Hi, all. I (23F) play for a college athletics team. We are having a charity / donation day coming up, and our coach is telling every person to have over 20 e-mail addresses to send the fundraiser to. Truth be told, I do not like asking people for favors or money or anything like that. It is for a good reason, to support our program, but it is a very awkward ask.
If this were five to ten people, I would have been a little more comfortable. But, over 20 different peoples email addresses is incredibly awkward.
Instead of sending these e-mails out to random people (I don’t even know 20 people that I am close enough to send these messages to), I would just donate to the team instead. The team gets a donation, and I can send emails to maybe five to ten people. I have a few people where I am fine sending emails too (because I am close to them), but 20 seems absurd.
So WIBTA if I donated to the team and emailed 5\~10 people I am close with instead of sending 20 + random people emails for donating to our particular sport?
Very quick edit for info I forgot: I am not the only person who is struggling to find enough people to send emails to. Over half our team is getting a bit fustrated due to the number of contacts we need to get.
How does the coach know who you emailed or how many?
Everyone will be meeting on Monday and he will go over the email addresses we are sending (not who exactly but counting them). He will do this individually, not in front of everyone. Though, he may say we have X amount of emails so far, we are missing X amount.
That is weird and invasive, imo. There’s no need for him to have access to so many emails of ppl he doesn’t know. Are there any consequences to anyone who can’t send 20 emails? I would get together with your other teammates who are struggling and approach your coach with your concerns.
NTA.
Based on the last line, you’re not the only one struggling to find 20 people to send an email to asking for money. To be honest, that is a weirdly large number of people for everyone on the team to reach out to.
I’d be honest with your coach and say you don’t feel comfortable sending an email like this to 20, but that you can do 8 or something.
NTA. We have to do this for our kids’ fundraisers every year and feel the same way. Maybe reach out to people ahead of time to ask if you can use their e-mail and tell them they do not need to donate.
So your coach wants you to spam people. Because that is 100% what this is. It is spam solicitation. 100% I would not participate. 100% Im not donating to anyone who sends me that email. Your coach sucks. If there is anyone you can report them to you should.