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#41
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school supplies!
"Michelle J. Haines" wrote:
My kindergartener was expected to bring (I am not kidding): 3 boxes of kleenex 8 glue sticks 3 boxes of crayons 1 pair of scissors 2 boxes of markers 2 boxes of pencils 6 folders in specified colors 1 full sized backpack 1 pair of shoes to be left at school We were informed that NONE of these were to be marked with her name except her backpack and shoes, because ALL of them are to be taken away from the students and go into a common pool to be shared as needed. I'm sorry, but this is absolutely absurd overkill. This isn't me supplying my child with school supplies, this is me supplies at least 2-3 children with school supplies, under some socialist "not all children can supply themselves, so the other parents must do it" mentality. Also, I can...sort of...live with her confiscating glue sticks and crayons and sharing those out as needed. But scissors? and folders? We labeled her scissors and folders anyway, and her teacher reportedly said "Oh, you're not allowed to share your scissors?" because I sent a note saying I labeled on -durable- supplies, but disposable ones she was free to share. Even my in-law's, who teach school, and my friend who teaches preschool and her husband who is a teacher was totally blown away by the absurdity of that school supply list. My older children's lists were slightly less ridiculous, but both of them had half of their paper supplies confiscated to go into the "common pool for when people run out." Gee, I thought when you run out, it was YOUR OWN responsibility to BUY MORE. Good grief. When my dh was teaching HS, he had to give the kids a point for each day that they had brought a pencil and paper to class. When I was teaching middle school, I had to have a supply of pencils to lend to kids who are without. In some cases, it was because their home situations were such that they didn't have the ability to supply their own paper and pencils. And in some cases it was lack of organization (In middle school I lost 8 Esterbrook pens in one year and I found out not too long ago that my sister had similar problems-that was when we really had ink pens and not ball points), and in some cases it was indifference. But you cannot reasonably expect kids who have not got the tools they need to just sit there while you instruct the other ones. So you do what you can (as a teacher) to see that they all have what they need to do the work. A lot of the overkill may be because there are people who do not or can not supply their own stuff. We always had to build into field trips a certain amount of extra so that the very poorest kids could still go. I did supply my own Kleenex, but then I wasn't teaching sniffly 5 year olds. And glue sticks (from experience) don't last very well once they are opened. At one point money was so short, that we teachers were buying our own mimeograph paper because each teacher was allotted only so much paper. I didn't have textbooks to give out to my class (because of the curriculum mostly), so I did a lot of hand-out material. Fortunately, dh was employed and with two salaries I was able to fill in the gaps. |
#42
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school supplies!
Rosalie B. wrote:
Penny Gaines wrote: [snip] Over here, you pay tax when buying a house, but it has nothing to do with property taxes going to the local council, it goes to the main government. Property taxes are charged completely seperately. I can completely understand that Anne's dh might not have realised that this bill didn't need to be paid. Yes I understand that there are differences. That doesn't excuse not asking the necessary questions so that you understand what all the numbers mean. It is a big purchase and involves a lot of money. It isn't at all similar to not knowing that you need 24 Crayola crayons. This isn't even a case of two cultures being divided by a common language. The math(s) are the same regardless. Well, no, it is a cultural difference. It is a need for Anne's husband to have realised that this bill from this organiszation related to that money he paid to that organization earlier, and that therefore he isn't responsible for doing anything with the bill. It's not just understanding the sums, it is also remembering some time later what these unfamiliar terms were about. -- Penny Gaines UK mum to three |
#43
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school supplies!
On Tue, 02 Sep 2008 21:42:59 -0700, Anne Rogers
wrote: If you want to get stressed, I have a good recipe... ...try to get school supplies on the evening before school starts! Our local schools just started a service where you can pay and sign up and have the school buy all the supplies. Works wonders here. The supplies are in the classrooms and the kids unpack them with the teachers on the first day. -- Dorothy There is no sound, no cry in all the world that can be heard unless someone listens .. The Outer Limits |
#44
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school supplies!
They didn't discuss escrow with you when you obtained your mortgage? I can see how one spouse would not remember, but it sounds like you both weren't clear on it. I think the problem is, so many things were discussed that it's entirely possible that it was said and forgotten, but I'm about 95% sure that this wasn't said, as I did have the vague idea in advance, but then don't remember anything confirming it at the time. I think a lot of things were gone over extreemly quickly as we ended up having a last minute crisis on the mortgage caused by an error in the person preapproving us, so there was a lot for everyone to deal with at the last minute and less time to go through finer details. We were given a book called "Hello USA" that did provide plenty of useful info, there are silly things like utilities, that are paid for in a different way, like water being metered and having to pay for trash collection. Different names for things can also make thing hard to find out, in the UK there is a difference in what kind of mortage you can get if you have 10% to put down as a deposit rather than less than that. We asked many many people if there was such a number in the US, but we must have been using the words, it was only later on that someone said we'd have been able to get something better had we put down 20% - had we known that we would have made different plans and put down that or more, as it was, not knowing this important figure, despite asking multiple people and trying to do our own research, we chose not to sell our house in the UK and rent it out thus meaning we were scraping the barrell to get money for a deposit and did not have 20%. Had we not asked, there would have been some excuse, perhaps it's one of those things that anyone who'd spent any time in the US would know, but we asked, many times, we asked our realtor, two mortage advisors, our relocation specialist and many other people all who said, just put down as much as you can - which is way too simplistic, it might not be for some people, but even when we explained that we had to make some choices still no one told us this number - yet after we'd been here a few weeks, it was obvious it must be an important one, as every advert for mortgages we heard on the radio had the fast talk, equivalent to small print saying loan about 80% of value.... Cheers Anne |
#45
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school supplies!
Anne Rogers wrote:
They didn't discuss escrow with you when you obtained your mortgage? I can see how one spouse would not remember, but it sounds like you both weren't clear on it. I think the problem is, so many things were discussed that it's entirely possible that it was said and forgotten, but I'm about 95% sure that this wasn't said, as I did have the vague idea in advance, but then don't remember anything confirming it at the time. I think a lot of things were gone over extreemly quickly as we ended up having a last minute crisis on the mortgage caused by an error in the person preapproving us, so there was a lot for everyone to deal with at the last minute and less time to go through finer details. We were given a book called "Hello USA" that did provide plenty of useful info, there are silly things like utilities, that are paid for in a different way, like water being metered and having to pay for trash collection. Different names for things can also make thing hard to find out, in the UK there is a difference in what kind of mortage you can get if you have 10% to put down as a deposit rather than less than that. We asked many many people if there was such a number in the US, but we must have been using the words, it was only later on that someone said we'd have been able to get something better had we put down 20% - had we known that we would have made different plans and put down that or more, as it was, not knowing this important figure, despite asking multiple people and trying to do our own research, we chose not to sell our house in the UK and rent it out thus meaning we were scraping the barrell to get money for a deposit and did not have 20%. Had we not asked, there would have been some excuse, perhaps it's one of those things that anyone who'd spent any time in the US would know, but we asked, many times, we asked our realtor, two mortage advisors, our relocation specialist and many other people all who said, just put down as much as you can - which is way too simplistic, it might not be for some people, but even when we explained that we had to make some choices still no one told us this number - yet after we'd been here a few weeks, it was obvious it must be an important one, as every advert for mortgages we heard on the radio had the fast talk, equivalent to small print saying loan about 80% of value.... A different type of mortgage? Or do you mean that if you put down at least 20% you don't have to pay private mortgage insurance (PMI)? If nobody told you about the PMI, that's truly astounding. Clisby Cheers Anne |
#46
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school supplies!
"Clisby" wrote in message m... A different type of mortgage? Or do you mean that if you put down at least 20% you don't have to pay private mortgage insurance (PMI)? If nobody told you about the PMI, that's truly astounding. I do think it's possible that when something is widely known, everyone assumes that everyone else knows it. So when Anne asks about a different mortgage when she means saving on PMI, no one knows what type of different mortgage she's talking about. No one would even think she's asking about something so widely known, they must think she's asking about something very obscure, especially if she's specifically asking about a *different* mortgage. She's not even aware of what to call this thing doesn't know exist. It's easy for me to see her difficulty. I'm not sure why everyone is giving her a hard time. |
#47
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school supplies!
Anne Rogers wrote:
I don't know how they will run the wipes system, whether each child will have to find their own or whether they will just use the packets in sequence until they are done and if they are doing that, why can they not just buy more of what they are already buying and up our fees by however many cents that costs? They give us 10 dollars a month discount for having 2 kids there, I'd rather not discount that 10 dollars and not have had to buy baby wipes! Usually they pool the things like wipes and tissues and hand sanitizer and such. I've heard a gazillion people say they wish the school would just buy the supplies and bill the parents if necessary, but I think that must not be the prevailing attitude. As I said, I'm shocked every year that most of the parents don't take advantage of the PTA sponsored class supplies kits, and given the demographics of the school, cost is definitely not the leading explanation for why people don't go for it. I don't know what the reason is, but it's clear that when given the opportunity most of the people here don't choose to pony up the money and have someone else provide the supplies. Best wishes, Ericka |
#48
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school supplies!
If you didn't understand it,you should have asked. It isn't necessary to blame this on 'things that are assumed'. You ask and keep on asking until you understand everything. Don't let them fob you off with some wonky explanation. But the problem was DH didn't even know to ask, as far as he was concered, he'd received a bill, it had a due date and he paid it by the due date. It's all very well saying ask, but it wouldn't have even occurred to him to ask because why would he think that there was some other bizarre way of paying the bill that would happen automatically. Because it isn't for information only. At least check with the bank. Weren't there also insurance, electric and other utility bills being dealt with at the closing. Which is precisely the problem, yes, all bills were dealt with at closing, but all except the tax from that point on would be paid directly by us. Later when we pulled out all the paperwork to look through and see if it was clear whether tax was being with the mortgage and it wasn't crystal clear. It may well have been if that had been the only thing we were dealing with at the time, but it wasn't, we weren't simply buying a house, but we'd moved continents, DH was starting a new job something that if it was the only complicated thing you were dealing with that had some vague familiarity to it is a lot easier than dealing with that and everything else, when it's completely unfamiliar. Buying a house in the US is completely different every step of the way to buying a house in the UK and I don't think any of the people that we were working with fully appreciated that, they had no difficulty communicating with us, so I don't think realised that they needed to explain things as carefully and as clearly as they might someone who spoke a different language. For example, it was assumed we knew what Escrow was, we didn't, we asked and found out, dealing with bills at escrow seemed a good idea, as we'd had problems with that in the UK, where there is nothing formalised about it, the new owner generally rings the utilities and says we are moving in on such and such a day, please terminate the contract of the previous owner, then when you move in you do all the meter readings and call up with them, which is both complicated and unreliable and the previous owner of our house didn't pay the bills and we had bailiffs coming round looking for him. So we thought we understood what was going on and had to provide details about lots of things, it really wasn't clear that one of those lots of things , the tax was tagged on to the homeloan and continually paid via escrow. The whole process was a bit like trying to understand an advanced class having not sat the basic ones, you ask questions and you think you understand the answers, but later you realise that the way you constructed the question the person was answering a different thing and what you thought they meant by the answer actually meant something different. So, if that bill wasn't "for information only", then do the tax people have no idea where the payment is coming from? if so, are we then expected to forward the bill to the relevant people, or are the tax people sending one to us and one to them? if so, ours is "for information only", yes we need that information, but a bill with nothing else mentioned on it is a bill that needs paying. It's a bit like when we get a bill from the hospital, but they've also sent it to our insurance, it's quite clearly stamped on it that it's for our information only, if it wasn't, then we'd have to call up the hospital to find out if they had actually sent it to our insurance or lost the details, or if we were expected to forward it to our insurance, I'm not quite sure this particular hospital sends a copy to the patient as no other office/clinic we've used does, but at least they don't give us a fright by not saying anything on the bill that implies we're not expected to pay it. I'd be surprised if the tax payment system is such that the tax receivers have no idea who the payment is coming from, only send the bill to the homeowner and then randomly receive payment on their behalf from escrow, if that's the case then it is reasonable to say nothing extra on the bill, though I'd be surprised if that was how it worked, on the other hand, if they are expecting to receive payment via escrow and they are sending out two bills then one should be marked in some way, it's not reasonable for anyone in the position of sending out bills to send out multiple copies without indicating which one they are expecting to receive payment from and which is just so everyone knows what is going on - then if we knew we'd paid off the mortage and no longer had the escrow account, the bill that we received for our information, we'd know we had to do something about it, similarly if we got one that had gone into arrears, we'd know we had to call the escrow company and work out what had gone wrong etc. For us it really has been a big problem that we apparently speak the same language, but when you to anything technical, it really isn't the same language, no tax in the US is called the same name in the UK and there are even some which have the same name, but are different things. Same with cars, there are very few parts of cars, or things surrounding them that have the same names, so it can be hard work to figure everything out - so it's hardly surprising that from time to time we get it wrong - all the small things that others have mentioned not knowing because it was their first child at that school, or whatever, happens to us or whatever in every walk of life and just as the school didn't think to mention, or informed in a way that wasn't necessarily obvious to the newcomer happens all the time, very few websites have glossaries and they are often the main source of information and put there by the officials. Here's one example, I didn't know until recently that you needed to carry your drivers license whilst driving, the Washington State Drivers Guide said you needed to license to drive - which to me meant have obtained your license, it be still valid and what not, not that it was in your pocket whilst you were driving. The crime of driving without a license, to me meant driving without having a license at all, not driving without it upon your person. When I found this out, I scoured the driver licensing website and found no mention of it, only the above, which as I've already explained I read differently - and is a valid way of reading it according to a US dictionary. It took ages to find confirmation of this, eventually I found evidence that is the case by finding a tiny bit of information deep in the transcripts of debate at state senate about different fines for driving without a license based on whether you actually owned one and could produce it later, or whether you really didn't have one - so even in finding out about a law of the state there is no clear expression of what it is, there is some statement of the law that is more formal than the drivers guide, but it says something that techincally is equally ambiguous, but by someone in the know would be read one way and for someone coming from a country where you don't have to carry your license, but do have to have one to drive, would be read as just that. Cheers Anne |
#49
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school supplies!
"Ericka Kammerer" wrote in message . .. Anne Rogers wrote: I don't know how they will run the wipes system, whether each child will have to find their own or whether they will just use the packets in sequence until they are done and if they are doing that, why can they not just buy more of what they are already buying and up our fees by however many cents that costs? They give us 10 dollars a month discount for having 2 kids there, I'd rather not discount that 10 dollars and not have had to buy baby wipes! Usually they pool the things like wipes and tissues and hand sanitizer and such. I've heard a gazillion people say they wish the school would just buy the supplies and bill the parents if necessary, but I think that must not be the prevailing attitude. As I said, I'm shocked every year that most of the parents don't take advantage of the PTA sponsored class supplies kits, and given the demographics of the school, cost is definitely not the leading explanation for why people don't go for it. I don't know what the reason is, but it's clear that when given the opportunity most of the people here don't choose to pony up the money and have someone else provide the supplies. I don't think I'd buy the kits, either, because I like to shop and buy the particular eraser that I like or scissors or whatnot. |
#50
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school supplies!
"toypup" wrote in message news "Clisby" wrote in message m... A different type of mortgage? Or do you mean that if you put down at least 20% you don't have to pay private mortgage insurance (PMI)? If nobody told you about the PMI, that's truly astounding. I do think it's possible that when something is widely known, everyone assumes that everyone else knows it. So when Anne asks about a different mortgage when she means saving on PMI, no one knows what type of different mortgage she's talking about. No one would even think she's asking about something so widely known, they must think she's asking about something very obscure, especially if she's specifically asking about a *different* mortgage. She's not even aware of what to call this thing doesn't know exist. It's easy for me to see her difficulty. I'm not sure why everyone is giving her a hard time. Maybe on the other side I remember seeing an American student opening a bank account in England. It took nearly half an hour for the harassed cashier to persuade them that, no they didn't have to pay, on the contrary the bank gave them £40 for opening a student account. At then end the student said "It can't be very good if you have to pay me for it" not knowing that it was standard for banks to entice students in that way. On the way out we saw that he was clutching a freshers guide which started by listing the different enducements the banks gave. Something that is standardly known in one place, may be confusing for someone from elsewhere. Debbie |
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