Free yearbook resources for PTA and PTO coordinators
These are the templates, forms and guides we give our own schools’ yearbook coordinators, with the guidance published here in full. Use them for any school’s yearbook, with any vendor, and there’s no sign-up or email address to hand over.
Most of them are for the parts of the job that sit around the book itself: running a cover art contest, collecting dedications and 5th-grade quotes, getting the order flyer out and getting photos in. Downloadable copies of the templates and forms are on their way; each page already has the wording, steps and prompts you need.
Plan your yearbook.
The job, the calendar and the numbers, in the order a coordinator needs them.
The first-time yearbook coordinator’s guide
The whole job, and the two dates that decide everything.
The yearbook timeline, month by month
What to do each month of the school year, for an elementary PTA.
What is a yearbook ladder?
The page-by-page plan, with a 60-page elementary example you can copy.
How much does a school yearbook cost?
Every Rethink price, published, and what moves the number.
How many yearbooks should we order?
How to think about quantity when books are printed to order.
The coordinator handover pack
What to pass on when yearbook officers change, and a checklist to do it with.
The easiest yearbook software for volunteers
Why Canva is usually the answer.
Custom and personalized yearbooks
What the words actually mean, vendor by vendor.
5th-grade memory books
Small runs for a graduating class: contents and cost.
Raise money.
What a yearbook sale raises, and the pieces that sell it.
Yearbook fundraising for PTAs
Set the family price above cost, and what the PTA actually takes home.
Fundraising calculator
Work out what a yearbook sale raises for the PTA at your prices.
Yearbook order flyer
A Canva flyer template and what to put on it.
Yearbook ads and dedications form
Let families buy a dedication for their child, with a form, guidelines and announcement wording.
Photos.
Getting enough photos in, from teachers and families, and what to expect from AI.
Photo collection guide
How to set up folders and what to ask teachers and room parents for, plus a guide you can forward to them.
Collecting photos from families
How to collect candid photos from families without anyone seeing anyone else’s.
Yearbook photo tips
How teachers and volunteers take better yearbook photos with a phone.
AI and yearbook photos
What AI should and shouldn’t do with yearbook photos, and questions to ask any vendor.
How much of the yearbook is actually your child’s year?
Why most children appear in only a photo or two, and what changes that.
Free templates.
Designs, forms and activities for the pages around the photos. Each has its own page with what’s included and how to run it.
Yearbook templates gallery
Eleven full elementary yearbook designs for Canva, from watercolor to comic book.
Canva layouts, embellishments and special pages
Page layouts, decorative elements and ready-made special pages to drop into a Canva yearbook.
Cover art contest kit
Run a student art contest for the front cover, with a flyer template and how to show the winners.
5th-grade yearbook quotes form
Collect short quotes from your graduating class, with prompt ideas.
Teacher statement form
Invite each class teacher to write a short reflection on their year.
Student memory book activity
A printable in-class activity so every child leaves with a keepsake, whether or not they buy a book.
For families.
Adding custom pages to your child’s yearbook
Step-by-step help for families at a Rethink school.
How to preserve your child’s artwork
What to keep, how to photograph and store it, and how to put the best of it in a book.
My child is missing from the yearbook
What to do about it this year, and how to prevent it next year.
Bring Rethink to your school
How to suggest a new yearbook company to your PTA.
Does personalizing make a yearbook less inclusive?
How shared pages and personalized pages fit together, including for families who don’t buy the upgrade.
Compare yearbook companies.
We make one of these products, so each comparison says where the other company is the better fit.
Best elementary yearbook companies
Seven companies compared for elementary schools.
Rethink vs. Treering
Automatic class and grade pages versus parent-filled custom pages.
Rethink vs. Jostens
Published pricing versus a rep-quoted plan.
Rethink vs. Lifetouch
Keeping picture day and changing the yearbook.
Rethink vs. Balfour
How the two compare for an elementary school.
Rethink vs. Picaboo Yearbooks
How the two compare for an elementary school.
Switching yearbook companies
How to switch, and when it’s too late in the year.
Use the resources.
See the yearbook.
Rethink Yearbooks makes these free for any school. In a Rethink yearbook every child is in the shared school pages, and families who choose personalization get pages built around their own child’s class and grade.