Our PTO has always provided a welcome back breakfast and a gift. Last year we provided each teacher (32) a $100 gift certificate to a school supply store. This year our budget is a little bit tighter and cannot afford to do this again. What are some other ideas that might be given to our teachers as a welcome back gift? We would like to scale down to between $25-50 per teacher as well as breakfast.

Two years ago, we bought everyone a nice coffee mug from Big Lots, filled it with candy, and wrapped it in clear cellophane. We spent about $120. They were a big hit with the teachers & staff.

Each year we purchase cheap laundry baskets or something similar at a local dollar store or Wal-Mart and fill it with boxes of crackers/snacks, tissues, wipes etc. The teachers love it.

We provide cash before school starts for each teacher to use for class needs. We will also provide a breakfast for teachers and staff during one of the workdays before the kids start back. Later we have wish lists for them to fill out of items we can purchase for them. We also do small gifts throught the year of candy or items we leave in their mailboxes.
Cash or wish list item amounts can be adjusted to fit any budget.

[FONT="Comic Sans MS"]I was invited to speak to the faculty on their administrative day today. After sharing with them what the PTO had planned for the new year, I gave each of them a bag of candy with a message attached. The clear celephane bag (bought in the Wilton section of Walmart's craft section) contained "treasures" candies. The tag attached was printed with the message "You are
Education's greatest treasure". They really seemed to appreciate it. I also had some postcards printed with a nice poem about teachers on it that I will give to them at the Back to School Luncheon that the PTO is sponsoring for them on the day before school starts back.[/FONT]

This year, I printed out a poem to use as a cover page for a calendar of events we have made for our teachers. I have bound them and now they have a month-by-month view of what all we are doing this year. They really enjoyed it and it only cost us paper to print it on.