Why do parents have to buy school supplies in public schools?

[Anonymous]

^just buy

[Anonymous]

Haha, I just paid $250 for my kid's enrollment in HS marching band, and they still want extra donations. OP, it only gets more expensive as your kid goes through school. School supplies are cheap in comparison!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If parents don’t purchase the supplies, the teachers often have to do it.

I worked in a public school that provided no supplies for teachers. I had to purchase copy paper, tissue paper, class sets of composition books, books for my classroom library, etc. I also needed basic decorations for walls and all of my own supplies (whiteboard markers, pens, etc.). I spent close to $800 a year at that school, and was still told by an administrator that I didn’t decorate my classroom enough.

I don’t work for that district anymore.

BOOKS FOR YOUR CLASSROOM LIBRARY -You truly are not very smart. All you school has to do is post or send an email out requesting books from the public/parents. Our school did this and literally hundreds of current/old/favorite great condition books were donated. We had to use the HS kids (as volunteer hours) to help us organize. There was a bin at the local HS for this too. We are in Loudoun County btw. I would have made a supplies stipend a condition of my employment.

Not everyone works in wealthy schools. Virtually none of my students have books at home. The vast majority had never been to a library.

I had a friend whose daughter attended K at at a Title 1 school. Someone had written a grant in order to buy books that could be sent home with each K and 1st grader. The books were meant to be kept by the parents. The hope was that the parents would be able to learn to read by using the books with their kids. The school knew that many of the parents of the kids that they taught were illiterate and were not willing to come to the school for offered reading lessons themselves. It is so hard to Teach at the lower incomes schools because the abilities and priorities of the families are very different.

Is there a way to send the registration for the Dooly Parton book program? It sends a book to the house of the child once a month that is on grade level. Maybe you could offer to help with registration at Open House? Or register for them if they agree. You need the kids date of birth, the family address, an email, and a telephone number. I know it is extra work but it might help some kids out. Just a thought. Link to the program is below.

https://imaginationlibrary.com/check-availability/?gclid=EAIaIQobChMI6_7eq7nohwMVcSzUAR1c8CjWEAAYASAAEgI79vD_BwE

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My child just entered public school and there is a list of items that we are supposed to send in, such as tissues and hand sanitizers. It is my understanding that these supplies are pooled in the classroom, so it is not the case that these supplies are for individual use.

I cannot imagine it is cost-effective for the schools to beg from the parents in this way. Moreover, --wouldn't it be more economical for the schools to buy these items in bulk? It's quite expensive and if families are poor, it is not cheap to buy lysol wipes or boxes of tissues.

Why do our school taxes not cover school supply expenses? Surely this is something that could be budgeted for.

Lolololol bless your heart.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It is ridiculous. Look I clearly don't think teachers should be paying for this stuff OOP and I always bring in everything that's asked for. But we pay very high taxes in MoCo and it's crazy this basic stuff isn't provided for.

I went to very average public schools growing up and we did not have to bring in any of this stuff. Nor did I hear of teachers having to make these bull purchases. It feels like schools were run in a more common sense way back then.

I lived in several "good" school districts. We used old-fashioned stuff.

I remember getting free lined, unbleached brown paper notepads, #2 pencils, fat Crayola crayon sets, and plops of white paste on a piece of paper towel. The school had communal watercolor paint sets and tempera paint in big jars.

Kleenex was not stocked in classrooms, I remember going to the office and paying 10 cents to get a tissue in 10th grade.

No glue sticks

Very little colored marker use and occasional colored pencil use. No dry erase or whiteboards. Only chalkboards.

Occasional composition notebooks. I feel like we were given these when needed.

Mostly used looseleaf lined paper until high school

No mandatory color coded folders by subject

It's almost as if times have changed. 🤯 I'm in my 50's, my parents bought school supplies.

My youngest is 24. We always had to send school supplies.

PP. I get it. I'm your age. My point was mainly...we didn't get much, but it was mostly provided. And, as things changed, and schools got more underfunded, there also emerged new categories of expensive "must haves". E.g., glue sticks, dry erase markers, disinfecting wipes.

I think there is a bit of a cultural expectation that people like to do back to school shopping and get doorbuster sales. And like to donate product. But a lot don't anymore. Post-pandemic, people have stopped doing a lot of social nicety busywork. Attitudes are definitely different.

Not underfunded. Misfunded.

Both.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:School budgets buy the Chromebooks and smart boards. And all those developers get a break and dont have to contribute to the school coffers when they build high rises because the calculations are off and its assumed no kids live in apartment buildings.

This. Yet drive by any of those apt. bldgs. during the school year (looking at you, downtown Bethesda) and there are kids and more kids waiting for a school bus (busy roads between apts. and BE, so even bussing close-by).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Haha, I just paid $250 for my kid's enrollment in HS marching band, and they still want extra donations. OP, it only gets more expensive as your kid goes through school. School supplies are cheap in comparison!

That's insane. We have to buy a bunch of shirts, shoes and a few other things but I wouldn't be donating extra on top of $250.

[Anonymous]

I don't mind buying consumable items for my child, but it just seems weird to me how every year I'm supposed to be buying her a pair of scissors. This scissors go to school. It never come back. It's just very strange that apparently every year the teacher loses 20 to 30 pairs of scissors. I can understand losing a few pairs but 20 or 30?

Also every year the second graders learn about measuring so they have to buy rulers and bring those into school. And again it would just seem to be more efficient to buy a set of rulers for the class. I'm sure a few would get broken or lost.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't mind buying consumable items for my child, but it just seems weird to me how every year I'm supposed to be buying her a pair of scissors. This scissors go to school. It never come back. It's just very strange that apparently every year the teacher loses 20 to 30 pairs of scissors. I can understand losing a few pairs but 20 or 30?

Also every year the second graders learn about measuring so they have to buy rulers and bring those into school. And again it would just seem to be more efficient to buy a set of rulers for the class. I'm sure a few would get broken or lost.

+1

I’ve never understood this about scissors either. Where do they go?

I understand the need to for parents to purchase supplies but I really wish they would just send a bill for a “classroom fee” that is optional, pool the funds and shop that way. I hate purchasing and lugging paper towels, reams of printer paper, Kleenex and Clorox wipes every year. With every other parent doing the same. So inefficient. Obviously the fee would need to be optional but I would happily just write a check. Either the teacher, PTA program can coordinate, or parent volunteers should do the shopping (can probably just do most of it online and have delivered, in fact) and it is cheaper to buy in bulk anyway.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don't mind buying consumable items for my child, but it just seems weird to me how every year I'm supposed to be buying her a pair of scissors. This scissors go to school. It never come back. It's just very strange that apparently every year the teacher loses 20 to 30 pairs of scissors. I can understand losing a few pairs but 20 or 30?

Also every year the second graders learn about measuring so they have to buy rulers and bring those into school. And again it would just seem to be more efficient to buy a set of rulers for the class. I'm sure a few would get broken or lost.

They should be sending your child's supplies home but they usually just put them all together and they are shared. I always bought extra and the cheapest but decent stuff I could find to donate more for kids who can't or parents will not but usually a few weeks in would swap out some of my child's stuff with nicer things than the teacher gave as it wasn't ever ours (i.e. folders, etc).

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If parents don’t purchase the supplies, the teachers often have to do it.

I worked in a public school that provided no supplies for teachers. I had to purchase copy paper, tissue paper, class sets of composition books, books for my classroom library, etc. I also needed basic decorations for walls and all of my own supplies (whiteboard markers, pens, etc.). I spent close to $800 a year at that school, and was still told by an administrator that I didn’t decorate my classroom enough.

I don’t work for that district anymore.

BOOKS FOR YOUR CLASSROOM LIBRARY -You truly are not very smart. All you school has to do is post or send an email out requesting books from the public/parents. Our school did this and literally hundreds of current/old/favorite great condition books were donated. We had to use the HS kids (as volunteer hours) to help us organize. There was a bin at the local HS for this too. We are in Loudoun County btw. I would have made a supplies stipend a condition of my employment.

Not everyone works in wealthy schools. Virtually none of my students have books at home. The vast majority had never been to a library.

The point is - ask your whole community - flyers at the grocery store, posts on NextDoor or DCUM, boxes places at gym entrances . Stop whining and just put the work in - it's not hard.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don't mind buying consumable items for my child, but it just seems weird to me how every year I'm supposed to be buying her a pair of scissors. This scissors go to school. It never come back. It's just very strange that apparently every year the teacher loses 20 to 30 pairs of scissors. I can understand losing a few pairs but 20 or 30?

Also every year the second graders learn about measuring so they have to buy rulers and bring those into school. And again it would just seem to be more efficient to buy a set of rulers for the class. I'm sure a few would get broken or lost.

They should be sending your child's supplies home but they usually just put them all together and they are shared. I always bought extra and the cheapest but decent stuff I could find to donate more for kids who can't or parents will not but usually a few weeks in would swap out some of my child's stuff with nicer things than the teacher gave as it wasn't ever ours (i.e. folders, etc).

Some years I've gotten supplies back. Other years no

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If the alternative is my kids not having hand soap at school, I’m happy to supply it. We can afford it, and my kids attend a Title 1 school too, so I know many of their classmates parents likely can’t. Should our tax dollars cover this stuff? Absolutely. But I think it builds school community to be willing to help provide for others.

Which district doesn't provide soap? In my 31 years teaching in an ES we always have had soap. Since we've always had soap I've never asked for hand sanitizer.

I work in Baltimore City. Prior to the pandemic, we'd run out of soap, paper towels, and sometimes toilet paper. We still run out of bottled water which we have to use because the water fountains are closed. The extra pandemic money has really helped but that's on its way out. I used to bring these things from home.

Thanks for the replies. PP here and I’m in Fairfax Co.

Why are your water fountains closed? Leftover pandemic policy?

It could have been because there is lead in the pipes and Baltimore county doesn't have the money to remediate fixing all of the pipes

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If parents don’t purchase the supplies, the teachers often have to do it.

I worked in a public school that provided no supplies for teachers. I had to purchase copy paper, tissue paper, class sets of composition books, books for my classroom library, etc. I also needed basic decorations for walls and all of my own supplies (whiteboard markers, pens, etc.). I spent close to $800 a year at that school, and was still told by an administrator that I didn’t decorate my classroom enough.

I don’t work for that district anymore.

BOOKS FOR YOUR CLASSROOM LIBRARY -You truly are not very smart. All you school has to do is post or send an email out requesting books from the public/parents. Our school did this and literally hundreds of current/old/favorite great condition books were donated. We had to use the HS kids (as volunteer hours) to help us organize. There was a bin at the local HS for this too. We are in Loudoun County btw. I would have made a supplies stipend a condition of my employment.

Not everyone works in wealthy schools. Virtually none of my students have books at home. The vast majority had never been to a library.

The point is - ask your whole community - flyers at the grocery store, posts on NextDoor or DCUM, boxes places at gym entrances . Stop whining and just put the work in - it's not hard.

We used to get all these donations of terrible books. It would take a lot time to sort through the garbage like people donating books like "go the f*** to sleep. Or old ratty copies of National geographic. (I don't know what it is but people are just convinced that schools really want old copies of magazines and no we don't. ) It would be better to make a wish list on Amazon or another bookstore

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If the alternative is my kids not having hand soap at school, I’m happy to supply it. We can afford it, and my kids attend a Title 1 school too, so I know many of their classmates parents likely can’t. Should our tax dollars cover this stuff? Absolutely. But I think it builds school community to be willing to help provide for others.

Which district doesn't provide soap? In my 31 years teaching in an ES we always have had soap. Since we've always had soap I've never asked for hand sanitizer.

I work in Baltimore City. Prior to the pandemic, we'd run out of soap, paper towels, and sometimes toilet paper. We still run out of bottled water which we have to use because the water fountains are closed. The extra pandemic money has really helped but that's on its way out. I used to bring these things from home.

Thanks for the replies. PP here and I’m in Fairfax Co.

Why are your water fountains closed? Leftover pandemic policy?

It could have been because there is lead in the pipes and Baltimore county doesn't have the money to remediate fixing all of the pipes

Yes. That was the answer given earlier in the thread.