Primary school closing early.

carlislelass

We provided pencils, crayons etc. Why not go back to that?

Cakeguts

Norman_Castle wrote: »

While it does seem wasteful to write oversize letters on large pieces of paper (environmentally friendly?) I doubt it makes much difference to the cost of running a school.

Contact your local fire brigade about the potential fire risk, they could do with a laugh.

Actually this was my first reaction. There was paper everywhere and water dripping through the ceiling. All of the walls shown in the tv news programme had paper stuck on them. Two children were sitting on the floor writing words in big small case letters on large pieces of paper in what looked like black felt tip pen. Another child was cutting out a pre printed triangle shape in the middle of yet another large piece of paper. I have never ever seen so much paper being wasted.


Last night I realised that the school looked like the interior of a hoarder's house. Lots and lots of paper and stuff and holes in the roof. The only good thing about it is that they can't afford to buy any more paper so that would reduce the fire risk.

Cakeguts

AnotherJoe wrote: »

Admin, please can you check out user "cakeguts", I think the account has been hacked into by a Daily Fail reading troll.

You probably didn't see the news item. I am old and I can honestly say that in any of the primary schools that I attended in the 60s and 70s no one ever cut out a triangle shape printed in the middle of a large piece of paper. In fact I can't remember ever doing this. I can remember cutting paper in art classes but not just as the purpose of cutting out. The news item said that this was a primary school not an infant school.

Mojisola

Cakeguts wrote: »

There was a primary school that was closing on Friday at lunch time because it had run out of money.

I have never seen so much stuff in a classroom. There were containers with crayons in them obviously provided by the school.

The other thing about that school was the amount of paper they had and were using.

Because of all these things that their budget had been wasted on they couldn't afford to open on Friday afternoon.

Paper and crayons (and other classroom stuff) costs very little - certainly not enough to pay staff for half a day.

If the budget is so tight that the school is moving to four and a half days a week, it's possible that the classroom equipment is already being funded by parents' fundraising.

Cakeguts

Mojisola wrote: »

Paper and crayons (and other classroom stuff) costs very little - certainly not enough to pay staff for half a day.

If the budget is so tight that the school is moving to four and a half days a week, it's possible that the classroom equipment is already being funded by parents' fundraising.

I don't know how much paper costs but they didn't seem to be using it in a way that suggested that there was any form of budgeting going on.

Maybe I am old fashioned but I would have thought that mending a hole in a roof would have been more important than buying paper for cutting out shapes already printed on the paper? There must be lots of people of my age who are well educated who never cut out coloured shapes pre printed on paper at primary school. I really can't see the purpose of that exercise. All it seemed to do was waste paper and printing ink with no educational benefit?

vivatifosi

Mending the hole in the roof ironically probably comes out of a different budget.

Did you see where in the country the school was? It may be impacted by the changes to the pupil premium or something similar.

Jackmydad

Clifford_Pope wrote: »

When I attended a tiny rural one-class school in 1956 the slates and chalk we wrote with were provided. There was no other equipment.

I was going to add that at the tiny rural school my mother went to in the 1920s and 30s the youngest pupils (all in one class, there were only two classes) wrote on slates with "slate pencils".
She said that while the abilities there were obviously mixed, everybody there could read, write and do arithmetic at least to some extent.
They were taught by two teachers, the "schoolmaster" and his wife.
I doubt if that school cost much to run.

At the primary school I went to in the 60s, pencils crayons and paper were supplied to the infants. Juniors supplied their own pencils pens and exercise books.
Again, I can't remember anyone there not being able to read, write, and do basic arithmetic. I know some found it hard, but they were given more help where possible.

molerat

Repairing the building is likely paid for by the council and not directly from the school budget, allocated funds can be shifted around to meet need. Paper etc will come directly from the school budget but a pack of paper costs a couple of pounds, less than a few minutes of the time cost of a teacher and a fraction of the heat and lighting cost of the school for that afternoon.

happyandcontented

Schools today are constrained by the requirements of the curriculum, hence, if they were undertaking a particular exercise it will be prescribed somewhere.

I saw the report and I suspect it was the ongoing repair budget that has made the difference in real terms. Capital expenditure (which repairs are) only attracts % funding from the LEA or Diocese in the case of VA schools. The rest has to come out of allocated budget.

That school will have probably been doing "running repairs" via tradesmen who have to be on the authorised list from the LEA and so charge a fortune....they cannot get a handy dad or grandad to come in and do a job it has to be done by proper tradesmen.So they have to stump up at the cost of other areas of expenditure.

If a class size exceeds 30 via an appeal in key stage one by law they have employ another teacher at a substantial cost even for an NQT.


Budgets have been slashed and are dropping further each year, many schools are in the red and it is becoming harder to balance the books due to cuts in free services and removal of specific funding.

Paper is the least of their worries.

Cakeguts

vivatifosi wrote: »

Mending the hole in the roof ironically probably comes out of a different budget.

Did you see where in the country the school was? It may be impacted by the changes to the pupil premium or something similar.

I can't remember where it was. I just remember thinking that something about the whole article didn't look right in terms of how the school was being run financially.

I assume that the budget for a primary school is based on the whole school year so they should know how much paper etc that they can order for the whole year? It appeared that the teachers had been told not to buy any more paper now in March? They have used a year's worth of paper between September and March? Does that sound like any budgeting going on?

The news item was shown where there were leaks in the roof of the school and that the playground items were old but not how old. I couldn't tell by looking at them. They didn't say they were broken in any way but were just old. To be honest the whole attitude of the school sounded to me like a black hole in money terms.