School seem to think we have a money tree at the bottom of the garden!

tessie_bear

op i feel your pain...its never ending especially in the run up to christmas i have found...just say no i suppose but that can be hard

meritaten

Its not just the money either - its the 'making' stuff for the kids too - this week its sports relief (they have to dress up as a famous sports person) the other week it was 'an animal', my poor DILs are not famous for their craft skills.........so its usually either down to grandma or the 'costumes' have to be purchased! right now my sis is running round trying to find 'proper' tutus cos her girls are doing 'ballerinas' I have an idea how much they cost - I told her to get the cheap 'practice' ones - but that isnt good enough for her girls!

CH27

I really do not get why people are moaning about dinner money & before & after school clubs.

kj*daisy

CH27 wrote: »

I really do not get why people are moaning about dinner money & before & after school clubs.

Me neither, do you expect it to cost nothing? And the fund raising benefits the school as a whole, and therefore your child at the school. And surely it's good that children get an awareness of charity and that there are many other people in other countries who have much much less than them, and yes, that we should help those people through events like Sports Relief.

Poor teachers and school staff, working their butts off to put this stuff on, on top of the teaching, and add value to the children's school experience and everyone just moans about it! Hear it so often.

Janepig

I don't really get the moaning either - my cousin's partner has just been on a fishing trip to the Gambia and as part of the trip they all went to a local school laden with stationery and other school equipment we take for granted as they have absolutely nothing.

IMO you can't complain about paying for school dinners, that's a given, and if you want to do it cheaper then give them sandwiches. That's what I've started doing as £80 per month was getting a bit silly. Most of the other stuff is optional, and believe me, in our school there are plenty of parents who don't pay and there's certainly no name and shame policy. And why wouldn't you want to give of your time if you can - I work, so there's little I can do, and in fairness there's hundreds of LSA's there so parents don't have to come in and do reading, but I do what I can, there are others who do alot more in terms of PTA, etc...., and the school rely heavily on fundraising.

Another option is to send your child to school in a "deprived" area - cue huge budget for the school and less likelihood of you being asked for money. One of my friends has children in a primary school in one area, and her brother's children go to another primary not far away, but in a "deprived" area. He never gets asked to pay for anything at the school (other than dinners), everything is subsidised. My friend on the other hand has to cough up for everything, and it turns out following a recent inspection, that their school has the lowest budget in that LEA. Despite this, they had a glowing inspection, as good as it could possibly be. So I guess it's a trade off.

Jx

Janepig

kj*daisy wrote: »

Me neither, do you expect it to cost nothing? And the fund raising benefits the school as a whole, and therefore your child at the school. And surely it's good that children get an awareness of charity and that there are many other people in other countries who have much much less than them, and yes, that we should help those people through events like Sports Relief.

Poor teachers and school staff, working their butts off to put this stuff on, on top of the teaching, and add value to the children's school experience and everyone just moans about it! Hear it so often.

Luckily, DD/DS's school has a sports club after school on Tuesday, which is free, and a cooking club after school every other Wednesday, again which is free, run by the staff in their own time.

Tomorrow afternoon there is a cross country competition about half an hour's drive away, which DD is competing in, and several teachers and the head will be there until about 8pm when it finishes. They work hard for the school, and the head reminds me of my old headmaster in comp, the school was everything to him and he worked so hard for the good of the kids. I've got every respect for him, I really have.

Jx

meritaten

kj*daisy wrote: »

Me neither, do you expect it to cost nothing? And the fund raising benefits the school as a whole, and therefore your child at the school. And surely it's good that children get an awareness of charity and that there are many other people in other countries who have much much less than them, and yes, that we should help those people through events like Sports Relief.

Poor teachers and school staff, working their butts off to put this stuff on, on top of the teaching, and add value to the children's school experience and everyone just moans about it! Hear it so often.

Well Yes actually! we ARE supposed to have free education for our children.
and I dont really agree that it adds value to a childs school experience - I believe it takes time out of a childs day that could be better spent by actually LEARNING! and yes I know you will say that they are learning - but compared to my childhood when all these activities were unknown - school results have not improved THAT much on levels of literacy and numeracy - I would argue they are worse!
It may well be fun for the children - but it isnt fun for parents who are struggling on low wages and are expected to shell out £000s per term - that is no exaggeration as my DD also kept track of the £1s and 50ps and in her kids school it came to £70 odd pound in a six week period. that was for ONE child! if you have two or more in school that adds up to a heck of a lot over the school year!

tiff

I totally get it, people are struggling and then there are demands from school, some of it is unneccessary. I would stick to your guns about the things that dont matter, they dont expect you to buy a new outfit for Sport Relief day. Give your children a small amount for the school fayre, mine would probably spend it on a drink and cake if there's food available.

Explain to your children why you cant give any more than what youre giving them. My two were quite happy most of the time. I didnt particularly like book week, books were always overpriced the best part of £10 for each child.

silvercar

meritaten wrote: »

Well Yes actually! we ARE supposed to have free education for our children.

Wait until you get requests for art equipment (saying no means your child can't do art gcse), geography field trip (again saying no means they will get marked down on data collection for their gcse coursework), english literature trips to see the plays of the books they are studying. Then comes the revision notes and past exam papers sent by email, so you have to print them out at home.

Free education has gone. If you want your child to have the same chances at gcse as the other children you need to pay.

VfM4meplse

Janepig wrote: »

Another option is to send your child to school in a "deprived" area - cue huge budget for the school and less likelihood of you being asked for money. One of my friends has children in a primary school in one area, and her brother's children go to another primary not far away, but in a "deprived" area. He never gets asked to pay for anything at the school (other than dinners), everything is subsidised. My friend on the other hand has to cough up for everything, and it turns out following a recent inspection, that their school has the lowest budget in that LEA. Despite this, they had a glowing inspection, as good as it could possibly be. So I guess it's a trade off.

Absolutely not :eek:

The inspection might be glowing, but surely you would want your children to benefit from making friends with people that have similar backgrounds and values? I'd be very concerned if my (notional) child's best friend's father happened to be a drug dealer / gangster / pimp on the local sink estate.

Spending a few unbudgeted pounds per annum is a small trade-off compared to the vast but unquantifiable benefits of sending chiildren to schools whose catchments are non-deprived.