Orinda Network for Education (ONE) is on a roll. It beat last year’s successful campaign by more than $213,000, surpassing this year’s ambitious $5.7 million goal by $73,000.
The money will fund programs and staff that district budgets increasingly cannot cover.
With roughly $1,500 raised per student, ONE’s fundraising prowess puts it in an elite group of public school education foundations nationwide. Equally impressive, almost 2,100 donors contributed this year, including roughly 67% of the families across all six Orinda schools.
“ONE’s success starts with a community that genuinely values public education and understands what it takes to maintain the quality of schools that make Orinda special,” said Emily Allen, executive director of ONE.
She added, “This is truly a community-wide effort. The generosity of our families, alumni, local businesses, civic leaders, volunteers, parents’ clubs and community members is what allows ONE to operate at a level that is unusual for a public school education foundation, both regionally and nationally.”
Allen credits the parents’ clubs at each of the six Orinda schools with building exceptionally strong family involvement and a fundraising culture that feels more like partnership than pressure.
Jill Hughes, a Miramonte Parents’ Club member and its vice president of fundraising, said that while ONE’s suggested donation is clear, once parents decide on their contribution, no one pesters them for more.
“We make a case from registration until the last day of school about what your donation funds, where it goes and why it’s important to give,” she said. “But if you donate during registration, I don’t ask you again – we don’t come back and say, ‘give again, give again, give again’.”
“Our ask this year was $2,000 per student, and if you donate $500 during registration, great. I don’t ask you later to make up the difference. Families can make up their own mind about what’s an appropriate donation level for themselves.”
Allen emphasized the importance of trust.
“Donors understand how funds are used and can see the impact directly in classrooms, staffing, and student programs,” she said. “We work hard to communicate clearly about both the needs and the outcomes, and that transparency builds long-term commitment rather than one-time giving.”
Before ONE shifted from a single, community-wide campaign to school-based campaigns, all funds went into a central pool to be distributed across schools. Now, each school’s parents’ club manages its own campaign and keeps any money it raises that exceeds the districts’ baseline requests, using the funds to support additional needs at their own campus.
For example, each of the parents’ clubs at the four high schools in the Acalanes Union High School District was asked to contribute $650,000 to fund specific district-wide needs.
Miramonte’s campaign covered its share easily, with over $800,000 to spare. The Miramonte Parents’ Club will invest that surplus in programs and resources not covered by the district budget, after meeting with parents, students and staff to identify high-priority needs.
“We look at needs at both the district level – where we can fill in – and at each campus, and we ask what will be most impactful for our donors and families,” Allen said.
“If people say, ‘I want to fund the library,’ or ‘I want to fund PE classes,’ or ‘I want to fund a Spanish class at OIS,’ we have to take all of that into consideration. When we sit down with the district, that feedback is part of the conversation. We’re always listening to donors, and if we’re hearing a concern across the board, we want to really look at it,” added Allen. “Overall, we see ONE as funding these programs with dedicated resources so that the district’s general fund can focus elsewhere.”
Although parent involvement is key to ONE’s success, what makes the campaign unusual is its high level of non-parent community support. Orinda’s median age sits in the high 40s, nearly a decade above the county, state and U.S. averages, and fewer than one in five households has school-aged children. Yet roughly a quarter of ONE donors come from community, alumni and business supporters.
In other words, Orinda’s older demographic profile has not dampened its willingness to invest in public education.
Finola Fellner, a local realtor who was born and raised in Orinda, is a longtime ONE supporter.
“You don’t need children in the classroom to recognize that strong schools are the heartbeat of Orinda, and that their excellence doesn’t sustain itself – it takes all of us investing in it together,” said Fellner.
Despite closing out a record-setting campaign, Allen is already thinking about the future.
“What keeps me up at night is sustainability,” she said. “Philanthropy can play an important role in supporting public education, but it cannot be expected to solve every funding challenge facing school districts. My focus is on ensuring that ONE remains a reliable, sustainable partner to our schools while being thoughtful about what we ask of our community year after year.”
Allen is proud of Orinda’s dedication to its schools.
“The good news is that Orinda has repeatedly demonstrated an extraordinary commitment to its schools,” she said. “My job is to honor that by being transparent about the need, responsible with donor dollars and focused on long-term sustainability rather than short-term gains.”
“At the end of the day,” Allen added, “people give because they want students to thrive. Our job is to show them how their generosity helps make that happen.”
