AIBU to think their should be a wieght limit on school bags?

[VelvetChairGirl]

just the title really.

my son has to carry everything in a backpack he isnt allowed any other type of bag, they have no personal storage spaces in classes or a locker, so all the books and equipment, water bottle etc have to go in the backpack and be carried all day around the school.

I ended up carrying his bag for him yesterday and my shoulder hurts today, he's only 11 its too much.

@HesterShaw1

Isn't a backpack better than any other style of bag for distributing weight?

We never had lockers either. Ah those memorable days of taking eight lessons worth of books, PE kit, cookery stuff and clarinet all on the same day.

Maybe that's why my back is screwed?

its not better then a little flight case type thing.

I have a randoseru and thats way better then his bag, its got shaped padding on it and the straps don't pull, it kind of has shock absorption.

DD & DS1 are in yr8 & yr7 respectively & I had to buy minimum 30 litre bags to get all their equipment in.

Today DD (very petite barely weighs 5 stone) has to take:

PE kit - trainers, socks, leggings, t-shirt & hoody.

Cooking ingredients - macaroni cheese - to serve 4 people

Large pencil case inc calculator, glue, maths kit, pens x 4, pencils x2, highlighters x 2, rules, sharpener, rubber etc.

Revision booklet, reading book, diary & school guide (detention given if not brought daily).

Lunch & bottle of water - takes so long to queue to buy lunch that there's barely any time to eat so she has to take it (or doesn't eat).

Oh & her phone, sanitary items, deodorant & hand gel.

She can't take a coat as can't carry it (not allowed to wear it inside the building & has to be put in bag!).

She used to take her PE kit in a separate bag but found it harder to handle.

Her bag threatened to topple her over this morning. This is not unusual sadly!

Yeah, I got my DS1 a wheely laptop bag from Mountain Warehouse when he kept bringing up his shoulders hurting. Sadly, it's not on their website now that I can find.

He says it helped a lot and fits everything but his A3 folder. I've been considering them for my DDs if they have any further bag problems at least for the walk to school, I'm not sure how they would work in the much busier corridors their school has.

@JurgensCakeBabyJesus

It was like this when I was at school but thought these days text books would be kept in class one set of 30 for each year group to use because the resources for homework would be online! Would also be much cheaper for schools than buying so many text books. We at least had lockers

The school has chrome books too, not your normal one they are big thick heavy ones like fisher price toys, thankfully I refused one because I have a laptop at home and I wasn't having him cart electronics back and forth I know what he's like, he's smashed 2 tablets.

I know they are big heavy things because they gave him one without permission and I had to take it back and tell them we dont want it because I will not be liable to any damage to it (he's SEN with a EHCP).

but some schools force them to have the school tablets and notebooks I think and they have to carry them between home and class with the charger every day.

I can't remember carrying anything much to school (1960s). All our books, equipment was kept in our desks. But all lessons except for science and art were taught in the form room, with teachers for the various subjects coming to us.
We did have to carry ingredients for cookery though, in a wicker basket covered with a divided cloth.
PE kit was kept in lockers and taken home very rarely when it needed washing.

Can he at least lighten the pencil case load a bit? He surely can’t require so much stuff on a daily basis to need two pencil cases. Year 7s start off with massive rucksacks of the entire contents of WH Smith and by the time they’re in year 11 they’ve just got one biro which they keep in a pocket!

@georgarina

I agree. I remember having to carry 3/4 heavy hard back maths/science/history books at a time.The big 500-page A4 ones. I got a rolling backpack. Can he get one?

they all have the exact backpack, theres only 1 allowed thats about £19 from the uniform shop with the logo on, theres no other types they do.

That's crap!
I agree with @GalaxyOnOrionsBelt

I have seen small girls and boys in ist year almost topple backwards on the stairs under the weight of backpacks.
There should certainly be a locker for every child but there just isn't room for them. Schools are badly designed in some ways.
Architects don't seem to factor in practical things for the comfort and safety of children. On new builds, corridors are so narrow that children have to go single file and there is no space for lockers. I am convinced that the load carried by the smallest could cause real damage to their backs.

@SpaghettiArmsMurderer

Can he at least lighten the pencil case load a bit? He surely can’t require so much stuff on a daily basis to need two pencil cases. Year 7s start off with massive rucksacks of the entire contents of WH Smith and by the time they’re in year 11 they’ve just got one biro which they keep in a pocket!

no they are school issued and colour coded with different things in for the different classes.

DS is in year 7 and he’s lucky he’s so tall and well built because his bag weighs so much. My back would kill if I had to wear it all day, he weirdly hasn’t complained about it hurting as yet. I got him a large one with comfortable padded straps, I don’t know if that’s why or maybe he has a particularly strong back- no idea. He has to take his planner, a reading book and pencil case every day obviously and on any given day he’ll also have 5 text books. 2 days a week he has full PE kit which includes trainers and football boots and 1 day a week he has to take cooking ingredients. Bit of a shock compared to primary when he just had his planner and reading book!

Oh and lockers were broken into in my secondary school regularly so I’m not sure they’re such a great idea. We all had to buy a padlock but dickheads would break the locks all of the time and damage or steal property. My brand new winter coat had bright green acrylic paint poured all over it once when someone broke into my locker, it cost £80 and my Mum was furious.

DC school hasn't allowed lockers for two years due to "covid".

Prior to that you needed to pay a set amount per year for one - about £5 - but the lockers were always in places that were extremly diffcult for DC to access - almost deliberately so their classroom had lockers outside they'd be assigned to another class or year group who'd struggle to access that area and a few were inside classrooms which they weren't allowed to enter break or lunchtime or obvioulsy during lessons or in change overs.

Having said that they do allow multiple bags and DS at least chooses to carry more than basics as he's so worried something will be forgotten.

Our school used to have lockers, but not anymore. It's ridiculous.

My year 9 daughter wears her pe kit under her uniform. Serves two purposes, one so she doesn't have to carry it, and two because she's frozen due to not being allowed coats in school. She also has to wait outside for half an hour due to staggered starts.

We are having exactly the same issue with my daughter who is in yr7. Weighed her empty backpack last night and it was 1.3kg! With her stuff it was over 4.5kg.

Sounds like the same or very similar bag to what you are describing, from the uniform supplier. It's supposed to be a 'back care' bag and it has a special raised/rubberised backing which sits against her body and is meant to do something like allow air flow I guess.

I emailed the school last night to say I'm getting her a plain black lighter weight bag. She's very small built and it's like it puts her off balance and it gives her neck/shoulder pain.
School haven't responded yet...

My y8 some days has packed lunch, water bottle, pencil case, reading book, exercise books, woodwind instrument, music book, PE kit... They can barely lift it and have to walk over half an hour to school. Not sure what the answer is though.

At least they don't seem to have text books - at that age we had to bring text books to and from school too!

The one thing that would help is wearing PE kit on PE days like they do at primary. But I think the secondary kids often get too muddy and sweaty to wear it all day.

Lockers aren't a thing apparently since covid.

We didn't have lockers at my school and in high school I never unpacked my bag as I was so disorganised I couldn't remember everything for each subject every day so I lugged it all around all week.

And when I was at school it was deeply, deeply uncool to have your backpack on both shoulders so I think everyone in my year now has back problems!

Kids in Spain all have wheelie bags. They are brilliant!

Add to that, when they have cooking and PE on the same day...my dc needs a friggin wheelie suitcase!

When I was at school, in the '60s and '70s, we used to have desks with a lift-up top, beneath which we stored our books. The only things that were taken home were the pencil case and the specific books needed for that evening's homework.

There was no homework until secondary school, so I never took anything home during my primary school years, except for my PE kit and pencil case on the last day of term.

Until recently, I worked in a school and frequently used to offer my assistance to small children struggling with ridiculously heavy backpacks - and they were often also burdened with a separate, huge, drawstring bag of PE kit, an item of sports equipment (tennis racket, hockey stick, lacrosse stick etc) and a musical instrument! I was aghast that the children were expected to lug so much stuff around the school.

Totally agree. Add into that a big instrument case. My Ds is like a twig and half the size of most his year group. He has to walk to bus and was crying when he came home last week as he struggled to get to it on time due to the weight of instrument case. It's new - I struggled carrying it! I'm now dropping him off on those days but overall with other pe kit etc it's too much.

Yes and remember girls are being made to carry the same- far less upper body strength!

I picked up my dd2 back pack
It was ridiculously heavy.
The paid for locker is inconvenient to get to.

The coat thing is ridiculous. Have to remove it before entering school then shove it in your bag.

Agree that schools are poorly designed and not considering needs of pupils.

YANBU when i went to secondary school we had lockers or desks that we could leave things in but even the weight of books /files that needed to go home for homework was ridiculous, we had backpacks that were half our own weight, plus PE kit, hockey stick / tennis racquet, musical instrument, home economics basket (the work of the devil!). The size and weight of some of the textbooks was crazy. This might be manageable for 15/16 year old but not a small 11/12 year old. If he's got a backpack make sure he carries it on both shoulders and has it adjusted properly so it's not pulling down or backwards.

I totally agree - I swear it's going to create a generation of back problems in later life!

My DD15 has to carry around a heavy laptop, water bottle and course books! It's so heavy and I feel so sorry for the younger students.