EAST FRANKLIN – After Tuesday night, no one will be able to say that East Franklin Junior High School Principal Scott Wiginton is not a man of his word.
Wiginton, who is in his third year as principal at EFJS, has made it a point to give his students an incentive to sell tickets to their annual Fall Festival fundraiser each year.
Last year, to make the fundraising efforts more fun, he told students that he would shave his head if they sold a certain number of tickets.
When the students came through and they exceeded their goal, some were surprised when Wiginton actually sat down in a chair and let a few students shave his head completely bald, much to the delight of the rest of the student body.
But this year, Wiginton went for an incentive that was a little more dramatic than shaving his head.
“I told the students if they sold 6,000 tickets to this year’s Fall Festival, I would sleep on top of the school for one whole night,” Wiginton said.
“I had heard of other people, radio personalities, doing things similar to this to help raise money for various causes and I thought it would be a good idea and something the kids would enjoy.
“Even though I went through with shaving my head last year, I still think it was hard for some of the students to believe I would actually sleep on top of the school, so it really seemed to get them motivated – just to see if I would really do it.”
The EFJH Fall Festival was held last week, and Wiginton said the students were still a few hundred tickets shy of meeting their goal when the morning of the festival rolled around.
“I kept telling them there was no way they would sell enough tickets to make me sleep on the roof,” Wiginton said, “but they proved me wrong.
“By that evening, they had sold above and beyond the 6,000-ticket goal.”
True to his word, Wiginton donned a tent, sleeping bag, air mattress and camp chair and made his way onto the roof of the school just before 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday so the students could see him on top of the school before they left for the day.
Wiginton returned later that evening and made his camp atop the roof, where he stayed until after 7 a.m. the next morning when students started arriving to school.
“This was just a way for me to get the students excited about raising money for our school,” he said. “It didn’t cost a dime for me to sleep on the roof, but it was fun for them and helped us meet our fundraising goal.”
Wiginton said the annual Fall Festival is the largest fundraiser the school has all year.
“We really depend on the money we bring in during this event,” Wiginton said.
“It helps us with the function and upkeep of the school throughout the entire fiscal year and basically keeps us afloat until next October.
“If we didn’t have the money from the festival, we’d probably be in pretty bad shape a lot of the time, so that’s why I try to push the kids to sell as much as they can.
“If they know I’m going to do something funny or silly or off-the-wall if they meet their goal, they’re more likely to get those tickets sold.
“So far I’ve kept my word every time. I don’t know what next year’s incentive will be, but you can bet that whatever it is, I’ll go through with it if the students come through for the school.”