Schools charging & people on benefits!

Indie_Kid

Oh how things have changed since I was at school! At primary school, we didn't have to wear the official uniform - a white polo shirt, a navy jumper (either v neck or the school sweatshirt) and navy/black/grey skirt or trousers was acceptable. Non-uniform days were 30-50p.

ladybez

When I was at school, Mum used to make a lot of my uniform, she only bought my PE shirt and Gym Bags (Don't ask!!!), my Blazer was handed down from a friend of ours. We only had one trip out a year, at the end of it, when we went to Chester Zoo and Mum paid for it. In my top junior year, there was a trip arranged for 5 days in Wales which would cost £25.00 This is a long time ago, also a Guide Camp for five days costing £7/10s. I chose the Guide camp and am still convinced I learned far more there. I buy all 3 of my childrens uniform from Tesco, with the exception of my daughters blazer, which I can buy anywhere and get the Badge from school. For next year, however, she has to have the new p.e. kit , which can only be bought from school and consists of T-shirt, Polo shirt, skirt, shorts, socks, tracksuit and waterproof jacket. I have told her she can have one top half, one bottom half and the socks (still costs about £25.00) and if the school arenot happy, they can contact me. DD is happy with that.

Plans_all_plans

I think some on here are unrealistic regarding school trips and their kids wanting to go on them.

My dad works full time but both my sister and I went to a private school. We may as well have been on benefits given the incomes of some of the other children there.

The amount of trips we did not go on was high given that everyone else went on them:

The German exchange
The trip to EuroDisney
The trip to Alton Towers
The sports holiday to Devon (every year we missed that one)
The skiing holiday to Italy

It really is just life! Admittedly for educational trips there was a fund that provided SOME of the money for poorer students, but parents still had to cough up for some of it.

The uniform cost a bomb too, but we got those second hand at the school fair. If you can't afford the trips, then you just cant go on them!

Indie_Kid

ladybez wrote: »

When I was at school, Mum used to make a lot of my uniform, she only bought my PE shirt and Gym Bags (Don't ask!!!), my Blazer was handed down from a friend of ours. We only had one trip out a year, at the end of it, when we went to Chester Zoo and Mum paid for it. In my top junior year, there was a trip arranged for 5 days in Wales which would cost £25.00 This is a long time ago, also a Guide Camp for five days costing £7/10s. I chose the Guide camp and am still convinced I learned far more there. I buy all 3 of my childrens uniform from Tesco, with the exception of my daughters blazer, which I can buy anywhere and get the Badge from school. For next year, however, she has to have the new p.e. kit , which can only be bought from school and consists of T-shirt, Polo shirt, skirt, shorts, socks, tracksuit and waterproof jacket. I have told her she can have one top half, one bottom half and the socks (still costs about £25.00) and if the school arenot happy, they can contact me. DD is happy with that.

Am I alone in finding it ridiculous that she has to have socks which can only be bought from the school? We were able to wear any socks we wanted.

Oldernotwiser

merlin68 wrote: »

My daughter had to go on the school trip in school time, it wasn't a choice. My other daughters school uniform costs about £200 and you can only get it from the school.

£200 doesn't seem a lot for the clothes that a child wears for most of the day and most of the year.

shegirl

Oldernotwiser wrote: »

£200 doesn't seem a lot for the clothes that a child wears for most of the day and most of the year.

It isn't!

add another few characters blah blah blah

Britwife

I'm a stay at home mom and my husband does OK with earnings. We dont' live above our means and are happy with our finances. I have seen plenty of SOA's on debt free wanna be with load of single parents on benefits bringing home more money than we are after taxes.

My husband works long hours to support us and it's quite disheartening to see someone able to stay home and get more money than we do. Yet, we still live happily and comfortably. So I guess what I'm saying is if we can do it getting less than those on benefits than so can those on benefits.

I do agree that things have to change in our education system. I'm fortunate that when our school has any activities that there is a fee involved, it is voluntary and if any child can't pay, they still get to go.

My suggestion is if you truly can't afford to go, then speak to the school and ask for help. Other than that, you are usually given a notice well before payment is needed. Take that time to put the money aside or again, ask the school if you can make a few payments.

Schools love when parents are involved and this is a great opportunity to get involved. If you're at home on benefits, go help out at the school a few times a week, even if it's just with lunch time.

paulwf

Bennifred wrote: »

However, there are loads of parents, both working or not, who cannot afford the language exchanges, ski trips, sports tours, etc etc and they and their children just have to accept that as part of life. There tend to be limited places on those types of trips anyway. Most children have to learn at some point that there isn't a bottomless pit of money, and certain choices have to be made. It's not a bad lesson to learn.........

Agreed...when I was at school I wouldn't have dreamed of asking my parents to pay out for a ski trip or foreign exchange. My parents weren't affluent but neither were they on the breadline...I just wouldn't have felt comfortable asking them to spend all that money.

Gf's nan was going on about how our niece had it so hard that she had to save up for her ski trip. We kindly pointed out neither of us would ever had thought about going on a foreign trip at school and anyway saving up is a good lesson.

It seems expectations have changed a lot over just one short generation, half of the activities being mentioned didn't used to take place so I can't see the hardship on missing them out.

SingleSue

After bashing the schools in my previous posts, I will say they have come up with an excellent idea for a trip next year to Honduras aimed at the 6th form.

It is a research trip so mainly working but with some fun time and the cost is £1800-2000 per child.....which is going to be raised by the students own efforts.

My son has been accepted onto it (very limited numbers due to cost and only for the high achievers/best behaved), I willingly paid the £50 deposit (it did cause a stress but I did it!) and now eldest has really got the bit between his teeth on fundraising by organising their first big event, a bag pack. He got a little frustrated at the waffling going on and the no action, so phoned up one of the big supermarkets off his own back and organised it for one of the busy weekends of the year....hopefully, the efforts will fund almost one place.

So it

A) Teaches him that if he wants something, he has to work for it.
That money does not grow on trees.
C) More effort you put in, the more you get out of it.

It has also brought him out of his shell and shown him organisational skills are possible!


I do spend an awful lot of time at the schools anyway as we work very closely together to overcome the boys disabilities and to enable them to learn. I listen to their advice and they listen to my advice, so we have a close working relationship. I also am part of the parents focus group which discuss and help implement various different things for the school, from homework issues to the talented and gifted groups, to the uniform.

Kayteehee

When I was at school we had a ski trip for 5 days organised, at a cost of £600+ to parents. Needless to say, I didn't even mention it to my Mum, although I was around 14/15 at the time so knew the value of money. I don't think it's fair to organise such high cost activities!

There was also an american exchange which unfortunately I didn't even have the option of going, they didn't pick my name out of the hat, but this was at a high cost for the flights etc.

I did go on a French Exchange which I felt was a much better experience, getting to be in a completely different culture and practice the language was great for my personal development and did absolute wonders for my French skills. I say if you've got a chance to send your child on one of these and could stretch the budget, it is worth spending on, rather then needless ski trips and the like.