altered those plans.
“The statute allows certain organizations to advertise using broadcasting, which includes television, radio, satellite cable, facsimile and the Internet,” said Jeff Prather, the state’s gaming manager.
Among the events having legislative approval for such advertising are the Nenana Ice Classic, Fairbanks’ Goose Classic and Petersburg’s Canned Salmon Classic. However, misunderstanding of Alaska’s gaming laws is evident by the number of organizations using the Internet, radio and television to advertise such things as raffles for new vehicles.
“The organizations that are doing that are violating gaming laws,” Prather said.
Careful to stay within the law, the school recalled brochures advertising the raffle so that a sticker could be placed over the e-mail address and fax number. When Martin was asked to do a radio interview about the raffle, he also politely declined.
“As the obstacles came up, we just kept working through them and figuring out what we needed to do,” Martin said.
In spite of the limitations, orders for 150 tickets have come in from across the country, helped by distribution of brochures through the Soldotna Chamber of Commerce and the Kenai Visitors and Convention Bureau.
“We’ve got wonderful letters in the mail from people saying this is a great idea,” Martin said. “One gentleman, a retired schoolteacher in California, said he thought it was a fantastic idea. And everybody loves Alaska and has a story related to it, whether they visited Fairbanks once or have an aunt in Soldotna.”
In spite of the challenges, Ninilchik School is already considering next year’s raffle. One idea is to turn it around by offering a trip to Mexico or Hawaii for peninsula reside`nts, followed by another dream charter fishing trip two years from now.
“While the ticket sales aren’t where we hoped they would be, (the raffle) is still coming off. We’ve raised more than we would have otherwise,” Martin said. “And there’s still time left to sell tickets.”
Fifteen percent of the raffle’s proceeds will be used to seed future raffles, 35 percent will go to academic programs such as Battle of the Books, and 50 percent is earmarked for co-curricular programs.
“What we envision is that students will still have to fund-raise, but we can match what they’re doing,” Martin said. “If they do a car wash and raise $300, we can match that. Then they have $600. That’ll serve them well.”
Alaskan Dream Trip tickets can be purchased at the school through March 31. The winning ticket will be drawn April 3. For more information on the raffle or Ninilchik School activities, call (907) 567-3301 or 1-800-567-1043.
McKibben Jackinsky can be reached at mckibben.jackinsky@homernews.com
