Schools Demanding Money from Parents.

[caringcarer]

AIBU to think this primary school is going too far in expecting parents to cough up money. DS's special primary school has asked parents for £1.50 every week additional contribution, since January they have had 5 separate sponsored events which were carried out in school time so compulsory to participate even if child not sponsored, a singing assembly every child had to pay £2 to listen, an indoor fete, 5 coffee mornings with child, 2 book fairs, children had to pay to take part in Easter bonnet parade and World Book Day dressing up as character and to top it all 6, yes 6 separate non-uniform days where instead of sending in a pound they wanted a toy or a bottle and a Valentine Disco. I have probably missed some things there are just too many to keep track of. Oh yes and 4 trips away including 3 day residential. AIBU to think this school is asking parents for too much money to be sent in to school. It is hard to say no you won't sponsor child or let them dress up or they can't wear no school uniform. We can afford it but I know many families are really struggling. Are other schools asking for this many handouts by parents or is new head B bloody U?

Well... this is what people get for voting conservative.

You do talk shite. My children were poorly educated under Blair and Browns shambles ; fleecing the parents was at this level back then.

How do you suggest schools survive the impact of the cuts, then, Viviennemary? Should they just not bother to employ teachers?

Do you teach in an academy, OP?

StillDriving, you are the one economising with the truth. Back in the 90s and early 2000s it certainly wasn't common practice for state schools to ask for parental contributions.

You do talk shite. My children were poorly educated under Blair and Browns shambles ; fleecing the parents was at this level back then.

I was a teacher then too and it was not like this then. This is like nothing I've ever experienced in state education.

No I don't teach in an academy. Nor does DC go to academy.

As teachers refuse to subsidise their own classes and they are leaving in their droves, it's going to get worse.

I'm a teacher and my school has had trouble spending its budget for the last five years or so. The money gets wasted on things that nobody really needs.

I think alot of the time there is budget but its just in the wrong category - and also depends on the skill of the head in planning budgets and bringing in grants from elsewhere. I think also there is sponsorship of none school charities such as children in need and save the children.

As a kid at school in the 80's at a catholic school there was always something and we were in a v poor area (think queue for lunch on a meal ticket was over 3 times the length of those with cash). Trips were less frequent and more local so cheaper - there was still an annual ski trip mind but thing that was more for the benefit of the PE staff than anyone else!!

My friend is a TA. She easily spends £300 a year on buying stuff for lessons/printing st home etc. Luckily they're not just dependent on her wage coming into their family. Public services are being decimated. Of course we will be continually asked for contributions. It's privatisation by the back door, same as all public services. Go speak to your head - they'll explain exactly why. I'm confused that your secondary school isn't struggling tbh.

My son started secondary school in 2002. We attended a new parents evening and the head gave a convincing speech as to why parents needed to contribute to extras in education that were no longer met by the government.

His suggested donation per month was £40. Direct debit forms were circulated and many parents signed up willingly including ourselves.

He had a great education with many opportunities some of which he took and some not. Sadly it's got much worse but if you can afford it why not pay? It's not compulsory and nobody will print the names of the non layers on a banner.

Our head was right. It was the price of a Mars Bar a day or similar.

If parents cannot pay there should be no issue at all. Personally I prefer the regular DD to constant drip feeds for cash every five minutes.

Schools sometimes forget that parents budgets are just as tight as schools budgets.

My parents made a contribution to my school in the 1960s!!! It is certainly not new and there never was a golden era of free flowing money!

Is your complaint about the amount of money per se, or about the faffing about asking for a pound here and a pound there?

If the former: bear in mind that we are in austerity right now--I "get" why some schools are feeling desperate for money.

If the latter: I do think that schools should offer parents the option of "make a decent sized donation once a year and we will not bother you the rest of the time." I wonder if you could consider approaching the school and offer directly, making it clear you will not be making other donations once that has happened....?

I would quite like it if school would be upfront about how much cash/contributions/ baking they'd be asking for at the start of term so we could plan for it.

I say that as someone who pays the weekly voluntary donation, mufti, sponsorship and I donate stuff when asked but I'd prefer they just asked for an extra couple of quid a week and skip a lot of the fundraising stuff.

Has there been a decrease in management pay and/or management staffing numbers while other cost cutting/revenue increasing measures have been put in place in schools?

Off thread and sorry to be dim, but I thought that the total school's budget was staying the same, it's the distribution that's changing. So there should be some schools gaining funds but I've not heard about any.

On thread again I hear you OP. I've no issue with paying £x per year or term for photocopying or science resources (secondary). It's clear exactly what it's for. When DS did rugby I paid a termly fee for the minibus he was using but stopped when he gave up. Seemed fair to me.

Sponsored x,y, and z drives me nuts though. I'm not trawling round asking randoms to sponsor my DC. There are plenty of threads on here about sponsorship. I decide how much we can afford and that's it. When DC were little I might have split the £5 into 5x £1 donations from GPs etc. Raffle tickets go straight back unsold.

Biggest bugbear is school's chosen charity stuff like Children in Need and Red Nose. Pressure to buy something to wear (that will never be worn again) AND then pay for the privilege to wear it.

At dd's school they do this a lot (not a weekly contribution though) and it all goes to different charities not the school - we're in Scotland. Tomorrow is the last day of school and kids have been asked to leave their school shoes behind and to leave school barefoot as a symbol of something or other to do with this week's charity. There's quite a bit of pressure to participate in this leaving your shoes behind on the kids and we've had letters, texts and emails about it too. We can't afford to leave a decent pair of school shoes behind in the offchamce they'll be too small after summer. We usually sell on things dd has grown out of to find the next year's uniform. Because we live in a reasonably affluent area, parental poverty is never taken into account and it's never said that these donations are voluntary. Indeed dd's teacher has pulled her up on more than one ocassion for eg not bringing in a pound to wear a Christmas jumper or not bringing in something for the tombola stall for school fair in return for no uniform day. I'm not sure what's worse sending her in uniform to stand out like a sore thumb because we don't have a pound that day or scraping together a pound grudgingly when it could be better spent elsewhere. And yes sometimes a pound is a lot to find when you don't have it.

I'm wondering if it's the number of events or the amount of money you are expected to find?
I think 2/3 of events per term is more than enough. Especially if the students are expected to do them in class time.
In addition to that a monthly contribution, with a reduced rate or exemption for lower income families.
I would rather that than the time the OP's son seem to spends away from the classroom, which is surely the point of him being there in the first place.

Teabag, the shoe thing is outrageous. I often buy new shoes for my dc in term 3 (cos you buy them when they need them). I would not be happy with pressure from school to leave them behind.

@Bordersarethebest you are right but I think that there are two problems with that.

Firstly the redistribution has huge impact on schools who lose.

Secondly with the change in the minimum wage pension costs etc the cost of employing staff is increasing significantly so staying the same is effectively a cut.

I support the need to do thism, I think teachers are undervalued and unbderpaid and everyone deserves a decent wage, but its just not been recognised how big an impact this has as of course the majority of the school budget is for staff. If nothing changes my DDs school are looking at a significant deficit and will have to explore merging classes in KS2 and redundancies.

I am slightly bemused by photocopying costs. The students were all asked if they had access to email at home and stuff is emailed home or is on the school website. Mine do their homework off that they dont even print it out.
Mind you I was at school before photo coping was the norm so I see not as much need for it.

The cold hard fact is this: if everyone wants their children to have totally free education, then we need to pay more tax. Either way, you've got to pay for it OP, but at the moment you're being asked to voluntarily pay it directly to the school.

Mind you, can someone explain to me where there is a proliferation of teaching assistants in infants and primary schools? When I was at primary school in the late 70s and early 80s, they didn't exist - at least not round our way. I've asked a lot of my friends - including those who are now teachers - who weren't born in this area and they say the same.

My kids school one year hounded parents to the extreme. They are more realistic these days generally but at the time I was quite shocked by the amount of pressure applied from the PTA directly on to the kids and in turn from the kids on to the parents. It got utterly rediculous and out of hand

Depends where you live in the country. I'm the most poorly funded area (and it doesn't look like it's going to get any better soon). This is because previous (Tory) councils chose not to spend on education. Schools here are making teachers redundant, have few TAs, search for and apply for every grant going and are thinking of closing one day a week. Were loath to ask parents for money because most people here struggle. Lots of parents help and some won't pay for swimming contribution so it runs at a loss (if I had my way we would stop it).
We may have to resort to asking parents or having mixed aged classes of 40.