Voluntary contribution of £120 for school

[Voiceofreason92]

My son’s school have always asked for a voluntary contribution of £35 per year per child. This year they have decided to up it to £60 per child. I have two children. In the past it’s never been clear what that £35 is going on so have always reluctantly contributed. This year they have asked for money for revamping the year 1 toilets, building a ‘summer house’ style cabin as an intervention room and to support their staffing structure.

since September, it’s been in the newsletter every week saying they still don’t have 100% of families contributing and they would really like it. (Only 50% have) This week a letter came home in my kid’s book bag from the head teacher saying that they noticed I havent paid my £120 contribution and they really think it’s time I contributed for my boys.
AIBU unreasonable for not contributing out of principle that I feel hounded and it’s meant to be voluntary.
(this is a state primary school not a private one)

I work in education. The 'faith factor' shaping this is that unlike community schools, Voluntary Aided faith schools have to pay a statutory 10% contribution towards any capital building costs (for historical and structural reasons around funding mechanisms for faith schools, site ownership of Voluntary Aided schools, and so forth). It has therefore been very common for many years for faith schools in particular to ask for voluntary donations for what is sometimes known as School Fund, Governors Fund or whatever - it will be at least partly to fund the statutory 10% contribution the school must make to any capital building costs. This has been the case since at least the 1970s when I can remember my own (faith) school making similar rather heavy handed requests to parents for voluntary donations.

Some schools do this sensitively but others clearly don't, and I agree with the OP it is totally inappropriate for schools to hound parents and try to guilt them into donating. Many state schools' budgets at the moment are in truly desperate straits owing to a combination of circumstances, but that doesn't make it ok to shift some of the core costs of state education from the state directly to individual families.

That’s nuts! My kids are in a private school and we pay that each month per child but we get small class sizes etc but £1600 for state?!!!

Or like asking people to earn above a certain income threshold to pay for their NHS prescriptions, or towards dental care, or opticians/glasses.....

We had this when DC1 started High School. I went home and googled how much the Head earned and decided the Academy could cope without our contribution.

I always refused to do it
I could afford it. I have always said I would pay more tax
But quilting people into doing it? When yiy have no idea of their current personal circumstances and things going on?
No i will not support this

Mine went to a faith school. The PTA raised all the money.

My grandchildren the PTA fell apart post COVID and never recovered. A few mums and teachers run an ad-hoc system now. They're really struggling. The education authority promised building work in 2023. It still hasn't been done. Schools have been shut, amalgamation since COVID ours is busting at the seams because they keep building estates.

It's unsustainable.

I’m assuming it’s a voluntary aided or controlled school? This means they aren’t given any income to maintain their buildings compared with other state schools. So are reliant on the voluntary contributions. They absolutely shouldn’t hound you. But I would spare a thought for the headteacher who doesn’t know how she will balance the books before writing off to ofstead. School budges are in a terrible way. Feel free to ignore it or even ask them to stop the guilt trip, but the letters are probably from a place of semi desperation!

It is nuts, but it's because it's a Jewish school so we need to pay for full-time security because of regular threats. Of course, not all the money goes to security, some also goes towards TAs etc. Although my older child only has 1 TA for the whole year, so she covers two classes / 61 children. So even with that ridiculous annual amount, it's clearly still not enough. Schools are incredibly underfunded!

Feel free to request voluntary contributions from them for xyz. Cheeky shits. Id never pay this. All children are entitled to an education. Im aware schools aren't well funded these days but thats a state issue, not parents. I'd be more likely to help if teachers worked the same hours that others did, with 25 days stat holiday and not 12 weeks a year off. Queue MN lynching for last sentence

Schools are hideously underfunded but that is the fault of the Government. Voluntary means just that. Contribute if you want, or not.
as far as I’m concerned the schools should be funded properly.
The only things I would pay for are extra curricular trips and activities.
interestingly, the note referred to staffing. This is what teachers went on strike for. They were striking as their pay was not fully funded so school budgets would be stretched even further.

What do you think I mean?

If you don't know how badly Jewish people were treated in the past, then I'm shocked. More likely, though, you're just being disingenuous.

No school should require armed guards, and neither should a place of worship.

But work experience is one thing.

The example @Humdingerydoo gave was where parents are basically paying for private security to keep their children safe while attending a state run school.

That cannot be right in any version of modern Britain.

Yes- I work in a state school so can see how underfunded they are. If in a class parents knew the money was going to a TA for that class I think they’d pay but without full transparency it’s a heck of a lot. Sad times but agree your school needs security 😞 though I feel it shouldn’t be paid by parents but a more central resource ?

That's exactly what I meant. So sorry you and your dc are having to live through times like this. 💐

no lunching here but just so you know most of the teaching and TAs holiday is unpaid. The part that is paid is in line with other professions. (I think 5.4 or 5.6 days for a full timer)

It is (sadly) much harder to justify the societal benefit of an individual glasses prescription or tooth extraction to educating children. And an income threshold for parents becoming personally responsible for contributing to the cost of educating their children would only worsen inequalities - there would be schools swimming in extra cash and schools with none.

Well the level of risk Jewish children at non Jewish schools have every single day offsets the additional cost. My son has been lucky so far but I’ve had to report hate incidents twice for my daughter so far this year. She’s started self defence classes now so at least she’ll be less scared. I’d happily pay £1600 for a bit of peace.

But this already happens it’s just called PTA events. The PTAs at the school in the expensive neighbourhoods bring in thousands upon thousands more than we do in our mixed catchment school. I’m the secretary of our PTA so I know this for sure.

I agree they shouldn't be hounding you, but it's peanuts in the scheme of things.

I definitely don’t think anyone should be hounded or any pressure put on.

It is a strange area. There are many parents who can’t afford or wouldn’t choose private schooling, but could easily afford a donation of some kind. If one family does this though it probably feels like it will be wasted as it won’t be enough to do much..while multiple families could make a difference but orchestrating that might look like pressure or requirements. Maybe schools could have specific wish lists and people can individually or through fundraising give a particular item on the list.

You actually say no I’d rather pay more tax?

I’ll contribute to my children’s school first thanks. Imagine if we could choose where our money went with tax!

It's not for use as a summer house.

When an ND or complex child in a primary classroom has a meltdown or becomes aggressive, it's important for them, and for the rest of the class, that there's a safe space that they can be taken to. Most primary schools don't have spare classrooms, and if they do, they aren't necessarily safe places for the child and staff member to occupy. It sounds as though this summerhouse is going to be used as a safe and calm space where a disturbed child can be managed and calmed. That's of benefit to everyone in the school..

As the OP has previously always paid it is not unreasonable for the school to think that they would pay again this school year. As it’s been in the newsletter every week the OP could have informed the school before the end of the September that they weren’t paying, which in turn would have stopped the chasers.

And if it was 10p per week I’m sure the OP would have paid as she’s been paying £35 a year not knowing what it’s for and 10p per week would be less than £4.00 part child.

This is wild, I've never heard of this being a thing! That said, a fair few of the parents I see are missing teeth and presumably can't afford basic dental work. Perhaps the schools just don't bother asking, in the circumstances.

Any voluntary contribution should be per family, not per child.

@Voiceofreason92 I'm a retired teacher. If my granddaughter's school was as pushy as yours, I'd advise my daughter to respond very simply with "The school fund contribution is voluntary. Please do not contact me again on this subject"

Having said that, I'd be interested to know what the exact wording is of the bit you were sent. Because "it's about time..."sounds very unlike school wording.