Free yearbook resources for PTA and PTO coordinators
These are the templates, forms and guides we give our own schools’ yearbook coordinators. Use them for any school’s yearbook, with any vendor. No sign-up or email address needed.
- PDF and Word downloads
- Canva templates
- Works with any vendor
Where are you in the year?
Three doors in. Each leads to a plain-English guide you can use today, whichever company prints your book.
I just took over the yearbook
The whole job, and the two dates that decide everything.
We are starting late
What to do first when the school year is already moving.
I need photos, now
Folders, reminders and a guide to forward to teachers and parents.
Free downloads, one click.
Printable and editable. Each one has a page that explains how to use it. No sign-up, no email address.
Count-back date planner
Start from the last day of school and count back to every date that matters.
Vendor comparison worksheet
Ask every vendor the same questions and read the answers side by side.
Start from a free template.
Mindful Moments is a calm, colorful yearbook template for Canva that any school can copy and edit. Every other template, and the full Canva files, come with a Rethink school.
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.
How to organize a PTA yearbook committee
The four roles, how many volunteers you need, and who does what each month, with free role cards and a sign-up sheet.
A tour of the coordinator dashboard
An eight-minute narrated walkthrough: your dates, ordering, photos and portraits, choosing a design, the ladder and first draft, and your fundraising.
The yearbook timeline, month by month
What to do each month of the school year, for an elementary PTA, with a free count-back planner and distribution-day kit.
What is a yearbook ladder?
The page-by-page plan, with a free ladder template and an elementary example you can copy.
How much does a school yearbook cost?
What moves the price of a school yearbook, and how to compare quotes, with a free vendor comparison worksheet.
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, with a checklist and a free handover template.
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.
Design your book.
The order of work, the photo plan, the theme and the extra pages, for any yearbook company.
How to make an elementary school yearbook
The eight steps in order, what software handles and who does each one.
Plan your yearbook photos page by page
Count photos by page, handle uneven volume and choose favorites.
How to choose a yearbook theme
A readable cover, colors that print well and a look you will still like in June.
Student quotes, teacher statements and cover art
What to collect, who approves it and where it goes in the book.
PSPA portrait files: fall and spring portraits
What to ask your photographer for and how to check a second set.
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: guidelines
How Ads & dedications work, ready-to-paste announcement wording and a free printable order form.
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, with email, text and social wording to copy.
Yearbook photo tips
How teachers and volunteers take better yearbook photos with a phone, with a free event shot list and photo coverage tracker.
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
Complete elementary yearbook designs for Canva, from dinosaurs and summer camp to watercolor and comic book. Search by theme and see every page of each one.
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
A clear starting price 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.