School Supplies

[Backroads]

I'm posting here just because it's a generally conservative-ish group of people I trust to not be crazy with a healthy sprinkling of other view points, also from people I generally trust not to be crazy. 

So... school supplies. I feel like I can't go on social media or even a news site without hearing about some school supplies crisis. I'm even hearing it from my homeschooling friends as they scramble to find useful supplies. School supply drives abound, teachers are putting up wishlists on Amazon, parents are begging on Facebook, etc. I'm slightly confused to some degree as I live in Utah where state law requires schools to provide basic classroom supplies through elementary (I haven't given a supply list or seen one for my own kids in years) but having been in the classroom I also understand that can only go so far. 

This gets me thinking. Just whose responsbility is it to provide the school supplies? I think most private schools are pretty cut-and-dry one way or the other, and while I know some homeschooling families who apply for grants or just collect donations like anyone else, they generally seem up for getting their own stuff. But public schools seem a bit funny. I keep hearing about teachers still sending out school supplies lists, and I hear them and parents complaining about having to pay for them.

Argument 1: We're already paying taxes into the school systems, so the schools should budget for all supplies. If it is needed to educate the child, the school needs to supply it. 

Argument 2: Parents are the ones who procreated and shipped the kids off to school. They're already getting an arguably good deal through a mass-funded public school, would it kill them to pitch in and buy some supplies?

Argument 3: (Which already sort of exists). It should be up to the individual teachers. Local or state governments (or, heck, federal, why not) would give funding for classroom supplies directly to the teachers, or teachers would request what they need.

Argument 4: We keep doing what we're doing and keep up with the community donations. It's charity. 

I just feel like there's some clash between government and personal responsibility somewhere here. 

Edited August 10, 2022 by Backroads

[Carborendum]

37 minutes ago, Backroads said:

Just whose responsibility is it to provide the school supplies?

Both.

When I went to public school a lifetime ago, we supplied almost everything.

• Notebooks/folders/binders
• Backpacks
• Calculators
• Personal Pencil sharpeners
• Standard writing and/or graph paper.
• Pencils were treated the same way.

The school supplied:

• Paper that was non-standard
• A wall-mount pencil sharpener.
• Crafts supplies.
• Refills for paper and pencils were available.  But they were in case we happened to run out.  It was not to be our standard supply.

I have no idea what the standard is today since we've homeschooled or private schooled all our kids.

[Backroads]

12 minutes ago, Carborendum said:

I have no idea what the standard is today since we've homeschooled or private schooled all our kids.

If I had to say a standard (again, in my state the school districts kind of handle everything, so I'm going with what I remember or hear about), families are now supposed to provide the following:

• Crayons
• Pencils
• Gluesticks
• Notebooks/binders/folders
• Scissors
• Hand sanitizer
• Tissues (in some extreme cases toilet paper, apparently some states don't provide that for their schools or something)
• Calculators depending on grade
• Copy paper for the copiers
• Writing paper
• Construction paper

So, not far off from your experience. I guess I could see where it would start adding up. 

I recall giving a sigh of relief when the Utah law went into effect. I effectively just ordered through the school what we needed and didn't have to worry about supply drama.

[Ironhold]

The issue is that your average school district is so under-funded (or suffers from such disproportionate allocation of funding) that they can't provide a basic level of school supplies for everyone, or if they do attempt to provide these supplies it's the cheapest brands they can get their hands on. 

Thus it's on the parents, and by extension various charities as necessary, to pick up the slack.

That being said, when I was in 5th and 6th grade, the school I went to would put together a limited number of pre-assembled supply kids (binder, paper, folders, pencils, et cetra) and sell them to parents for $30 a kit. 

[Just_A_Guy]

13 hours ago, Carborendum said:

Both.

When I went to public school a lifetime ago, we supplied almost everything.

• Notebooks/folders/binders
• Backpacks
• Calculators
• Personal Pencil sharpeners
• Standard writing and/or graph paper.
• Pencils were treated the same way.

The school supplied:

• Paper that was non-standard
• A wall-mount pencil sharpener.
• Crafts supplies.
• Refills for paper and pencils were available.  But they were in case we happened to run out.  It was not to be our standard supply.

I have no idea what the standard is today since we've homeschooled or private schooled all our kids.

This was my experience as well—we were expected to outfit ourselves, but teachers didn’t go begging for extras for the entire class.

We are also in Utah, and teachers now almost always send out wish lists for various items.  This year crayons, construction paper, Clorox wipes, and ziploc bags seem to be especially in demand. 

[Backroads]

8 hours ago, Just_A_Guy said:

This was my experience as well—we were expected to outfit ourselves, but teachers didn’t go begging for extras for the entire class.

We are also in Utah, and teachers now almost always send out wish lists for various items.  This year crayons, construction paper, Clorox wipes, and ziploc bags seem to be especially in demand. 

I've asked a few friends about that because I'm still noticing it. Right now I'm still teaching online and am entirely separated from the school supplies department so I don't know what's what.

Some friends are saying they're still not sending out lists. Others are saying their schools aren't supplying enough. So... who knows. I'm going to be watching for any list my kids bring home.

[Vort]

I'll be 60 early next year. When I was in elementary school, families were expected to provide a cigar box (seriously) containing a ruler pencils, erasers, paste (no gluesticks at the time), wide-rule notebook, and other grade-appropriate items, such as crayons, compasses, that sort of thing. We were expected to bring our own lunches or money to buy lunches at the cafeteria. The school supplied a physical place to meet, faculty, outdoor play equipment, a gymnasium, and textbooks.

Through the years, schools have evolved (devolved) in a way that the schools themselves have taken the responsibility for providing basic supplies to the students, even food. It's a shameful period we live in. Future generations will look back on us and shake their heads in pity and disgust. At least, I hope they do. The alternative is much worse: That they look back at us as some sort of golden age.

[Just_A_Guy]

45 minutes ago, Vort said:

I'll be 60 early next year. When I was in elementary school, families were expected to provide a cigar box (seriously) containing a ruler pencils, erasers, paste (no gluesticks at the time), wide-rule notebook, and other grade-appropriate items, such as crayons, compasses, that sort of thing. We were expected to bring our own lunches or money to buy lunches at the cafeteria. The school supplied a physical place to meet, faculty, outdoor play equipment, a gymnasium, and textbooks.

Through the years, schools have evolved (devolved) in a way that the schools themselves have taken the responsibility for providing basic supplies to the students, even food. It's a shameful period we live in. Future generations will look back on us and shake their heads in pity and disgust. At least, I hope they do. The alternative is much worse: That they look back at us as some sort of golden age.

I remember cigar boxes in school.  Quite handy little things, really . . .

[Ironhold]

47 minutes ago, Vort said:

I'll be 60 early next year. When I was in elementary school, families were expected to provide a cigar box (seriously) containing a ruler pencils, erasers, paste (no gluesticks at the time), wide-rule notebook, and other grade-appropriate items, such as crayons, compasses, that sort of thing. We were expected to bring our own lunches or money to buy lunches at the cafeteria. The school supplied a physical place to meet, faculty, outdoor play equipment, a gymnasium, and textbooks.

Through the years, schools have evolved (devolved) in a way that the schools themselves have taken the responsibility for providing basic supplies to the students, even food. It's a shameful period we live in. Future generations will look back on us and shake their heads in pity and disgust. At least, I hope they do. The alternative is much worse: That they look back at us as some sort of golden age.

Schools began offering lunches (and in many jurisdictions, breakfast) as a way to deal with malnutrition and poverty. 

Study after study showed that children who went hungry not only suffered physically but had trouble keeping up academically. 

Many school districts now offer meals for free (it's generally a nominal fee per meal unless a family is receiving state or federal financial assistance, in which case the government entity in question pays for it), with a few even *mandating* that children have to eat the school's lunches as a societal equalizer. 

This is why Michelle Obama's school lunch "reforms" were so disastrous, as the nutritional guidelines failed to account for the fact that student athletes and students on financial assistance *need* extra calories and nutrients in their meals, and so there were plenty of reports in various newspapers concerning kids either passing out from hunger or having to eat cheap snacks to compensate. 

[Backroads]

17 hours ago, Ironhold said:

This is why Michelle Obama's school lunch "reforms" were so disastrous, as the nutritional guidelines failed to account for the fact that student athletes and students on financial assistance *need* extra calories and nutrients in their meals, and so there were plenty of reports in various newspapers concerning kids either passing out from hunger or having to eat cheap snacks to compensate. 

I never understood the change. I remember reading multiple articles about the program. In one or two strokes of keys children's caloric needs were mentioned, the number of kids in poverty was mentioned, and then the caloric limit of the school meals. I'd be scratching my head. 

Really, if our concern these kids aren't getting enough calories is so great we're providing food, shouldn't the food contain... Calories?

Would also likely make the meals taste better because calories are delicious. 

I have a complicated view of free school meals. On the most practical level I can't say feeding kids in poverty is a bad thing, but there have been some odd consequences.

[LDSGator]

On 8/10/2022 at 11:13 AM, Backroads said:

Just whose responsbility is it to provide the school supplies?

I went to a private, Catholic school from 6th-12th grade, and they made us pay for everything. Books, etc. 

It was a heated topic of debate in my house as I got older (11th, 12th grade when I had summer jobs, etc). One parent demanded I pay for my books in high school, one parent thought it was their responsibility until I got to college.  Essentially, I hated high school so much that I refused to pay a dime for anything and my parents began to just buy the books to shut me up and keep the peace. 
 

note-the school also made us sell “calendars” for extra money. They charged us 40$ a calendar and you paid that if you sold them or not. Odd. 

[Backroads]

6 minutes ago, LDSGator said:

I went to a private, Catholic school from 6th-12th grade, and they made us pay for everything. Books, etc. 

It was a heated topic of debate in my house as I got older (11th, 12th grade when I had summer jobs, etc). One parent demanded I pay for my books in high school, one parent thought it was their responsibility until I got to college.  Essentially, I hated high school so much that I refused to pay a dime for anything and my parents began to just buy the books to shut me up and keep the peace. 
 

note-the school also made us sell “calendars” for extra money. They charged us 40$ a calendar and you paid that if you sold them or not. Odd. 

I could see where that would be annoying.

My babysitter's dad is a finance guy. They're not super wealthy, just average people, but Dad believes very much in kids earning money. The kids are all homeschooled, so the older kids are financially responsible for a lot of their own homeschool supplies. 

[LDSGator]

7 minutes ago, Backroads said:

The kids are all homeschooled, so the older kids are financially responsible for a lot of their own homeschool supplies

Whatever works. All families have different rules and ideas when it comes to money. 

[Ironhold]

On 8/12/2022 at 9:15 AM, Backroads said:

I never understood the change. I remember reading multiple articles about the program. In one or two strokes of keys children's caloric needs were mentioned, the number of kids in poverty was mentioned, and then the caloric limit of the school meals. I'd be scratching my head. 

Really, if our concern these kids aren't getting enough calories is so great we're providing food, shouldn't the food contain... Calories?

Would also likely make the meals taste better because calories are delicious. 

I have a complicated view of free school meals. On the most practical level I can't say feeding kids in poverty is a bad thing, but there have been some odd consequences.

Really, the entire round of Obama-era "reforms" was a giant mess. 

Among other things, schools were made to implement these new programs without any guidance or resources for how to teach children that the newer foods were better for them, so the schools were left on their own. 

Not only that, many of the healthier options were also more expensive, and so a lot of schools were left with tight budgets. 

For example, suppose it's an extra $0.25 / each for a whole wheat bread roll compared to a standard bread roll. 

If a school expects to serve 2000 students for lunch (yes, my high school was that overcrowded), then that's an extra $500 just for that lunch that has to be budgeted for. Wealthier school districts can just soak it up, but not poorer districts. 

[mirkwood]

On 8/12/2022 at 8:54 AM, LDSGator said:

just buy the books to shut me up and keep the peace. 
 

 

heh....heheheheheh.....hehehehehhehe....hahaha...bahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha

[mirkwood]

Anyone interested in helping, PM me for my Venmo and I will purchase a bunch of books for @LDSGator.  Now we know how to shut him up.

[LDSGator]

12 minutes ago, mirkwood said:

Anyone interested in helping, PM me for my Venmo and I will purchase a bunch of books for @LDSGator.  Now we know how to shut him up.

Lol!!!! No lie detected!!!!

[Jedi_Nephite]

On 8/10/2022 at 12:00 PM, Carborendum said:

Both.

When I went to public school a lifetime ago, we supplied almost everything.

• Notebooks/folders/binders
• Backpacks
• Calculators
• Personal Pencil sharpeners
• Standard writing and/or graph paper.
• Pencils were treated the same way.

The school supplied:

• Paper that was non-standard
• A wall-mount pencil sharpener.
• Crafts supplies.
• Refills for paper and pencils were available.  But they were in case we happened to run out.  It was not to be our standard supply.

I have no idea what the standard is today since we've homeschooled or private schooled all our kids.

Same here.  It’s also the same for my kids.  The only difference is that the teachers send out a list of supplies for us to buy, whereas, when I was a kid, we just kind of assumed what we would need.