My son decided to join RCAF this year, but he only donated the minimum of $100. He called the RCAF and Ticket Office and asked if he will get Super Regional tickets at his current level, or should he bump up his donation to the $250 level? He was told, "Donating more will increase your chances of getting tickets."
Why do they do this? Just be straight forward and tell the people the current minimum amount you need to donate to be in the running.
I'm trying to explain to him he has no shot, and that I don't probably don't even have a shot at my donor level... but I guess 20 year olds like to learn the hard way. Hahaa
I've been All-Cajun the last few years, but I only do a $50/month draw for RCAF, and then I do a big lump donation at some point in the year to get me to over $1000 for the year. Typically I do the big one after my quarterly bonus or my tax refund comes in. I made said donation just prior to Super Regionals last year (late May/early June, so an inconvenient time for me financially) and didn't receive tickets. Wasn't upset about it. And hey, the Super Regional wrestled that final $400 out of my hands, so UL benefited.
Well how are they going to pull those shady tactics when we have a point system and the athletic dept announces, "Everyone who is ranked 811 in points will be in the range for Super Regional tickets. If you check your points and have 134, you know not to give because you are no where close. If you are sitting at 803, you know giving a little more may bump you over the needed rank to get tickets.
All I am getting at is the day is coming when "getting money from people by giving them false hopes of getting tickets" will no longer be a valid working fundraising mechanism (and I honestly feel we shouldn't be using this practice anyway).
You know why last year was the biggest year for RCAF donations before football season even started? ...because of the softball and baseball teams both hosting regionals and supers. We can't cross our fingers and hope our teams make it to the post season so we can have an increase in donations. That is not how fundraising works. Fundraising should be going on 24/7/365.
With a point system, I'm not sure you'd ever see them post a cutoff limit with points similar to what you're looking for right now with $ amount.
If the cutoff is X amount of points then people just below X amount of points will donate to get to level X. Problem is with this new group of people who are now in the > X group, this group is now too big to accommodate the number of tickets UL has, so the new cutoff number will in fact be X + Y, and those people who donated to get to X will still be left out, and would be ____ed because their increased donation did not produce the desired result.
IMO the whales need to be taken care of. After that a lottery with every hundred you donate gets you 1 chance. A guy giving five thousand gets fifty lottery tickets. A win gets you two tickets. The guy giving a hundred gets one chance.
Of course with computers this is easily done. Of course everyone will claim it to be fixed.
Right now there is a totem poll, the higher you are on the totem poll the better chance you have of getting tickets. That isn't shady, it's the truth. What if all those people ahead of you don't go to the regional? Schools out, people are on vacation, who knows. When we have points system... It will be the same because everyone can raise their points at anytime, not just the people right below the cutoff, it will drive more donations. Those said people still need to request the tickets, they don't just mail them to the top donors whether they want them or not.
I am not talking points, but rather ranking. A person's points and ranking will fluctuate, but not the cutoff number.
Example: Athletic department has 800 tickets to distribute and each donor can request two tickets. So where you rank (in points) has to be between 1-400 to be guaranteed tickets. Your ranking might fluctuate day to day, but that number of 400 or better stays the same. If you are above 400 you are safe, if you fall below 400 then someone jumped you and you better donate more if you want guaranteed tickets.
Guaranteed tickets are a sure thing, other than that cross your fingers. If some of the people in the top 400 do not request tickets, it will be a pleasant surprise for the people ranked 401-477 to get tickets when they thought they were not.
As it is today, people are already increasing donations without desired results. A points system just lets you know where you stand in the big picture.
I agree with CajunEXPRESS, the whales need to be taken care of regardless.
I totally understand your point. The problem right now is that nobody knows where they stand on the totem pole and the RCAF will not tell you where you stand.
I also agree with you that if people know where they currently rank and where they would like to be ranked, donations will increase. I understand these are donations and nobody is guaranteed anything, but let's face it, people will donate more when they know there is a reward for doing so.
They are encouraging people to donate more "to increase their chance of getting tickets" when they know those people giving an extra $100, $250, $500, etc have ZERO CHANCE of getting tickets unless they donate $5,000 or more. I find this practice to be misleading people. Why not just say, "Increase your donation to at $5K if you want to get tickets?
Am I the only one who thinks this practice of asking for increased donations by giving people a false hope of being awarded tickets is rather deceiving?
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