The “Big Beautiful Packet”: How to Open Doors at Every Elementary School in Your Area

When a principal, a PE teacher, or an after-school coordinator says “send us some information,” most school owners email two paragraphs and a rate sheet, then wonder why nothing happens.

Here’s what I did instead for decades at Mile High Karate — and what I teach our coaching members to build today. I called it the big, beautiful packet. It was about forty pages thick. I’d take it to the FedEx office, put a clear plastic cover on the front, black plastic on the back, wire binding — so it landed on a principal’s desk looking like it came from a serious institution, because it did.

What Goes in It

The cover letter. One page: here’s who we are and here’s specifically what we’d like to do — with the after-school enrichment program as the lead offer, because that’s your highest-value entry point into any school.

Testimonials — lots of them. Principal and PE teacher testimonials once you’ve earned them; parent testimonials by the dozen from day one. This is the bulk of the packet, and it should be. Educators trust other educators, and every parent voice is social proof that you’re safe, professional, and beloved.

The program itself. A sample registration form for the after-school enrichment program, plus the curriculum: I always included one summary sheet showing all six lessons, and then the individual handout for each lesson. And understand what those six lessons are — respect for teachers, respect for parents, saying thank you and I love you, clean your room, do it the first time. Character development, top to bottom. That’s the language schools speak, and it’s genuinely what we teach.

The two pages nobody asks for — and everybody notices. I ran a background check on every staff member — the same check a daycare or elementary school runs on its own hires — and put the results in the packet. Then I went to our insurance company, had the school added as an additional insured, and put the certificate in too.

Here’s the thing: in all those years, almost nobody ever asked for either one. Which, frankly, scared me a little — if my kids were in that school, I’d want everyone background-checked before some stranger walks into the gym. But that’s not why those pages are there. They’re there so the objection dies before it’s ever spoken. A stranger wants to come into our school and work with our kids? Well — here’s the background check, here’s the insurance. Concern gone, and I never had to have the conversation.

That’s the design principle of the whole packet: bury every possible objection under so much thorough, professional documentation that the only remaining question is scheduling. If you’re doing the Children’s Hospital fundraiser, the flyer’s in there. Permission slips, in there. By the time you’re done, you’re not sitting across the desk asking, “Is it okay if I do this?” You’re saying, “Here are all the details” — and those are two very different conversations.

The Secret: Nobody Reads It

Now the punchline. In all the years I used that packet, I don’t believe a single principal ever read all forty pages.

Didn’t matter. The packet’s job was never to be read. Its job was to produce one reaction: “This is an impressive package — let’s talk to this person.” It sparks the conversation and positions you as a professional. The actual agreement happens face to face, where you explain in plain language what you want to do. So build it thick, make it beautiful — and never mistake it for the thing that closes the deal. (And never mail it in place of a scheduled appointment. The packet opens the door; the appointment walks through it.)

You Don’t Need Everyone to Love You

One more story, because every owner eventually runs into this person.

At one of my best elementary schools, the principal loved us. The PE teacher loved us — he once invited me to be his substitute for two days during field week. The assistant principal, though, despised me. Fought me at every turn. When I came to collect the registration forms from an after-school program, she had gone through every single form with a magic marker and blacked out the addresses, the phone numbers, the emails — everything but the kids’ first names.

Did it matter? Over the years, I enrolled probably a hundred students out of that one school. The principal overruled her from above, the PE teacher worked around her from below, and the parents kept coming.

The lesson: you deal with what you have to deal with. Build relationships at every level of the building — principal, PE teacher, front office. One blocker doesn’t shut down a school where three other people are advocating for you. Show up, deliver a great program, keep stacking testimonials into next year’s packet, and the doors keep opening.

One school relationship, worked properly, is worth a hundred students. There are a dozen schools within ten minutes of your front door. Go build the packet.

The complete school-partnership system — packets, after-school enrichment, orientation days, PE-teacher-for-a-day — is what we build with members week by week. Start with the free book at FillYourSchool.com, or call/text 1-720-256-0208 and ask Bob Dunne about a free school evaluation.