So, it’s not news that NYC public school children (and probably school children everywhere) have to buy more than their own basic supplies. I am used to buying soap, paper towels, baby wipes, tissues, other basic needs for my children to take to school. This year we even had to buy a ream of paper per child in the first grade!
But when we have to pay for things like dry erase markers, that’s just crazy. They’re expensive, and they’re for some sort of ‘thing’ they do now. They give each child a little whiteboard slate to do lessons on. Is there some sort of amazing educational advantage my child gets from using this? Does spending an extra $6 benefit my child? Are the leftover markers from last year enough? (Apparently not.)
And then there is the pointless spending for no reason at all — Senior year, where you have to spend on all the extras or your child is left out. And I’m not talking about Senior year in high school, no, I’m talking the fifth grade, where I am counting stupid expense number one:
a white shirt and dark pants/skirt, to be worn once, for a class group photo.
The shirt at least had to be new, because a photo can’t have your kid wearing a dingy less than sparkling shirt. But why? After a whole school experience of not wearing uniforms and looking different and wearing what they wanted they have to dress the same for one photo? One photo that will be in the yearbook, and who knows how much that will cost, last year the LEAST amount you could spend on photos was sixty PER CHILD. Twenty per child for fall photos and FORTY for the spring ones. At least for that expense we didn’t have to buy them extra clothes!
It’s almost fundraiser time too — maybe the time has come to hold a fundraiser of my own, to meet the expenses of sending my children to a free public school.
I had no insurance for my kid when he started kindergarten. Cost me $475 to get his physical and shots and stuff to be eligible for his free education.