School supplies - am I missing something here?

seeker

Sun, Aug 09 2015, 1:21 pm

doublemama, I do not understand your question regarding the hard hat. Did you not read the letter stating that "ALL supplies must be brought in the day of orientation." (They all say that. Of course, we don't want to waste any time getting started. Wasting time isn't on the schedule until January when we'll start to practice for graduation/siddur play/chumash play/end of year celebration.)

youngishbear

Sun, Aug 09 2015, 1:29 pm

seeker wrote:

O, Wise Seeker, why would my young lass or lad require a hard hat on the very first day of school?

mandr

Sun, Aug 09 2015, 1:29 pm

Ticonderoga pencils are the best Smile

Have an electrical sharpener on the teacher's desk or off to the side and you're good. Lead pencils (mechanical) keep breaking. I never knew how much lead to keep "out" and it always just broke. Good for older kids maybe. But not kids learning how to use a pencil for the first time.

I think that the pre-packaged school supply kits are great for those weird items that you can only get in Jewish stores, like a "machberes" and weird divider tabs you seriously cannot find in any other store besides the local Jewish store that still has them from 1990. You go and buy the kid a notebook and the teacher says that no, they need a different kind of notebook.

amother

Pearl

Sun, Aug 09 2015, 4:17 pm

Quote:

I find sale prices in regular stores usually beat out dollar stores, but then you have to be willing/able to do the footwork.

Even if someone would not shop any sales and just go into Walmart one trip and buy everything, the price would still be way less than what these companies are charging (imagine how much you could save if you do shop sales!)

I am pulling a list from one of these websites just as an example and putting in approximate prices of what my local Walmart charges. I am rounding up and if you need to buy a whole package of something, even though you only need one of it, I'm putting the price of the whole package:

This is the first grade list, price of $68.00
1. Sharpener (50 cents)
1. Yellow Folder (50 cents for poly)
1. Red Folder (50 cents for poly)
1. Orange Pocket Folder (50 cents for poly)
1. Package of Yellow Sticky Notes ($1.00)
1. Pack of Washable Crayola Markers ($2.00)
1. Pack of Crayola Color Pencils ($3.00)
1. 1” Binder ($3.00)
1. 2” Plastic Poly Binder ($3.00)
1. Box Crayola Crayons (50 cents)
1. Box Crayola Markers ($2.00)
1. White 1 ½” Binder ($3.00)
2. Pairs of Fiskars Scissors ($1.00)
2. Boxes of #2 Pencils ($2.00)
2. Blue Sturdy Folders ($1.00)
2. Dry Erase Markers ($2.00)
2. Packs Index Cards ($1.00)
2. Bottles of Elmer’s Glue ($1.00)
3. Pencil Cases ($1.50)
4. Large Pink Erasers ($1.00)
10. Sheet Protectors ($5.00)
10. Elmer’s Glue Sticks ($4.00)

Total is less than $40.00. So that is close to $30.00 extra
(don't get me started on the ridiculousness of this list, that is not even what my rant is about)

seeker

Sun, Aug 09 2015, 5:18 pm

youngishbear wrote:

O, Wise Seeker, why would my young lass or lad require a hard hat on the very first day of school?

Not your lass; that was doublemama's. Heaven help if you borrow someone else's list. They are all different.

Very thankful that for this school year, my list is very short. But so's my kid.

ra_mom

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 10:49 am

For anyone in Brooklyn, Quick Aid pharmacy on 13&39 has jumbo Elmer's glue sticks, pack of two Elmer's gel glue sticks, pack of 4 metal sharpeners, 24 pack Crayola crayons for $0.99 and a lot of other items for that price too.
They have the Crayola ultra clean markers for $1.99 and Crayola erasable color pencils too.
Lots of good items.
Stocked up this morning.

LittleDucky

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 11:03 am

amother wrote:

Quote:

I find sale prices in regular stores usually beat out dollar stores, but then you have to be willing/able to do the footwork.

I know your rant is about something else but why do they need Crayola markers and Crayola washables?
"Suzy, for this project you can stain your clothes. We only stain during the afternoon".

gp2.0

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 11:48 am

ra_mom wrote:

Wow. What a find! I wasn't able to find the jumbo glue sticks anywhere local. None of the other class mothers could find them either.

Now I'm wondering why sharpeners weren't on my first grader's list. The list was actually very short:

6 Pencils
4 jumbo glue sticks
24 pack of crayola crayons
Washable crayola markers
Scissors
Eraser
2 plastic folders
2 tissue boxes

Aaand $30 for supplemental supplies throughout the school year.

gp2.0

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 11:52 am

Now that I'm thinking about it some more, I'm wondering why they require parents to purchase some of the supplies in the first place, and how they decide which supplies are funded by the school and which ones parents need to provide. How does it work? Does anyone who works at a school know the answer?

For example, parents are not required to supply paint, paintbrushes, do a dots, oak tag, sequins, stickers, construction paper, glitter, etc.

Fox

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 12:16 pm

My kids are blessedly beyond the school supply stage. Well, Druscilla is in college and likes everything color-coded by class. Fortunately, she takes care of this and the pre-nursing curriculum doesn't seem to rely heavily on glue sticks.

However, I remember those years well. Or should I say they still give me nightmares.

Personally, I never cared about nitpicking the list or spending extra, though there were years when an extra $20 made a big difference.

I would have just been happy if the school supplies had been more-or-less used at some point during the year! I still recall paying $6 for a pack of vellum tracing paper. When it was finally used sometime in March, each student needed only one sheet! Or 3" x 5" cards in various colors? Or 6 notebooks, of which 2 or 3 were used.

Having been a teacher, I realize that often these lists are prepared long before the curriculum is finalized, let along individual projects are planned. But if you've requested that students bring 600 blue and 150 pink index cards, by golly, you'd better allot part of May to having them build geodesic domes or practicing Japanese book binding or whatever you can think of to use up those !$#*(!#*& index cards!

Oh, and glitter should be banned by federal law.

ra_mom

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 1:01 pm

gp2.0 wrote:

It could be that since the child is supposed to bring 6 sharpened pencils with them each day, they assume 6 points will be enough every day. I know that many kids play and fiddle with the sharpeners and their shavings so maybe they are trying to avoid that Twisted Evil

Just wait until you see how many arrive home every day and how many more you have to add to the 6 each night Mr. Green

Load up on boxes of Dixon Ticonderoga pencils now (the only ones that sharpen properly without the lead falling out). Like a dozen boxes of 12.
We also keep a battery operated electric pencil sharpener at home to make things easier.

gp2.0

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 1:29 pm

ra_mom wrote:

Just wait until you see how many arrive home every day and how many more you have to add to the 6 each night Mr. Green

Uh oh. Pretty sure I bought the wrong pencils then. Thanks for the tip!

Hashem_Yaazor

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 6:53 pm

gp2.0 wrote:

I'm still trying to get clarity on this, but my understanding is that the school buys a lot of these craft stuff in bulk at a good price. The extra parental supply money is for teachers to get specific things for their class: e.g. a hagada scrapbook/binder project where they may use some of those sequins but need a binder or whatever for that project. Or Rosh Hashana picture developing on the cards they make. Things like that where the teacher goes out and gets things on her own for her classroom in particular.

gp2.0

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 6:59 pm

Hashem_Yaazor wrote:

Right, so what I'm wondering is why the schools don't buy all the regular supplies in bulk as well - like crayons, pencils, erasers etc. I'm sure they could even get deals for cheaper stuff where for example a case of 1,000 boxes of crayons all have misprinted boxes.

Hashem_Yaazor

Wed, Aug 31 2016, 8:19 pm

They would and charge you more. Some schools do do this, and others let the parents get it themselves and possibly still save money by buying loss leaders since they can shop around. In addition, schools only collect 80-90% of the fees. So if they charge another 20 parents $30, they don't expect to see $600, but maybe $500 and can only spend $25 per student. If parents are not asked to pay a fee, he kids will still come with their needed supplies, and the classroom can function as normal. It can also function as normal with one less pack of construction paper. But it can't if the teachers who have less money to spend than necessary for daily supplies can't stock with the necessities. And raising the fee for the parents who do pay to have enough for the rst of the class is not a fair solution either.

Mind you, there are many things I think should be part of a collective school budget, but a personal stash of crayons, etc doesn't bother me.

One more thought: parents who buy things they see they bought (and students at an old enough age to understand) will take more care and responsibility for their owned items than ones "gifted" by the school, even if the school provided ones were paid for via a fee.

zigi

Thu, Sep 01 2016, 12:39 am

trying to figure out what a spiral index is. if it was in target I didn't see it. omg 7.49 for avery 2" binders the dollar store one break easily. I wanted something sturdier, amazon has 4 binders for 12$ all the same color though. next time I am ordering it. when I got to the check out with everyone I just paid the price not going to run around for something cheaper.
ra mom so true. electric sharpeners are the only way to go with cheaper pencils otherwise triconderoga if you use a manual sharpener