school supplies!

Banty wrote:

Where I *did* have complaints and had sympathy with other parents' complaints
was the short lead times that schools and activities like Scouts sometimes give
parents. If a child comes home even as far ahead as a Monday night with a
homework project due Friday that calls for a different size milk carton than
usually bought in that household, that can mean an extra grocery trip which
impacts the household evenings where meals have to be served, activities have to
be attended, bedtimes observed, etc. etc. There seemed to be an assumption of
an SAH parent who can run errands any given day.

Hear Hear! My school is very reasonable on costs and projects etc. I
don't really have complaints about it but this one is very difficult
sometimes. And to echo one of your other posts our issue last year was
a shoe box. My son needed a shoe box. Well my house doesn't have shoe
boxes in it. So I load up all 4 kids and go trudging down to K-Mart to
find a shoe box - on a week night - when I have about 3 hours between
off work and bedtime to manage what needs to be managed for 4 small
kids. You can imagine how happy they all are to go shopping in the
freezing cold dark winter night when they are either hungry (before
supper) or tired (after supper).

--

Nikki

Banty wrote:

In article , Rosalie B. says...

I have never been able to get over the outrage that was expressed when
I asked the kids to have a ruler with metric marks on it (in addition
to inches). I don't really understand why that was such a problem for
them. That was the only thing I asked for that wasn't a team
requirement. They acted like it took their mortgage payment or
something. And yet, they were OK with being required by the school to
buy a gym uniform from the school that cost $14.00

I also asked the kids to make a weather instrument and gave them
directions for various things that could be made from ordinary
household items. (This was 6th grade). One of the items was a rain
gauge, which in simplest form is some kind of container like a tin can
with straight sides, and a ruler or some markings on the side.

There were more complicated things (the choice was up to them) like
an anemometer which required a milk carton and some other items. One
mother was highly indignant because the pointer on this instrument was
made out of a "broom straw", and she "had to" go out and buy a broom
to get a broom straw and also she "had to" buy milk in a different
size carton than she usually got. I mean really!! She could have
used a toothpick or gotten a straw from a brush or any similar object.
Or she could have told him she didn't have those things, and to make
something else.

Well, those kind of complaints are pretty familliar to me as being on the Cub
Scout committee it seems every little item or the yearly fee or fee for campling
trip was objected to as something that will break the families' banks even
though every effort was made to do things on the cheap. But, in the end, the
five or ten dollars, or fourty dollar yearly fee would come in.

Where I *did* have complaints and had sympathy with other parents' complaints
was the short lead times that schools and activities like Scouts sometimes give
parents. If a child comes home even as far ahead as a Monday night with a
homework project due Friday that calls for a different size milk carton than
usually bought in that household, that can mean an extra grocery trip which
impacts the household evenings where meals have to be served, activities have to
be attended, bedtimes observed, etc. etc. There seemed to be an assumption of
an SAH parent who can run errands any given day.

The weather instrument was a quarterly project. If the parent didn't
know about it until the weekend before, it was because the child
procrastinated or didn't tell them.

I had a project each quarter. Really simple things like keep a
notebook of observations over several weeks - write a few sentences
about what you see a couple of times each week. Things like a leaf
collection. This was to teach them about longer term projects. The
weather instruments were a winter project after they'd had the fall
project done (the notebook of observations) and the parents knew or
should have known that the child had said project.

I didn't give any other homework other than the quarterly project. The
math teacher gave homework, the English teacher gave homework. The
social studies teacher and I didn't generally give homework. I sent
the parameters home at the beginning of school and each quarter.
As for the rulers, parents said that they couldn't find them,
specifically in the drugstore. But it wasn't as if I needed them the
absolute first week of school or would have shamed the child or
something for not having one.

Personally, I wouldn't try to have absolutely everything that the
child needed before the first day of school. Just give them the
basics and wait a week or two to get the more exotic things.

This is one reason why I took up the Cub Scout newsletter - to get all the
information out at least 10 days ahead of the Pack Night meetings, and *all* the
information out (as a Tiger mom new to Scouts I was told "but everyone already
knows that because we do it that way every year ..").

So consider if sometimes the problem is more in the timing of the requirements
than the actual dollar costs.

Banty

Nikki schrieb:
Banty wrote:

Where I *did* have complaints and had sympathy with other parents'
complaints
was the short lead times that schools and activities like Scouts
sometimes give
parents. If a child comes home even as far ahead as a Monday night
with a
homework project due Friday that calls for a different size milk
carton than
usually bought in that household, that can mean an extra grocery trip
which
impacts the household evenings where meals have to be served,
activities have to
be attended, bedtimes observed, etc. etc. There seemed to be an
assumption of
an SAH parent who can run errands any given day.

Hear Hear! My school is very reasonable on costs and projects etc. I
don't really have complaints about it but this one is very difficult
sometimes. And to echo one of your other posts our issue last year was
a shoe box. My son needed a shoe box. Well my house doesn't have shoe
boxes in it. So I load up all 4 kids and go trudging down to K-Mart to
find a shoe box - on a week night - when I have about 3 hours between
off work and bedtime to manage what needs to be managed for 4 small
kids. You can imagine how happy they all are to go shopping in the
freezing cold dark winter night when they are either hungry (before
supper) or tired (after supper).

What is it with shoeboxes anyway? Last year we had the teacher telling
the kids on monday that they need a shoebox on wednesday for an art
project. Well, there isn't even a shoe shop where I live anymore. I
finally scored a box in a sporting goods store. Then when I bring it in
on Wednesday and tell the teacher that next time could she please give
us a weeks warning she goes "Oh, I went and got some boxes yesterday
anyway, just in case, you needn't have worried" well, why can't she go
and get all the stupid boxes if she's going to go and get some as backup
anyway, or at least let us know that it's not a huge deal if we can't
find a shoebox.

Another really nice thing was last year at the first parent teacher
meeting thing (all parents and teachers of the grade meet in the evening
to talk about the school year, requirements, what's going on in class,
etc.) anyway, at some point she brings up the cost of water (we don't
have fountains, the school buys bottled water and each kid pays x-amount
towards it), and also that she wants to go to the theater with the kids
9€ and there's a theater coming to the school 5€, and she'd like to buy
this special maths exercise book for 8€,... And then one woman chips in
and says "Why don't we all give you 40€, that way we should be ok for
most of the rest of the schoolyear." Uhm, sure, why don't I spend my
last money on school activities instead of buying food... It was the end
of the month and I went to the teacher to ask if it's ok if I give her
the money next month, she looks at me in total bewilderment clearly not
understanding why I ask, I explain that it's the end of the month,
still, blank look, I explain that I don't have that much money left to
just spend, finally she says "Yeah, whatever, just bring it in as soon
as you can."
And I think that's what ****es me off most really, that it's assumed we
all have unlimited time to go and look for supplies and that we have
unlimited funds and can just hand over cash at very short notice.

cu
nicole

Yes, all of that plus there are some of us who have 2-3 kids and sometimes
they all need something at the same time. I seem to get nickel and dimed and
even if the money won't break the bank for one child, it may have been the
third request for money and sometimes we just don't have anything extra on
some weeks.
--
Sue (mom to three girls)

"Banty" wrote in message
...
In article , Ericka Kammerer
says...

Banty wrote:

So consider if sometimes the problem is more in the timing of the
requirements
than the actual dollar costs.

Timing is definitely an issue, but I think some of it
just comes down to the fact that some people will trade money
for convenience and others will trade convenience for money.
Some would prefer for all the costs to be bundled and to pay
one fee and be done with it. Others want the costs spread
out or would prefer to get their own (either for control or
because they think they can get a better deal). People just
have different preferences, so it's darned hard to satisfy
all (or even most) of them. Everyone would like enough lead
time, of course, but even with lead time you're not going to
satisfy everyone.

But everyone likes lead time, or at least, nobody is hurt by lead time -
no?
Without leaving enough lead time, to my mind even the first effort to try
to
enable people to get what *the school* (or Scouts, or whoever) is
requiring *of
parents* isn't being made.

I was more replying to Rosalie's post about incidentals that happen
through the
school year. So often it seemed the lead time was being counted in three
or
four days, when those three or four days for me, and probably other
families
with all parents working, weren't very good days.

There's also sometimes this idea that everybody's household has certain
things
because, well, it seems teachers' households do. One evening we had to
scramble
for an ice cube! For a home experiment. Well, in our house ice cubes
just
isn't this handy thing. We simply refrigerate our cold drinks, any ice
cubes
remaining from entertaining probably had long sublimated in the freezer
;-)
Boughten ice is crushed, not a cube. So we went to neighbors, and seemed
to
have found the evening when all our immediate neighbors were out. Good
thing we
knew someone four houses down. But it took a good hour for us to find an
ice
cube! Then there was the saga of pizza boxes. One teacher had pizza
boxes
designated for the base of the school project, because they were just the
right
size, were flat, and she planned to arrange them abutting in an array to
show
off for the Parent Night. So it pretty much had to be a pizza box.

Well, we don't do pizza much as it's highly glycemic for me (I only get to
eat
the topping). So I tried to get an empty pizza box from a local pizzeria.
Which they were willing to do - *after* they got all the orders from a
line
because the teen at the counter wasn't sure what to do and the owner was
busy
making the pizzas. Yes, I tried to pick the pizza box up on the way home
from
work close to dinner time. But to do otherwise would mean missing a lunch
meeting or making an extra trip. So it was like, 45 minutes to get a
pizza box.

So, not that these are big huge deals that I ever complained to the
teacher
about. But sometimes I don't think teachers and the like realize what a
parent
has to do to scramble up some specified supply even if they've made an
effort to
require some common thing. Indeed, it would be the worst impacts because
those
would be things required that very evening or the next day.

Banty

Banty wrote:

So, not that these are big huge deals that I ever complained to the teacher
about. But sometimes I don't think teachers and the like realize what a parent
has to do to scramble up some specified supply even if they've made an effort to
require some common thing. Indeed, it would be the worst impacts because those
would be things required that very evening or the next day.

Yeah, I always hope for a teacher who has multiple
kids ;-) Cuts down on that sort of stuff.

Best wishes,
Ericka

NL wrote:
Rosalie B. schrieb:
Anne Rogers wrote:

You also have the pressure of being expected to understand, it isn't
always acceptable for adults to ask "silly" questions - and it can be
I am too old to be bothered by people thinking that I am asking silly
questions. And have been for a long time. I am every teacher's
nightmare.

Well, I don't fear asking stupid questions either, but asking questions
_all the time_ in a business meeting will make everyone feel
uncomfortable, besides there's usually a "time limit" meaning you can't
make a 1h appointment into a 2 or 3 hour appointment because there's
other people waiting.

exactly, I don't not ask a question because of what other people will
think of me, but in any situation, there are still things that are
appropriate and things that aren't. I do ballroom dancing, when I first
went to lessons, I never asked anything, because I didn't know anything,
I figured I'd try and do what I was being told to do and had no idea
that some things were more important than others. Then as I learnt more
I'd find I did have questions, but you still have to moderate what you
ask and it's actually a good skill to learn to try and work out answers
for yourself, you simply can't ask every question you might think of to
ask and be a reasonable member of society!

Cheers
Anne

I don't either - and I'm not giving her a hard time. I'm also not
talking about asking a work colleague or neighbor. But if a person
(especially someone from another country) asks an American realtor or
mortgage company rep something to the effect of, "Does it matter how
much we put down?" I find it astounding that none of those people would
mention PMI. I don't know what else Anne could reasonably have done to
drag the information out of them if she didn't know the information was
there to be dragged.

Clisby, don't worry about giving me a hard time, I certainly didn't
think that of you and I doubt toypup did either. But you're right,
knowing what I know now I do find it quite stunning that we really
didn't manage to drag it out of anyone, I don't think we even managed to
get a hint of 20% being a cut off point of getting a better deal, let
alone it being a point where we could find we actually couldn't even get
a mortgage - which is essential knowledge and could have completely
changed our plans, I do feel as if everyone we were involved with was in
it for what they could get out of it and that as my husband's employer
offered us significant benefits to use one of two loan companies and one
real estate agency, we felt that they had failed in there
responsibilities to new hires.

I think the company has grown so large that it's lost some of the
oversight that a smaller company has, it's very easy for something very
significant to happen a lot of layers down from top management. For
example, today, I got an email saying that if I had used the health
website to do anything that I needed to print it all out because they
were changing providers in 3 weeks time, I haven't really used it, but
we've been bomarded with encouragement to set up individual profiles and
health records and take questionnaires and what not, I suspect that the
two clashing things have come from them being things dealt with my
seperate areas and no one person having oversight - the encouragement to
fill profiles and what not in probably comes from the financial side,
with the idea of education and health living cutting insurance costs,
but what the engine behind the website is is probably a different
persons resonsiblity with different motivating factors - which is all
getting rather off topic, but it illustrates some of the challenges of
working for a large company that pretty much drives the economy of the area.

Cheers
Anne

You know the interest rate, if it's fixed or not, the term, and whether or not
you can prepay, I hope. Do you?

Yup, those things at least are quite similar to the UK, not what they
typically are but the words used! We got a pretty good fixed rate for
the time, term 30 years and I can't remember the specifics of the
prepay, but if it wasn't free we definitely judged that it was worth it
for whatever number we considered as a minimum length of time before we
sold the house.

Cheers
Anne

If the school is in an area where the majority of students couldn't
afford such a trip, then that's when you have to start appealing to
local companies etc. not expecting the few that can pay to pay for everyone.

I doubt VERY much if we would have been allowed to do that at a public
school.

Why not? I read just today of a huge amount of money travelling between
a local company and the local school district, perhaps what makes it ok
is that the money officially comes from a foundation, which was created
by the owner of the company and technically is his choosing to do
something with a portion of his earnings. But the company does directly
channel a lot of money in to local schools (we could be the only school
district where ALL the high schools made the national top 100 last
year), it's never as simple as just handing over the money, but for
every hour an employee gives their time to the school, such as
volunteering in the classroom the company gives 17 dollars to the
school. For every donation an employee makes to a charity, the donation
is matched - I'm not sure exactly what bits of school are registered
charities, but PTA fundraisers must be. It would be VERY interesting to
see a break down of where money came from for the entire budget, I
would guess that a significant amount does come indirectly from this one
company.

Cheers
Anne

Anne Rogers wrote:

If the school is in an area where the majority of students couldn't
afford such a trip, then that's when you have to start appealing to
local companies etc. not expecting the few that can pay to pay for
everyone.

I doubt VERY much if we would have been allowed to do that at a public
school.

Why not? I read just today of a huge amount of money travelling between
a local company and the local school district,

State laws may vary, but corporate partnerships with
public schools are not uncommon. Not all corporate partners
are as generous, but most of the public schools around here
have some kind of relationship with a corporate partner.
That said, the nature of the partnerships differs quite a
bit, perhaps according to the needs of the school, perhaps
according to the preferences of the company.

Best wishes,
Ericka