Today Show....School supply list

[luvmy3]

When my oldest two were in public school they were asked to bring film for the camera (teacher took photos during the year of the students, some times you got a picture sent home of your child...etc), lightbulbs for the teachers lamp, hand soap, kleenex, copy paper, colored copy paper, dry erase markers, post it notes and many other things that they never used personally. I understand that teachers have to spend much of their own money for these supplies....and that makes it hard. I always supplied everything requested but now I'm glad to be out of that loop. I hate that they spend their own money....I really wish the public schools were in a better state.

Half of that stuff should be supplied by the school and the other half should be supplied by the teacher. If a teacher wants to take pics of thier students, or use post it notes then there is no reason they shouldn't be buying that stuff themselves. If it isn't a need in the classroom then it shouldn't fall on the parents to supply it.

 

[MPwifey]

Half of that stuff should be supplied by the school and the other half should be supplied by the teacher. If a teacher wants to take pics of thier students, or use post it notes then there is no reason they shouldn't be buying that stuff themselves. If it isn't a need in the classroom then it shouldn't fall on the parents to supply it.

I am a Pre-K teacher and the way it works for film in our school is they have a camera and you can get pictures printed out about every 3 or 4 months. Another option is to pay for them ourselves and turn in a receipt along with a picture of the pictures we took to ensure our pictures are necessary. Then we may get reimbursed in 8-10 weeks. I like to take pictures of my kids all throughout the year and then send it home at the end of the year to the parents as a book of their year.


Today I posted my request list on our door of some supplies for future projects, I requested;

dryer lint
old small puzzles with missing pieces
cinnamon
fruit styrofoam plates
small glass jars
bubble wands


It is an interesting list but I find I get more of a response asking parents to bring in these items and then working with what I have. Oh and in case you are wondering, the dryer lint is for playdough

 

[blueangel]

Our school is huge (1400+) and many of those kids are irresponsible with their clothes. Tons get left in PE or classrooms and are never claimed. Twice a year the PE department puts together a "shopping trip" for some of the most needy kids. The clothes, of course, need to be washed first for sanitary reasons.

 

[Halbleib1]

The public high school I went to had a washer and dryer in the home ec. room. I believe this was to wash the clothes that students made in class. Uniforms etc. for sports/band had to be taken home for washing as well as all gym clothes.

The public elementary school I went to I know they had extra clothes in the nurses office for any child that may need them if they had an accident during the day. As far as I know these would have been the only clothes washed there. As well as the blankets and sheets used in the nurses office as well.

We were not required to supply anything in elementary school but in high school we had to supply our own paper pens pencils binders and calculator for math if we chose to use one. Also for home ec. we had to buy our own kit to sew. All the food for the cooking part was supplied by the school though.

 

[Kathi OD]

I got to agree with you here. I wonder why is that private school can operate on a lower budget and can still provide more than public school .

Two words: Special Education.

PL94-142 (IDEA) requires public schools to spend a huge amount of their budget on providing disabled students with an appropriate education. What many people don't realize is that this law isn't just about hiring special ed teachers, but also includes purchasing equipment necessary for all students to participate in the educational process. For some students this means special texts (no buying in bulk to get a publisher's discount). It may mean special equipment has to be purchased. Some student's require sophisticated health care during the school day, or they may need speech, physical, or occupational therapy. Students with physical disabilities may have to have an adaptive physical education class.

While these services may be provided for a student attending a private school, be assured that they are being paid for by the public school district and not from the tuition parents pay at the private school.

If you read my original post, I fully admitted our school does not provide the services like this that public school does. I merely questioned whether these services can really account for more than a $100K difference in funding per classroom...

Yes, it really can cost more than $100K in funding per classroom, especially when combined with the higher salaries and benefits the teachers receive. Equipment for special education students is extraordinarily expensive.

 

[Kathi OD]

Half of that stuff should be supplied by the school and the other half should be supplied by the teacher. If a teacher wants to take pics of thier students, or use post it notes then there is no reason they shouldn't be buying that stuff themselves. If it isn't a need in the classroom then it shouldn't fall on the parents to supply it.

While it should be supplied by the school, more than often it's not. What then? The teacher should supply it all? I'm not talking about film for taking pictures, but paper, crayons, pencils, kleenex, paper towels; that kind of stuff.

 

[disneylove69]

I am a Pre-K teacher and the way it works for film in our school is they have a camera and you can get pictures printed out about every 3 or 4 months. Another option is to pay for them ourselves and turn in a receipt along with a picture of the pictures we took to ensure our pictures are necessary. Then we may get reimbursed in 8-10 weeks. I like to take pictures of my kids all throughout the year and then send it home at the end of the year to the parents as a book of their year.


Today I posted my request list on our door of some supplies for future projects, I requested;

dryer lint
old small puzzles with missing pieces
cinnamon
fruit styrofoam plates
small glass jars
bubble wands


It is an interesting list but I find I get more of a response asking parents to bring in these items and then working with what I have. Oh and in case you are wondering, the dryer lint is for playdough

Where do I send the lint? I think my dryer turns those missing socks into lint piles.

 

[smokeyblue]

Two words: Special Education.

PL94-142 (IDEA) requires public schools to spend a huge amount of their budget on providing disabled students with an appropriate education. What many people don't realize is that this law isn't just about hiring special ed teachers, but also includes purchasing equipment necessary for all students to participate in the educational process. For some students this means special texts (no buying in bulk to get a publisher's discount). It may mean special equipment has to be purchased. Some student's require sophisticated health care during the school day, or they may need speech, physical, or occupational therapy. Students with physical disabilities may have to have an adaptive physical education class.

While these services may be provided for a student attending a private school, be assured that they are being paid for by the public school district and not from the tuition parents pay at the private school.




Yes, it really can cost more than $100K in funding per classroom, especially when combined with the higher salaries and benefits the teachers receive. Equipment for special education students is extraordinarily expensive.

Are you ever right. My dad has been a school administrator for nearly 40 years and insurance and special ed are the budget breakers. The actually have a student the have to provide a 1:1 RN for, yes an RN! Other students require 1:1 aides, that is a full time position for one person to just take care of one student. Mind you that the per year benefit package for each employee is $15,000 above their pay. I may be wrong but I think that he told me that they are responsible for educating special needs children from age 3-25.

There needs to be some reform as far as special education goes. Schools should not be responsible for taking care of the medical needs of students. Should they make resonable accomodations for children with mobility, speech or hearing disabilities, absolutely!

I don't blame parents that have special needs families for using these services, what choice do they really have. I am so sorry and hate that they are in this position.

The fix for all of this is just as convoluted as healthcare reform.

 

[CrazyDuck]

I am a Pre-K teacher and the way it works for film in our school is they have a camera and you can get pictures printed out about every 3 or 4 months. Another option is to pay for them ourselves and turn in a receipt along with a picture of the pictures we took to ensure our pictures are necessary. Then we may get reimbursed in 8-10 weeks. I like to take pictures of my kids all throughout the year and then send it home at the end of the year to the parents as a book of their year.

I think you or your school needs to invest in a Digital Camera! They are really great. You can keep taking pictures and you can delete the ones you dont like instead of wasting film on bad pictures. It's really NEW technology! They have only been around for 15 YEARS!

 

[rparmfamily]

I saw a blip about it on the Today show, and laughed when they mentioned a school in Honolulu was asking for toilet paper. I wish they said which school, ours doesn't!

 

[NMW]

Are they able to just make a ruling on that, to pay an additional $170.00.....don't you have to vote on that as a community?

Not every state gets to vote on school/tax issues. In PA where I live, our school board votes...period. We get a tax increse if they say so. Now in NJ where we lived, the community votes on the school budget that the board presents. We don't get that choice here.

 

[snowy76]

I've asked students for tissues - our school supplies them but they are thinner and coarser than even the cheap ones they give you in the hospital. When sinus infections went through with H1N1 last year the kids complained about the tissues - I told them, if you want guaranteed soft tissues, BYOT.

As for detergent.... well, that is what really caught my attention in this thread. I can guess that many, many people here have no experience with a poor, urban school setting... but I immediately thought of the last building I was at prior to this one. 95% free and reduced lunch, started K-5 and wound up K-8. We had children with a LOT of social problems, lack of hygiene, bedwetting problems (likely due to abuse), etc. Poor kids whose parents bought them only one or two uniforms because, since the clothes all looked the same, they figured the kids could wear a few times before washing. Let me tell you, a 10 year old elementary student in a PE class starting her cycle with no gym clothes, no deodorant, and no clean feminine products NEEDS some washing done. Should they do it themselves? Yep. Should their parents? You bet. But if they don't, what were we as a staff supposed to do? Do we let them sit there in their own stink day after day?

Just some food for thought. I didn't see the Today show reference but I'm going to guess it was a school with some pretty needy kids.

 

[Indiana Rose Lee]

While it should be supplied by the school, more than often it's not. What then? The teacher should supply it all? I'm not talking about film for taking pictures, but paper, crayons, pencils, kleenex, paper towels; that kind of stuff.

I love your sig quote.

People are spoiled. When my mom and grandmother went to school, they had to take tissues and all that sort of stuff. When I was in school in the 70's we had to also. The teacher should not have to buy any necessities. If the students need the stuff, their parent's or a parent group needs to provide them.

I can't imagine any school still using film! Totally weird.

Snowy, I have worked with those kids in a different capacity, and must say that I am grateful that schools are willing to help those students out. No kid needs to smell like urine all day. And some parents stink, unfortunately.

 

[luvmy3]

While it should be supplied by the school, more than often it's not. What then? The teacher should supply it all? I'm not talking about film for taking pictures, but paper, crayons, pencils, kleenex, paper towels; that kind of stuff.

You are putting words in my mouth, I never said that teachers should supply it all in fact I said just the opposite in my first post in this thread. As far as personal supplies like pencils, crayons etc thats for the parents to supply. If a teacher wants to have a supply for the kids whose parents don't send in that stuff, thats their choice and they can buy it, or like in our school the PTA has a fund for that very thing, or they could put in a student "store" in the builing where a kid can go buy a pencil for 10 cents if needed.

As far as what then, let the school districts decide how to re-arrange their budget in order to be able to supply the school with things like Toilet paper, bleach, etc. Thats the point of the taxes we pay, thats the point of residents voting so that we make sure our money goes to whats needed, not whats wanted or many times whats wasted. Have the PTA have fundraisers and use that money for needed supplies instead of that new mural on the wall, or monthly breakfasts for character ed. There are ways other than expecting parents to supply that stuff or expect teachers to but its easier to "force" parents or teachers to do it, and a long as the teachers and parents continueto because "who else will do it" there is no need to change things.

ETA We are one of the largest districts in our State and at the same time, we fall into the lower end of money spent per pupil. We manage just fine without requiring parents and teachers to supply certain items.

 

[McKelly]

Our school's PTA also has a separate fund for kids that don't send in the necessary supplies. It's a specific fundraiser we do every year and all the money goes to that specifically. Some teachers use it, others don't.

We have parents that complain about that fund, they don't want to pay for some other child's supplies/field trips/winter coats. I just hope they never find themselves in a similar situation and that people do not have long term memories...........

 

[crisi]

Yes, it really can cost more than $100K in funding per classroom, especially when combined with the higher salaries and benefits the teachers receive. Equipment for special education students is extraordinarily expensive.

Yep, it doesn't take much when you look at equipment, space, salaries. A lot of public schools have 30 kids to one teacher, but in a classroom there might be be two or three other PAID adults - ESL teachers, disability aides. It really shocked me to realize that during English class, my daughter's third grade classroom had four ESL teachers helping the English as a second language kids. This was for an hour a day, there are four classrooms, that's another two full time teachers - specialists with master's degrees, to support the third grade just for ESL. That isn't the special ed program, or dealing with disabilities, or the gifted program...that's just ESL.

Our school has 40% of the kids on free/reduced lunch - that adds hundreds of thousands of dollars to the budget. 25% of the kids don't have English as a first language. That adds - as you can see - a lot of ESL support. HALF the kids get special services either out of the Special Education program or out of the G&T program. To add insult to injury, we have not passed NCLB, so our school has to take money out of ITS budget to bus students to other "non failing" schools (my kids score well above average in standardized tests, I'm not worried about the quality of their education - I'm worried that you have a hard time getting a child who lives in poverty and doesn't speak English at home to pass a standardized test).

The tax base has fallen, so there is less money to support all of this.

Which means the school isn't buying teachers paper towels and kleenex. If they need them, they either need to buy them or ask the parents for them.

I live in a strange area. 40% of the kids are on free and reduced lunch. And 10% of the cars in the parking lot on a school event night fall into the Lexis/Mercedes/BMW category - there is a large SEC bracket in our school attendance area. Not every parent can afford to send a box of kleenex -but there are plenty of parents that can.

 

[luvmy3]

Yep, it doesn't take much when you look at equipment, space, salaries. A lot of public schools have 30 kids to one teacher, but in a classroom there might be be two or three other PAID adults - ESL teachers, disability aides. It really shocked me to realize that during English class, my daughter's third grade classroom had four ESL teachers helping the English as a second language kids. This was for an hour a day, there are four classrooms, that's another two full time teachers - specialists with master's degrees, to support the third grade just for ESL. That isn't the special ed program, or dealing with disabilities, or the gifted program...that's just ESL.

My ds had 5 ESL kids in his class out of 19 students and there are no ESL teachers in the classroom, those students get pulled out to go to ESL, where there are only a couple teachers who specialize in it for the whole school.

I hate to say it but schools have become to compassionate, instead of practical, but its easy to do when you aren't spending your own money. There is no need to have an ESL teacher for every student in the class, no need and its a blatant waste of tax payer money and just a small example of why schools don't have enough money to pay for things they do need.

(And in case someone misunderstands, I am not saying that those ESL students shouldn't have ESL at all, I'm just saying that they don't all need an individual teacher to do it.)

 

[Kathi OD]

ETA We are one of the largest districts in our State and at the same time, we fall into the lower end of money spent per pupil. We manage just fine without requiring parents and teachers to supply certain items.

There-in lies the answer. As a large district your administrators are able to negotiate lower prices for most items. Gasoline for buses, cleaning supplies, and equipment are all cheaper/unit if you are purchasing in large quantities. Sometimes those discounts are up to 50% less than the price paid by smaller entities.

Additionally, large school districts tend to get more than their fair share of the state education dollar, while smaller districts tend to be short-changed. It's easy to understand why. The larger districts have more voters than the small ones.

 

[crisi]

My ds had 5 ESL kids in his class out of 19 students and there are no ESL teachers in the classroom, those students get pulled out to go to ESL, where there are only a couple teachers who specialize in it for the whole school.

I hate to say it but schools have become to compassionate, instead of practical, but its easy to do when you aren't spending your own money. There is no need to have an ESL teacher for every student in the class, no need and its a blatant waste of tax payer money and just a small example of why schools don't have enough money to pay for things they do need.

(And in case someone misunderstands, I am not saying that those ESL students shouldn't have ESL at all, I'm just saying that they don't all need an individual teacher to do it.)

Your school probably isn't in danger of being closed down because the ESL kids aren't making Adequate Yearly Progress and therefore pull down the scores for the school. We used to do it that way, too, until test scores forced us to throw a lot of money at certain subsets of the student population. Which is where we've been for several years.

It worked, we passed last year and have a year of probation. Then we will be a "not failing" school - and my kids will have moved on.

 

[luvmy3]

There-in lies the answer. As a large district your administrators are able to negotiate lower prices for most items. Gasoline for buses, cleaning supplies, and equipment are all cheaper/unit if you are purchasing in large quantities. Sometimes those discounts are up to 50% more than the price paid by smaller entities.

Additionally, large school districts tend to get more than their fair share of the state education dollar, while smaller districts tend to be short-changed. It's easy to understand why. The larger districts have more voters than the small ones.[/QUOTE]

But the saddest part is they don't vote, and then are the first to complain where their money is going. People came out in record numbers for last years vote, why, because the sports program was in danger of being cut. Its sad that people come out to save that yet when it comes to things like voting for "basic necessities" they don't bother. I bet when the district starts making parents and teachers supply those things they will, which of course is still sad but it gets people to decide where the school should spend their money.

As far as gov't funding, like all over the country it was drasticaslly cut, which is why the sports program was threatened because the district decided that wasnt as much a need as other things. It was the voters who decided that the program shouldn't be cut and were willing to pay the increase in taxes (to make up for the loss of gov't funds) in order to keep it. I say this because in general I don't believe people actually loook at what it is they are voting for, or they don't vote at all. If they did, maybe more schools would have what they needed, and parents and teachers wouldn't be forced to supply it and every year having to supply just a little bit more each year. I don't believe size makes a difference, what makes a difference is more people caring.