its only a frigging £1

[PepperPigsPorkScratchings]

a few of the mums think its unreasonable for the school to ask us to pay £1 a week for the children to have some fresh fruit everyday.

am i the only one who thinks you'd be hard pushed to buy fresh fruit for your child for a whole week for under £1?

tight arses

free for ks1 children??? I pay £1 every week for my sons fruit snack (which ive seen consists of a plate full of apple or orange shared between them all) i have paid £1 every week since he started in nursery ...is it not free in wales?

Trois
Teachers get paid 28th monthly

maybe in your LA?

You mean, something the Welsh actually have to pay for?

I begrudge the one piece of fruit round 3million children thing that seems to go on. It's great when it's fruit like pears that many of the kids hate as mine hoover up the left overs apparently!

I am in wales, I sent in 3 pieces fo fruit with DD's through nursery and reception, fine, no problem.

Now eldest is in yr 1 I have to send her in with 25p a day to buy fruit at break, she is not allowed to take it in.
I sent her with £1 on the first day (tuesday) figuring it would last her. They didn't give her change and 'the teacher paid for my fruit and you owe them the money'
Apparently they don't like letting yr1 have loose money.

So don't fucking START me.

I already pay £10 per week per child for meals, when all 5 are in primary school that would be £50 per week to the school. To me that should cover the small bit of fruit they get for a snack.

If it was really about the kids having fresh fruit, they'd tell parents to send 'em in with fruit, wouldn't they? Then the PTA member with a greengrocery could send in some unsolds to be bought by un-fruited () kids at 20p, and budgeting mums can buy Aldi 39p fruit bags. It's plainly about stealth fundraising.

Am also shocked a having to pay for swimming, shop-bought cakes and all the other stuff you lot are complaining about! If the nation can't afford to teach its children to swim, the nation needs to fork out an extra 0.001% in tax or whatever it costs. Or get lottery funding. Or stop employing MPs' wives as overpaid assistants. Or something.

I used to send mine to a preschool that introduced this because the parents were first asked to bring in an item of fruit per day to be shared but 90% failed to do so. Ironically we live in a very productive rural area and most of the year there are ample windfall apples, pears, strawberries, even melons and peaches to keep them going. But no we still had to pay our £1, even if we brought in enough apples to last them a month

At the new school we haven't been asked for anything yet - but it's early days!

Primary school dinners are a total rip off. They cost £2 here (also in Wales) and on the odd occasion when my dc had them, they would often say the portions were really small or the canteen ran out of options. By contrast £2 in the secondary school buys huge garlic baguettes, cheesy pasta and pizza. Okay, not healthy, but it is filling.

garlic the issue with the swimming is that it is a compulsory part of the school curriculum, yet they expect parents to pay for it. to my mind, if something is compulsory, then the money to pay for it should come from the school budget.

I am fed up with the schools spending my money for me. one idea floated by my local secondary school was a £10 contribution per child at the start of the year. Then they go and change the school uniform (to an expensive supplier) and send home a list of things you have to provide for your children doing their GCSE's. They can now fuck right off if they think I'm giving them another penny.

I agree, karma! Swimming jolly well should be compulsory and, as it's compulsory, should be paid for by the schools system. Surely the pool gets a fee or a tax rebate or something from govt for this?

yes its a bargain

BUT WILL YOU JUST FUCK ME UP THE ARSE

bargain isn't the point here.

fucking schools parenting kids, taking over fucking eating and health.

fucking government parenting by fucking proxy

bargain my fucking arse.

and no don't use my tax to pay for free fucking swimming lessons. use it to teach kids how to fucking read first..... i mean if the teachers actually hae enough time in the day - what with doing all the parenting that the government requires them to do.

Well said Bogey

Well put Custardo

Swimming has only been made compulasory because so many parents failed to teach their own children to swim. So for the children's sake, the government had to make schools do it.

I think all schools should have to offer extra curricular swimming for those parents that can't do it themselves, so that those of us who do teach our own children and take them to the pool regularly can choose to use the school or not. And the children who wouldn't otherwise get the opportunity still get to learn to swim.

DS Infants got the free fruit and we were asked to provide a single piece weekly to add to the pot. (so an apple or a orange etc).

Now he's in juniors he takes his own. It probably costs me about £1 a week.

no way I'd pay a £1 for fruit for a week at school. Have you see the choices the KS1 get - apple/pear/banana/tomato/2 little pieces of pineapple or the ubiquitous clementine.

They get no choice on the day - so if you are allergic or just don't like the day's offering -tough.... If I send in fruit it is liked/eaten and generally costs 20p or less anyhow!

trois Scots don't get free school meals across the board. We get free fruit in primary school, but have to pay for milk.

£1 a week here also (reception) and it is a scrabble to find a bloody pound Monday mornings. I don't object to the cost as much as I resent paying x amount so that ds can wear his own clothes on non uniform days or the bizarre "sponsered play day" where the children are "sponsered" to run around the playground?? Errr that'll be normal playtime and you want me to fleece ask my relatives/friends for money?

slavetofilofax you sound very smug there about providing swimming lessons. It's not something everyone can afford both financially and in terms of time so the schools SHOULD provide them free for ALL children.

Do we still get free fruit right up to P7 Wilson? Older 2 DCs at high school now, and DS2 at nursery, but I thought free fruit ended in P3? Maybe not...

Definitely no free school meals for all up here - oh, how I wish!!

Errrr we're only in P2 Maisie so I don't know - I guess I just assumed. But by your user name you are in my council region so I guess you would know

Bunbaker - thanks for link. seems like a real pain tho for teachers to manage and for parents to remember - and thats ignoring the problems for those parents for whom 1 extra pound a week would be difficult.

Wake up.

Someone at your school has done a five-a-day course and feels like being virtuous with someone else's money.

We have state education that includes some form of school meals that are paid for out of everyone's taxes.

I'm willing to pay for that. But why on earth should I be adding to it?

10p per day in DS' special school which I knew about six months before he started there so I budgeted to give them £20 in September so that I wouldn't have to remember again for the rest of the academic year.

The fact that DS gets what he is given, has all the advantages of being with his peers and their influence when it is dished out as well as expectations from his teachers and their assistants... I think it's a very important part of school and well worth the money.

we can't afford to pay for lessons for dd2 to learn to swim.
For me to take her swimming it costs a tenner (buses there and back, admission for me\baby\her)
I do take her but it's the kind of treat to her that other kids would think nothing of.