Is this a normal amount of requests from the school - its non stop!

[SchoolRequests]

Dc started reception just over 5 weeks ago and already had

• An ongoing weekly donation request
• Request to buy waterproofs (with 5 days notice of when needed)
• Non uniform day plus donation
• Harvest festival donation
• School photos
• Request to go through books with no words on a night and write in communication dairy on a daily / weekly basic
• Harvest bag to fill with leaves and pinecones
• Panto trip in december to pay for

I'm dreading opening his school bag to find more letters requesting things. It is just constant requests for time and money. Is this a normal amount? Do schools think parents have lots of free time and money to get stuff with little notice constantly and don't have work or other children to look after?

What is it like at your kids school?

The weekly donation is unheard of in my area. I don't know of any school that do this!!

Everything else is normal though.

If our school asked for a weekly donation I would ask the headteacher to justify the cost of two full time secretaries for a school of just 116 kids. Similar sized schools just have 1 x Office person.

I'm sure it has nothing to do with the secretaries being the HTs best friends 🤣

To be fair, I'd expect most 4 year olds to have waterproofs and wellies. Which their parents could of course source in whichever way they wanted. And they would be a useful inclusion in any school second hand uniform shop.

The trouble with school keeping its own supplies is that they "walk" over time, or you end up with children of the wrong sizes and they just have to make do with best fit. I bet school do have some spares anyway.

It is incessant, isn't it?

Yes.
I have 2 schools to deal with.
Plus various clubs for both kids.
Their life admin is exhausting!

We also have emails, class whatsapp group/ text messages/ an app for ordering lunch, the PSA app for events/ fundraisers/ fairs etc... its a bloody comms nightmare

The thing is, when they are little, you think it'll be easier to juggle life when they are at school. Then they get to school, and you realise it was all a lie 😭😭

Normal at the start of the academic year and when there’s lots going on like the run up to Christmas, generally tails off considerably by January and thereafter ime.

I work in a school.

You're damned if you do, damned if you don't.

No waterproofs = either not going outside or ruined uniform.

School donations = small primaries are poor! They're on their knees financially. No donations = lack of resources. Same for non uniform days. They'd rather not ask but they need to.

Harvest festival - do you really begrudge donating a few tins to those in need?

School photos = most parents love them so we have to offer

Panto = again, it's something nice for them to do outside of school. Most parents want this kind of thing. Trust me, most school staff would rather NOT have to organise them but hey, it's what parents and Ofsted expect

School donations = small primaries are poor! They're on their knees financially. No donations = lack of resources.

This is the part I don't get. Asking for money on a regular basis from parents who may also be poor and on their knees financially just seems so wrong. The pressure it could create for someone barely making ends meet is really worrying.

I get that schools are underfunded, but there must be so many ways to raise money that don't involve regular, direct requests for cash from parents.

Families are a damn site poorer than schools @EmmaDilemma5
Asking for donations is tone deaf in the COL crisis.
Hope that helps

I think some schools wanting them to provide wellies and waterproof to leave there - just seems wasteful to have 2 lots per child (one for home and one at school) especially age 4 and 5 when they are outgrown quickly. DD’s reception used to have wellies they all used (I assume previously donated)

The thing is it all adds up.

It might not seem much but every week it seems like a request for more money, random objects (we don't have wine or spare toiletries around the house), donations where dc feel like crap if they don't take any in, the random Greek/roman/Viking/pirate day where they say it is optional and to just use what you have but come the fuck on, no one has that lying around!

And you have to run and spend the last money you had on a stupid costume the dc will never wear again but you don't want them to feel like crap/ be bullied more than they already are for being S.E.N and not joining in.

Special mention to whatever fucking teacher decided to have an art lesson that involved covering ds new jumper and shirt (which I had to save for and waited until he was bursting out of his old ones) in a blue paint that is literally unremovable. Bleach didn't even touch it!

@Guiltycat That't not on. The school should replace those!

I did shed light in an earlier post further back.

To be fair, I'd expect most 4 year olds to have waterproofs and wellies.

Mine does. But now she needs two sets, one set to be kept at school all the time. Every time she goes up a full shoe size she needs two new pairs of wellies, one pair of which I'll never see her wear. I brought Asda ones for school, they were 10 quid, she'll need new ones before the end of the school year because she'll go up at least one size. That's £40 just on wellies by the end of the school year. At least when they're in nursery you can keep their wellies in their rucksack and bring them home every night. It's not good either financially or environmentally.

I'll also add that as a teacher last year I approached around 20 local businesses for help. Local supermarkets for cakes for a cake sale to raise money for a trip, all sorts of shops for miles around for help buying pencils, some huge local businesses which have world-wide success but are based near our town for help buying new books. All of shops said no to the cakes and not one of the others even replied to a single letter.
I think the attitude that it's the teacher insisting on these things doesn't help. These are all initiatives decided by the head, slt and governors due to ofsted pressure as I previously posted. I don't know what the answer is but if it annoys you, please lobby the government/write to your mp about school cuts! Or even better, the way ofsted measure schools.
And as a pp said, there are parents that complain when we don't do these things and those are the ones ofsted listen to.
Competition for school places also means our slt want us to be seen to 'doing more' than other local schools, because funding is allocated on a per-child basis.
The whole farce needs to stop.

please lobby the government/write to your mp about school cuts! Or even better, the way ofsted measure schools.

Genuine question, @User65412 but presumably the school heads, SLT and governors do this and don't get anywhere?

I feel your pain.
Mine are in year 1 now. So far seems to be 3 lots of school pictures a year! That despite texting and emailing me pretty much daily to remind me about donations for something or buying something else they never remind us about school pictures but tell us it's 'on the calendar on the website!'
They seems to communicate randomly with emails for some things, texts for others, letters in book bags for others (along with website) . Leaving me chasing round trying to make sure I am aware of everything (like the fact they had to be kings in a school play but I only found the tiny slip of paper stating they needed a costume the night before screwed up in the corner of a book bag)

Along with using 3 different apps (parent pay, tapestry and the school dinner one). The calendar is full to brim with reminders for school. Sigh.,. They're not young for long grits teeth

buckle in for the next 6 years. It dies down in year 6.

It really doesn't It doesn't stop until they leave school. (Year 13.)

But it IS unreasonable for the school(s) to expect parents, as I said, many of whom struggle financially, to financially buffer the school!

I believe they can't actually insist they wear branded uniform anymore.

@Blackberrybunnet

You don't think 8 requests in 5 weeks is unreasonable? And you don't class that as being inundated? WTAF?

@PeekAtYou

It gets much easier in secondary.

As I said, earlier, it really doesn't.

This sounds totally normal.
DS primary averages an email every day about something.
In the next 2 weeks up to half term we’ve had wear yellow for mental health (why does this help??)
bake for harvest appeal
non uniform and money for harvest appeal
swimming gala
panto money.

There’s a reason schools have to ask for donations. The government drained the budget and there’s nothing there to resource the schools .

It can be overwhelming when you have more than one kid in school but I'd say this is pretty typical. Like others have said, this term is the worst, plus parents are busy this time of year too which makes it worse!

The passive aggressive demands (especially the ones for us to come in at short notice in the middle of the day for assemblies or some activity) crack me up. Me and DH both work at hospitals, we can't just drop patient appointments.