Is anyone else's school doing this?

[zibazinski]

Actually, they can be removed from the bus, just someone from the school has to transport them. In one case, our principal. I enjoyed that. She deserved to have to transport that brat. Special needs should not equal a brat.

[Deleted]

Yes, i'm sorry, you are correct, what i should have said is that we had to provide transportation, thus it was discouraged to remove them from the bus, as in the schools where i worked a 'short' bus or van would need to be sent. Point being though, transportation had to be provided...

[Deleted]

EOG - it's becoming a lot more common for schools to charge fees, transportation and for textbooks. I grew up in CA and transportation was provided for a fee for elementary kids. Other than that it was walk or take the public system on your own dime. Dark Honor had a long thread on YM about the cost of providing transportation for school students.

[tcu2003]

Sept 2, 2012 2:15:22 GMT -5 @patstab said:

But then I don't think we need sports stardiums for high school that look like professional ones either. I could find lots of ways to save money for academics and for teachers salaries.

Agreed. A town near where I live is opening a $60 million dollar high school football stadium this year. Yep, you read that ridiculously high number right. That's just crazy...

sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2012/highschool/08/30/allen-high-football-stadium.ap/index.html

[luckyme]

Our HS doesn't have busing, and there is poor public transportation, so there is a lot of car pooling. Walking is actually dangerous, as the dumb a$$es built the new HS in a commercial zone, near the expressway on/off ramps. Also, in the winter, the only place the kids have to walk is on the busy roadway, as the few sidewalks are never cleared.

There are usually a few kids getting hit by cars every new school year. My oldest now drives, so this will be the first time in 6 years I will not be driving any kids to school. It feels so strange!

The extra curriculars usually have some fees, but luckily we don't have to buy the actual school books. We do get lists of things the kids need, plus a list of requests for the teachers. Compared to some of the expenses listed here, we're not to bad off. Also, our HS has a spectacular honors program; the expensive private school actually based their curriculum off of the public one.

Although, we are one of those cities who are in deep financial problems. But we also have large numbers of low income students, so looking into the future, I think the public schools are really going to decline. I am glad I don't have little ones who are just starting out in the public schools here.

[Ombud]

He is in a charter school so technically we can be charged. But it is only max $600 per kid for after school things [marching band $340, cross country $50, track $100, sweatshirts x 3 $60, mandatory t-shirts x 3 = $15, bowling $85 = $650 but those sweatshirts don't count]. Yes we pay for the bus to events, bus to school if they need that [no max on $$ or family cap]. Buy workbooks which are the only books they use. And then there seems to be weekly fees on top of that. This week it's minuscule [$3]

2nd kid's school has a mandatory $10 for science

3rd kid's school has $30 for supplies but no back to school shopping so we came out ahead

[sheilaincali]

DS just started high school this week. He is open enrolled to the better school in town (grandfathered in since we moved from one side of town to the other in the middle of the school year 3 years ago). I have to provide his transportation which is awesome this year. He is like 2 miles from my work (very busy highway/bridge so he can't walk).

In MN we have never had to pay for text books. Only regular school supplies- but they did frequently ask for 2 boxes of Kleenex's and that sort of thing. This year the only thing special he needed was one 3 ring binder for German. He already had the special calculator from last year and we bought several flash drives when we found them on sale so he has been using ones from that inventory for 2 years.

Here the transportation is provided if you are over I think 1.5 miles for Elementary school and 2 miles for High school. (may be 1 and 1.5 respectively- not 100% sure) but if you are not outside the limit you have to transport your kids or they have to walk. Judging by the insanity of the parking lot at the high school there are lots of parents that transport their kids.

[Ombud]

#2 walks a mile. It's just a mile and they have a set of books for home so they don't carry that. He does carry an alto sax but a mile isn't far

#1 carries track gear, sax & french horn and school is over 3 miles away so he gets a ride

[ambellamy]

There is one high school in my area where the kids take the public buses because its a fraction of the cost of the school bus and the stop is just across the street from the school because there are 2 shopping centers there.... It's literally like a mob of people on the sidewalk with everyone trying to cram themselves onto the first bus that arrives when the bell rings... I think it takes a good 3 rounds to get them all going (in both directions too).

[andi9899]

I have one in public school and one in private school. I think I pay just as much for each. My one that goes to public school doesn't have fees books or transportation, but huge fees for activities and "extras". I'm going to end up paying an extra $1500 this year for my public school child. That's not a whole lot less than the tuition for the other one.

[princessleia]

Property Tax that I pay is $5600+ (on a $250K home) which most of it goes to fund the school district. So far, I still have to pay:-
$35 Registration Fee per kid
$125 Sport Fee (for 1 sport, subsequent ones another $25...)
$70 Orchestra Program
$14 for Foreign Language
$204 (Morning Bus Ride only per kid....if you want the return trip ride, add another $204). This would have been free if I live outside the 2 mile radius. But as luck would have it, I lived 1.9 miles away from the school.

[mizbear]

When I was in school, all my mom had to pay for was the supplies and extras. Whereas the high school stop was adjusted whereever the students were when I lived with my DGM, when we lived in the little town we were in over in the next county when I started high school, there was one bus pickup in the center of town- for a 75 pound, 4'8or10" kid who was recovering from mono- that was one hell of a hike with a duffle full of books every day. It was a mile tops, probably closer to a half-mile, but after the 2nd or 3rd day of school, one of the older boys carried my books home everyday. Back then the only neighborhood that was not bussed was the 2 blocks around the high school- unless you were a high schooler who could catch a transfer bus at the high school when the middle schoolers were transferring busses. But you had to be signed up to ride that bus.
My niece starts high school next year and the only fee they will have is supplies and her laptop insurance. The bus still does main road drop offs for the middle and high schoolers- although it is the driver's option to drop off closer.

Another county my nieces attended school in the teachers were really strapped and asked for various supplies like sheets to use on the transparency. And TP.

[p8nt]

WOW! I live in a very small town in Northern CA. A huge percentage of kids qualify for free/reduced lunch. The only fee our school charges (outside of yearbooks, dance tickets, ASB cards, etc) is a sports transportation fee. It is $50 per sport. You can get a waiver if you get free/reduced lunch or just sign a statement that you can't afford to pay it. I wrote a letter that I could afford to pay it, but I was not going to pay it because for the smaller sports they don't provide any transportation and I'm not paying my $50 to subsidize a larger sport like football when those kids get to ride the bus but I (willingly) have to drive my child to all the games.

Honestly, if they started charging for books, etc there would likely be about 75% less kids at school. Many of the parents would not be able to afford to send their children. Personally, I would homeschool based upon the principle that public school should be funded by property taxes and I pay over $2,500 a year in property taxes.

[973beachbum]

I guess the participation fees are okay because sports really are not what the school is supposed to be about. I do think they can be important for a number of reasons but that doesn't make them necessary. The idea of paying for the books blows my mind. What is next my bills for my share of the heat or electric bill?

I pay plenty of school taxes and one of the top things I thought it should pay for are the textbooks. Most schools are moving to online books anyway but charging for this is just wrong IMO.

My son's teacher this year only had a few very basic things she asked the kids to bring in. One parent asked why the forth grade teachers on the website had a huge list but her's was really small. Her answer was that she had kids and she refused to ask us to supply anything that she would have been annoyed at being asked to supply.

[mizbear]

My mother always questioned why we had to have binders for every flipping subject! They didn't fit in lockers right and they didn't fit in desks. And God forbid you had to haul them all home for homework