For whoever got handed the teacher grant program
You’re not bad at this. Your spreadsheet is.
You inherited a Google Form, a tab with formulas you’re scared to touch, and a check day that eats a Saturday. And nobody — not the teachers, not the board, not you — can say how much money is actually left.
So we built the boring part. Teachers see what they have left before they ask. You just say yes or no. Check day prints itself. Run the whole thing without the spreadsheet, the checkbook math, or the “did you get it?” texts at 9pm.
$39 for the whole program. Not per teacher. Not per month. Cancel whenever.
Have to run it past the board first? We wrote that email for you →
Lincoln High School PTO · 2026–27
Hi Ms. Rivera 👋
Chemistry — Rm 214
$100.00 left
Robotics Club
$22.50 left
Science Olympiad
$100.00 left
MG-27-014 · Paid
Approved for $84.32. Check #1207 is in your mailbox.
This is her whole experience. No account. No password. One link, forever.
Quick quiz, no pressure
How much money do you have left right now?
Take your time. Nobody can answer this — that’s the actual problem, and it’s not a spreadsheet you built wrong. Here are the three numbers hiding behind it.
Already spent, sort of
$1,840
You approved it. You haven’t written the check yet. It’s gone — but your sheet still thinks you have it.
If everyone actually asked
$4,700
47 classrooms and clubs × $100. Your pot is $4,000. Nobody has ever done this math, and it’s the one that decides whether you’re saying no in February.
Quietly evaporated
$15.68
You approved $100. The receipt came to $84.32. That difference should go back in the pot. It doesn’t. It just sits there, promised to nobody.
Made-up numbers from a pretend $4,000 program, not a real one. Put yours in below and see what falls out.
The form’s fine. It’s everything after the form.
Google Forms collects applications great. So does ours, and ours is free. Here’s the part that actually costs you your evenings.
“Wait, do I even qualify?”
She opens her link and sees exactly what she has left. Before she types a word. You get zero of these emails.
“Hey — did you get my application?”
Same link tells her. It updates itself. She stops asking you, which is the entire point.
Check day is a whole Saturday
Click once. Out comes the register, the thank-you letters, and the mailbox labels. Go get your kid.
The treasurer needs it in QuickBooks
A CSV shaped the way she wants it, and every receipt zipped up with a list. She’ll be thrilled.
The board wants a report. Again.
It prints. The numbers already add up, because they came from the same place the money did.
Someone left an envelope in the PTO mailbox
Log it in thirty seconds, snap the receipts, done. Paper is allowed here — teachers are going to do it anyway.
No judgment
Be honest — which column is you?
Two of these are how most programs still run in 2026. They were fine. They were also handed to you by someone who inherited them too.
| The job | Envelopes in the mailbox | Google Form + spreadsheet | PTOKit Mini-Grants |
|---|---|---|---|
| She can see what she has left | Nope | Nope — she emails you | Yep, before she applies |
| “Where’s my check?” answers itself | Nope | Nope | Yep — one link, forever |
| Approved vs. actually paid | In your head | A column you keep forgetting | Tracked to the cent, always |
| A teacher with a classroom and two clubs | Argument in February | Argument in February | Three separate $100s, sorted on day one |
| Leftover money goes back in the pot | Never | Never | Automatically |
| Check day | A Saturday | A Saturday | About twenty minutes |
| One check per teacher, not per grant | If you catch it | If you catch it | Always |
| The board report | Rebuilt by hand, 6× a year | Rebuilt by hand, 6× a year | Prints |
| Showing people what the money bought | Stories | Stories | A page you can actually send |
| Surviving the June handoff | Dies with the folder | Dies with the formula | Forward a login |
| Cost | $0 + your Saturdays | $0 + your Saturdays | $39 a year, whole program |
You’ll notice there’s no row for “collects applications.” All three do that fine. That was never the thing eating your Saturday.
The whole job
You do three things. It does the other three.
There’s no dashboard to learn. You open it, and it tells you what needs you: decide these · still waiting on receipts · ready to pay. That’s the screen.
Set it up
Your pot, your cap, your rules — once, in about ten minutes. It hands you a flyer with a QR code for the staff room and a blurb to send round.
They check
Teachers get their answers without you: what counts, how much is left, how they get paid. Then one emailed link shows them their own numbers.
They apply
From a phone, with the balance right there. Receipts snapped straight in. And if she hands you an envelope instead, that works too.
You decide
you do thisOne list. The math is already done. Yes, partly, no, or “send me more” — and the email writes itself in your program’s own words.
You pay
you do thisPick who’s ready, hit print. Register, letters, mailbox labels, the CSV, the receipts. Type in the check numbers and everyone gets told automatically.
You look good
you do thisBoard report prints itself, six times a year. Plus a page showing what the money actually bought, which is the thing that wins next year’s budget vote.
The fight that happens every February
She teaches chemistry and runs two clubs. Does she get $100 or $300?
$300. Three separate hundreds — her classroom, Robotics, Science Olympiad — because advising a club is a whole second job with its own receipts. And she can see all three before she asks you for anything.
Every program has this argument eventually, usually after two teachers got told two different things and one of them is upset. Here it’s decided on day one and the math just follows. Want one flat $100 per person instead? That’s a setting, and everything else keeps working.
You can always see why
Ask “why does it say $37.50?” and you get the actual list of things that add up to $37.50.
Saying yes sets the money aside
So you can’t accidentally promise the same hundred dollars to two people.
Leftovers come back
Approve $100, receipt says $84.32 — the other $15.68 goes straight back in the pot.
Check day
Click once. Out comes the checks, the letters, and the labels.
One check per teacher, not one per grant — nobody writes three checks for one mailbox. Her classroom grant and both club grants become one check, one letter, one envelope, one line for the treasurer.
The register
Every payee, every amount, totalled, with a line for the second signature. The thing your bylaws want and that currently exists nowhere.
Thank-you letters
Mail-merged, on your letterhead, in your words. Not ours.
Mailbox labels
Name and room number. Stuffing envelopes becomes a podcast activity.
The treasurer’s CSV + all the receipts
Date, payee, amount, check #, category, memo — and every receipt zipped with a list so nobody goes hunting.
Then you type in the check numbers, hit go, and every teacher gets: “Approved for $84.32. Check #1207 is in your mailbox.” That one message is what ends the check-chasing texts. Most of those aren’t impatience — they’re just silence.
The money bit
$39 a year. That’s less than half of one teacher’s grant.
It’s still the community’s money and you should still have to defend it — it’s just a much shorter conversation now. Put your real numbers in, then screenshot this bit for your treasurer.
If everyone asked
$4,700
47 classrooms and clubs at your cap — $700 more than your pot. Bet nobody’s run that number.
What $39 costs you
What comes back to you
$350
in leftovers, if a tenth of what you approve comes back under receipt — 9× what this costs. Money that right now just sits there. Where that 10% comes from.
Money you stop losing
Leftovers go back in the pot instead of sitting promised to nobody. And you can’t accidentally promise the same dollar twice.
Money you don’t have to beg for
Seeing “68% committed, 30% through the year” in December means you can raise the pot, cut the cap, or tighten the rules. Finding out in March means apologizing.
Money you get again next year
“We raised $18,000” is a number. “34 teachers got what they asked for, and here’s what it bought” is an argument. Guess which one wins the budget vote.
About these numbers. The first two are just arithmetic on what you typed. The leftovers one assumes 10% comes back under receipt — because receipts on a $100 grant usually land under $100 — and your program’s real number will be different. We haven’t run a full customer year yet, so we’re not going to dress up a guess as a result. And we’ve put no number on the hours check day gives you back, because you know how long your Saturday takes better than we do.
The part that decides whether any of this works
Half your teachers didn’t apply. Not because they’re lazy.
Because nobody told them they qualified. And the ones you did tell got asked to make an account for an $80 reimbursement, so they closed the tab and never came back.
Teachers here never sign up for anything. They get one link by email. It never expires.
It lists what they’ve got — “Chemistry, Rm 214: $100 left · Robotics: $22.50 left” — before they fill in a thing.
They apply from their phone, photograph receipts into it, and watch it move along.
It answers “did you get it?” and “where’s my check?” so they never have to ask you.
They can still hand you an envelope. Teachers will do this forever and pretending otherwise is how programs break.
No password between a teacher and eighty dollars. That’s a rule we don’t trade away.
The honest bit
No school logos up there. We don’t have any yet.
We could’ve stuck five crests and a row of gold stars at the top and you’d probably have scrolled right past it. Here’s what you can actually go check instead, right now, without paying us anything.
Use the free half. Today. No card.
The Mini-Grant Kit writes your policy, a printable application form, a copy-paste Google Forms question list, a teacher FAQ, a staff-room flyer with a QR code, and a tracker spreadsheet with the math already in the formulas. Ten minutes, no account. If that stuff is good, the paid stuff is by the same people. If it’s not — you’ve lost nothing and you keep the documents.
Read the list of things we won’t build
It’s further down this page, with reasons. Anyone who’ll build whatever you ask can’t write that list, which is exactly why it’s worth a look.
Notice how specific this all is
$84.32. Check #1207. Room 214. The February club argument. That stuff is in here because somebody sat down with a real PTO’s grant program — fifteen rules taped to a spreadsheet and fourteen things the chair wanted fixed — and built against it. You can tell the difference.
Stuff it doesn’t do — on purpose
It doesn’t move money. No ACH, no cards, no bank login. Your checks go out exactly the way they do now, because your bylaws almost certainly want two signatures on the way out, and a payment rail just fights that. It also won’t buy things for teachers, run an approval chain, or talk to the district’s HR system.
If that ever changes it’ll be because a paying customer asked twice — not because it sounded good on a page like this one.
And genuinely, don’t buy this if:
- · Your program is small. A dozen teachers and $800 a year is a spreadsheet’s job. At $39 a year the cost isn’t really the argument — not adding a system you don’t need is. Take the free kit.
- · You want it to write the checks. It won’t. It makes check day fast and remembers everything; a human still signs.
- · Your problem is that nobody applies. Software alone won’t fix that. The program page, the flyer and the “here’s what you have left” email are aimed right at it — and you get all three free. Try that first.
We’d honestly rather you came back next year with a program that’s outgrown the spreadsheet than have you buy this now and resent it in March.
Price
$39 a year
That’s the whole thing. Every teacher, every grant, every school year. No bundle, no per-user pricing, no setup fee, and nobody will ever try to book you a demo.
Everyone’s included
Unlimited teachers, unlimited clubs, unlimited applications and check days. Twelve teachers or a hundred and twenty — same price.
Jump in mid-year
Already halfway through? Import what’s happened from a CSV and every balance is right from day one.
Take everything with you
The treasurer’s CSV, every receipt zipped up, the whole year exported. Available the entire time, not as a parting gift.
The free half stays free
The Mini-Grant Kit keeps writing your policy, form, FAQ, flyer and tracker whether you ever buy this or not.
Billed once a year · cancel whenever · your stuff exports whenever you want it
Want to understand the job first?
The field guide walks through how a teacher mini-grant program actually runs — the policy, the caps, the receipts, the parts that go wrong in March. Free, no account, and worth reading before you run one either way.
Things you’re about to ask
We already have a Google Form and a spreadsheet, though.
Right, and the form isn’t the problem — we’ll even give you a better one free. A spreadsheet can’t tell a teacher what she has left before she applies, can’t keep “approved” and “actually paid” straight, can’t print check day, and definitely doesn’t survive the next chair clicking into a formula. You’re not buying a form.
Is $39 a year worth it for a program our size?
Against a $4,000 pot it’s about 1% — less than half of one teacher’s grant. The easiest way to think about it: approve $100, pay a receipt of $84.32, and $15.68 goes back in the pot. About three of those cover the year. If you’re a dozen teachers and $800, honestly keep the spreadsheet — we said so further up.
Do teachers have to make accounts?
No. One link by email that never expires. It shows what they’ve got left, takes applications and receipts from a phone, and tells them where everything stands. No password between a teacher and eighty dollars.
We’re already halfway through the year.
Almost everybody is. Import what’s already happened from a CSV — approved and paid grants land in their final state, so your budget and everyone’s remaining balance are right from day one.
Our teachers hand us paper. They’re not going to stop.
They’re not, and they shouldn’t have to. Log an envelope for them in thirty seconds, snap the receipts, and it joins the pile like anything else — marked as paper, because that’s what it is.
Can teachers ask before they spend their own money?
Yep, that’s a setting. Pre-approval sets the money aside when you say yes, chases the receipts for you, and quietly releases it if they never come — after a reminder, a grace period, and a note that makes clear nobody’s in trouble.
What happens when the money runs out?
It closes to new requests and says so, with the actual number. Long before that, it warns you when you’re spending faster than the calendar — back when raising the pot, lowering the cap, and tightening the rules are all still on the table.
What if we stop paying — do we lose everything?
No. You leave with the treasurer’s CSV, every receipt zipped with a list, and a full export of the year. All of that is available the whole time you’re a customer, not as a goodbye present.
Okay, who else is using this?
Nobody yet, and we’re not going to pretend otherwise. It was built against one real high-school program — fifteen written rules and fourteen things its chair wanted fixed — and it’s new. Judge it on the free kit, which does real work today, and on the list of things we refuse to build.
Does it touch our bank account?
Never. It remembers how each grant got paid and makes check day fast, but the money leaves your account exactly the way it does now, with the same two signatures.
Next check day, you’ll be done before the coffee goes cold
Thirty teachers paid in an afternoon. No “did you get it?”. No Saturday math. No rebuilding the board report for a meeting you already prepped for twice. And in June you hand it over with a login instead of an apology.
Or send it to whoever has to say yes — the message is already written.