Commerce & fundraising
The money engine that pays the school.
A program runs on money, not just pages. Homeroom builds in every way a school raises and collects it — book sales, ad sales, fundraising, athletics fees, and sponsorships — and settles every order on one record where the math is exact to the penny and the school always gets its share. There is no separate fundraising app, no separate ad tool, and no separate payment vendor to reconcile.
One student list, one storefront, one record. Card details never touch our servers — the payment provider holds them.
Two promises behind every order
The school gets paid
The school keeps a real share of every book, portrait, ad, and product sale — built into the split, not an afterthought. Shipped
The whole gift goes to the school
On the donation and fundraising lane, Homeroom adds no platform fee — we take none of the gift. We make our money on the relationship, never by skimming a donation. Card-processing fees still apply, and any platform fee a school chooses to add is the school’s own surcharge line. Shipped
Book sales, built for the way families actually buy
Everything here is live today. Print-on-demand means there is no overprint and no leftover-inventory risk — the late order simply prints later.
Prices that step up by deadline
Early-bird, regular, and late tiers, resolved at checkout, with a final price that never closes so no family is ever locked out. Shipped
An automatic discount for low-income schools
High-need schools get an automatic per-book discount at checkout — and it can never drop below cost. Shipped
Buy more than one, with no account
Parents buy several copies in one order and check out with a one-time email link — no account required. Shipped
Personal pages, printed only into one book
Each student can design personal pages printed only into their own copy — the first pages free, submitted and locked before print, and never allowed without permission. Shipped
A discount code can apply on top, up to an owner-set cap, with a cost floor underneath it so nothing ever sells at a loss. Cover choices, a foil or raised name on the cover, and add-on supplement books are all available. Pay-over-time options — so a family can split a larger order into smaller payments while the school is still paid in full, upfront — are planned. Pay-over-time options in early access
A full ad-sales engine — the highest-margin line
Recognition ads and business ads run across every publication — the yearbook, the newspaper, and the magazine — on one connected system. There is no photographer split on an ad, so nearly all of it funds the program. All of this is live today.
From first contact to a signed contract
Track advertisers from prospect to renewal, draft a proposal from your price list, lock it with a typed electronic signature, and hold the artwork until the contract is signed. Shipped
Invoice, proof, and place — safely
Create invoices with the due date figured automatically, record proof approvals that cannot be changed, mark paid, and send each line into the book’s reserved ad pages — never billed twice, never placed twice. Shipped
Every ad size, every channel
Page-fraction yearbook ads, newspaper column-inches, magazine spreads, and standard web ad sizes — with premium-position pricing, volume discounts, and a media kit built from one price list. Shipped
Commissions that ride paid invoices
Rep commissions are figured and recorded on paid ad invoices, safe to retry and never doubled. Shipped
A parent self-service senior-recognition ad builder and a cross-school ad marketplace are planned for later — we will not show them as shipped.
Fundraising and giving, all on one honest record
Beyond the book, Homeroom runs the rest of the program’s money — the donation drive, the parent-teacher group, per-student fundraising pages, athletics, events, and matching gifts — and books every dollar on the same tamper-proof, add-only record so a back-dated edit or a deleted line is provable.
Donations — the gift goes to the school
Add any amount per book, run a donate-a-book drive that covers students who cannot buy one, or run a campaign with a goal and a public total — raised so far, percent of goal, donor count, and a recent-donor list with names hidden. Homeroom takes none of the gift (card-processing fees still apply). Shipped
A parent-teacher group that builds its own directory
Run the parent group on the permitted student record — the family directory builds itself, opted-out families never appear, and the treasurer’s books are an add-only journal re-checked on every view, with separate treasurer, check-signer, and reviewer roles. Shipped
A fundraising page for every student
Build a fundraising page automatically for every permitted student or athlete from the student list — the read-a-thon beater — each one showing a first name and last initial only, a live thermometer, and team leaderboards. A lapsed permission goes dark on the very next view. Shipped
Athletics, registered once
Register a student-athlete once on the family record, gather every required signature in one place, and turn clearance green only when every signature is present — never a human checkbox. Pay-to-play fees post to the same exact-cent record. Shipped
Events with ticket levels, phone-based silent auctions with a tamper-proof bid trail, fund-a-need direct giving, and tax receipts that show the deductible amount are all live. Employer matching-gift capture is live (we flag a match, never fake one); the automatic employer-match lookup and automatic low-income fee waivers turn on once a partner or data feed is connected. Match lookup & auto fee-waivers in early access
Sponsorships, sponsor credits, and certificates
Sell display ads, sponsor credits, and love-lines as their own products; a sold sponsor credit is placed into the book automatically at its spot, through the same permission check used everywhere else. Track a sponsor from first contact through renewal, with sponsor contact details walled off from studio sales reps at the database. A built-in word check warns when a thank-you crosses from a safe acknowledgment into advertising — a warning to review, never a tax ruling. Certificates and personalized documents can be printed in bulk or sold, with a free certificate costing exactly nothing.
Booking a signed sponsorship straight onto the exact-cent donation lane is in early access. Sponsor payment booking in early access
A homeschool ESA marketplace that proves every dollar — without holding your money
For Education Savings Account (ESA) programs, Homeroom is the accounting and audit layer, not a bank. We never hold or move ESA funds. A reviewed marketplace lets only identity-checked vendors receive a spend, every allowed-use decision lands in a per-account add-only record the database forbids editing, a fixed list of spending categories keeps anything uncategorized in a needs-review queue, and an auditor view checks every entry — all of them, not a sample — the report a state treasurer actually asked for. The balance tracker mirrors the state award as an accounting record only; it is clearly not a held balance.
ESA support is an accounting and audit record only — Homeroom never holds or moves ESA funds. Per-state allowed-use rules are still being confirmed: every rule stays inactive until an expert confirms its exact limits, so an unconfirmed item lands in needs-review by design. Actually paying out ESA funds would require a licensed processor partner and is not offered — without one, an allowed order is an audit record only. Per-state allowed-use rules in early access
We’re honest about what’s shipped
Book sales, ad sales, the donation and fundraising lanes, the parent-teacher group, per-student fundraising pages, athletics, events and auctions, sponsorships, certificates, and the homeschool ESA audit record are live today. Pay-over-time installments, the automatic employer-match lookup, automatic low-income fee waivers, sponsor payment booking, and per-state ESA rule confirmation are in early access. The parent self-service ad builder, a cross-school ad marketplace, and live grant submission are planned for later — never shown as shipped.