The cost of Free Education.

thesimpsons

For my son in secondary I bought the school PE crested teeshirt in 1st year. In 2nd yr they decided to change the colour of PE shirt. I refused to buy it, the existing one fitted him fine. After son explained it to the teacher I still had to write a letter explaining why I wasn't buying new one. It wasn't even that I couldn't afford it (though I've obviously plenty of better things to spend the money on), it was very much a matter of principle. It didn't become an issue after that although this year I've had to write the letter once again - one I bought in 1st yr still fits !!

we'llallhavetea_old

i am in shock at most of the stories in this thread. is it mainly dublin schools for some reason?

my daughters school could not be more accommodating if they tried tbh. you can buy whatever uniforms you like as long as they are the correct colour and you get the crest from the parents association (which i've never gotten and nothing has been said about it) they have a school tracksuit, which you do not have to buy, you can just get a navy tracksuit and yellow polo shirt.

the kids have never been called up on wearing boots/runners instead of the black shoes either.

they have a book rental scheme, €55 for the year, that includes homework journal.

last year, my daughters teacher apologized anytime the school were looking for money (never very much)

it seems to me that the country schools are not fussy at all, i don't get the double standards with the dublin schools, it's not right.
i think the only way for change is gather up as many parents as possible, sign petitions etc, demand change. no one needs this black hole swallowing up more money unnecessarily.

i truly do feel for all you parents, i honestly don't know what i would if i were in the same position.

Fittle

teacosy wrote: »

I can't wait for my 3 children to all be in school.

By the time the last one starts we'll have forked out the guts of 150k in creche fees. Primary and secondary school expensive? Yeah right.

What a ridiculous and smug response from a parent.

Do you not think that there are those of us who have ALSO paid thousands in creche fees BEFORE they even begin school????? Do you think you're the only person who has paid/is paying creche fees??

This post is about back to school - primary school - we are all aware of creche fees and the fact that many of us have been paying/and continue to pay second mortgages for creches and now, for afterschool care does not give u the right to be so smug.

teacosy

Fittle wrote: »

What a ridiculous and smug response from a parent.

Do you not think that there are those of us who have ALSO paid thousands in creche fees BEFORE they even begin school????? Do you think you're the only person who has paid/is paying creche fees??

This post is about back to school - primary school - we are all aware of creche fees and the fact that many of us have been paying/and continue to pay second mortgages for creches and now, for afterschool care does not give u the right to be so smug.

Smug? Ridiculous? How exactly? I'm just pointing out the huge difference between preschool costs and schools costs. How would i think that i'm the only one paying creche fees? Calm down.

Nevyn

Please note that civil posting is expected on this forum and flaming is not permitted.

Fittle

teacosy wrote: »

Smug? Ridiculous? How exactly? I'm just pointing out the huge difference between preschool costs and schools costs. How would i think that i'm the only one paying creche fees? Calm down.

Sorry Mod.

I just thought it was ridiculous that we are all in the same boat, struggling to pay school fees, particularly the hidden ones, and somebody tries to point out how lucky we all are, because they are paying huge creche fees.

Nevyn

we'llallhavetea wrote: »

i am in shock at most of the stories in this thread. is it mainly Dublin schools for some reason?

Well all schools around the country get the exact same grant per child per year.
But some will have higher rates then others to pay, some will have to pay higher oil prices, some will have to use extra heaters as they are portacabins or very old draughty buildings.

School will then ask for extras to cover the difference, esp when the grants are paid in the new year and the school has to manage the budget for the year and when it's gone, it's gone.

So you get parents being asked for arts money, photocopy money, a donation to the school, and they get some money when they bulk buy books and dont pass the discount to the parents and any % they get from the crested school uniforms.

mariaalice

I found primary school alright cost wise but secondary school is horridness...my youngest daughter needed a new skirt going in to 5 year and i spotted one very like the uniform skirt in M+S ( which i got )... it was 10 as opposed to 55 for the school one...she had to get a new jumper for sixth year which was 50 euro i tried asking around and tried the charity shops but others parents had got there before me!

The books are the worst going in to 5th year i spent about 400 euro on books one of the books alone was 35euro!!!! then you have the 70 for reports postage etc plus the 300 euro thy would like you to pay at your own discretion!!!!

But my big concern are thing like after school study which in my daughters school is 120 euro a term. I think it discriminates again poorer parents and put parents under tremendous pressure.

angelfire9

Thaedydal wrote: »

Well all schools around the country get the exact same grant per child per year.
But some will have higher rates then others to pay, some will have to pay higher oil prices, some will have to use extra heaters as they are portacabins or very old draughty buildings.

School will then ask for extras to cover the difference, esp when the grants are paid in the new year and the school has to manage the budget for the year and when it's gone, it's gone.

So you get parents being asked for arts money, photocopy money, a donation to the school, and they get some money when they bulk buy books and dont pass the discount to the parents and any % they get from the crested school uniforms.

I don't know if that is the reason to be honest!
My daughter attends a primary school which still uses the original CBS building built in 1855!!!!
She is in a prefab this year
The school doesn't ask for a voluntary contribution there is €35 per year for arts/crafts & photocopying
I paid €2 at the start of Jnr Infants for the text system to notify parents of early closures etc and that €2 will do for her entire primary education!
Her tracksuit is crested & costs €80 but I am getting 2 years out of each one and they are being passed down to my niece when she grows out of them ditto the school jumper which is €40 so all in all I don't think i'm doing too badly
Bought all her books second hand this year for €30 and had to get new workbooks and a few bits of stationary which came to €35

Glad I don't live in Dublin!!!

thesimpsons

angelfire9 wrote: »

I don't know if that is the reason to be honest!


Glad I don't live in Dublin!!!

its not just Dublin - living in small city/large town and we had some stupid uniform rules. I just don't give in to alot of them and nothing ever gets said.

OS119

Fittle wrote: »

....Later in the afternoon, the principal came in to his classroom and told him to 'bring this note home to your parents'. The note said
Dear Ms X, I noted today that your son X was not wearing the school designated t-shirt. It is imperative that all boys wear the uniform, as indicated on the school charter..blah blah blah blah blah...'

I'm appalled to say the least.....

to which your response should be:

Dear Sir,

Fcuk off.

yours faithfully...

the great thing about living in a democracy where - assuming you push hard enough - elected politicians make the law that the electorate want them to make, is that it would be pretty easy to outlaw this stuff if enough people honked off at their TD and let them know it was a vote deciding issue.

Nevyn

The thing is schools can set thier own rules and policy and can just enforce it.
Failure to follow/comply with school rules means that they if they choose suspend/expell a student for failing to comply with the uniform code.

Our kids have the right to an education but not in the local school or the school of a parents choosing.

OS119

Thaedydal wrote: »

The thing is schools can set thier own rules and policy and can just enforce it.
Failure to follow/comply with school rules means that they if they choose suspend/expell a student for failing to comply with the uniform code.

Our kids have the right to an education but not in the local school or the school of a parents choosing.

not if the politicians - those grubby folk who accost us in the street around election time and pretend to give a monkeys what we say - re-write the law.

this is not some inviolable commandment that comes down from god himself and must remain forever more, its just a situation that's been allowed - by politics - to evolve because nobody rose a sufficient stink about it.

it would not require a constitutional amendment for the law to state clearly that any school in receipt of public funds was unable to set a prescriptive uniform policy, or that a school that required uniform to be purchased from a particular supplier be fined, or that swimming lessons no longer be allowed to be mandatory. its called democracy, and it would take a short afternoon to work out something sensible...

my city - under political pressure from the voters - did it: no blazers, no specific retailers, just colours, inexpensive iron on badges and ties.

Nevyn

Changing the policy can happen with the parent's association putting pressure on the board of management but often both are quangos with tight meshed cliques of the same people who have been involved for the last 10/15 years and are popularity contests.

I swear if I had a euro for every time over the last 8 years I have been told "this is the way it's always done" I would have enough money to buy a new car.

dan_d

Why are you all screaming about the schools being to blame for the uniforms?

Fair enough they've a uniform - and I agree that they should allow kids to have the basic M&S or Dunnes skirts/trousers/pinafores/blouses/cardigans/jumpers/T-shirts. At least that way the only really expensive thing is the tracksuit, which is usually custom made.

But surely the retailers selling this stock are to blame from charging 80eur for a kids tracksuit. The school might set the uniform, but they certainly don't set the prices. At most they should be trying to find 2 or 3 different stockists, but at the end of the day their business is education, not retail.

As for mandatory swimming lessons.....I understand you want a choice, but surely you want your child to learn to swim.And have you seen how much private lessons cost??:eek:

To be honest - politicians should not be involved with schools at all. Beyond possible involvement the provision of new ones where communities are growing. The board of management makes all other decisions, so take it up with them - usually composed of a number of local residents, a priest (possibly) and the school principle.

we'llallhavetea_old

dan_d wrote: »

Why are you all screaming about the schools being to blame for the uniforms?

Fair enough they've a uniform - and I agree that they should allow kids to have the basic M&S or Dunnes skirts/trousers/pinafores/blouses/cardigans/jumpers/T-shirts. At least that way the only really expensive thing is the tracksuit, which is usually custom made.

But surely the retailers selling this stock are to blame from charging 80eur for a kids tracksuit. The school might set the uniform, but they certainly don't set the prices. At most they should be trying to find 2 or 3 different stockists, but at the end of the day their business is education, not retail.

the highlighted part really answers everything! the school are aware of the price of the uniform they choose.

As for mandatory swimming lessons.....I understand you want a choice, but surely you want your child to learn to swim.And have you seen how much private lessons cost??:eek:

well tbh, they shouldn't be mandatory, some kids don't want to learn to swim.

deisemum

Thaedydal wrote: »

Changing the policy can happen with the parent's association putting pressure on the board of management but often both are quangos with tight meshed cliques of the same people who have been involved for the last 10/15 years and are popularity contests.

I swear if I had a euro for every time over the last 8 years I have been told "this is the way it's always done" I would have enough money to buy a new car.

This is the most apt description of BOMs that I've come across. The election process in some schools is a sham and often done in such a way that the parents often the creeping jesus types the school wants get elected.

In a lot of cases the BOM is structured in such a way that it's stacked against the elected parents and the rest are normally hand picked and go along with the principal and parish priest if it's a catholic school.

thesimpsons

schools should not be run by BOMs consisting of the local great and good, parish priest and teachers - in almost all cases these people are not business people and they do not actively go out and search for good value for money, good business techniques, etc. 3 local schools I've been on BOMs and where they are looking at prices for painting, for reroofing, for new photocopiers, anything - they aren't able to actively seek out and negotiate good business deals. Money is being wasted on stupid things. I tried and tried a number of times to get things done another way and nothing ever changed. They don't want to cos "its always been done by X supplier, by x contractor, or whatever". A case recently where a contractor installed a piece of expensive piece of equipment, it didn't work properly, every year they griped, complained, and muttered but I could not get a single agreement to go back to contractor for the item to be replaced. In the end, the school replaced the item from school funds (vol contrib). What business would tolerate this kind of behaviour from a contractor. With the volumes of public money and vol contrib flowing through schools, they should be run like businesses.


Swimming lessons aren't mandatory - schools would have you think they are but whats on the curriculum is called acquatics. All it involves is the school providing education in how to behave around water, water safety. This can be done in a classroom setting. Majority of kids who do do school swimming don't learn from it - 30 kids in the pool with 1 or 2 coaches who have to spend alot of time fixing goggles, swim hats, Mary kicked Joan type of problems, etc, 6 or 8 lessons a year - have never yet seen a child learn to swim from this type of class.

OS119

deisemum wrote: »

This is the most apt description of BOMs that I've come across. The election process in some schools is a sham and often done in such a way that the parents often the creeping jesus types the school wants get elected.

In a lot of cases the BOM is structured in such a way that it's stacked against the elected parents and the rest are normally hand picked and go along with the principal and parish priest if it's a catholic school.

much easier then to persuade 84 TD's of the case for a less prescriptive (and non-stitched up) school uniform policy than to overhaul however many thousand school boards of management.

these are public bodies - they exist purely because the state pays them for a service, and were the state to withdraw that funding they would cease to exist in a heartbeat, so they will comply with whatever the state decides should be uniform policy. 84 TD's up for re-election, one snotty headmaster, and one civil court case later, and this ridiculous farce of schools forcing parents to purchase clothing at way over the odds from particular shops (which they are certainly not getting a backhander from m'Lud) will be over.

job jobbed.

phasers

thesimpsons wrote: »

Swimming lessons aren't mandatory - schools would have you think they are but whats on the curriculum is called acquatics. All it involves is the school providing education in how to behave around water, water safety. This can be done in a classroom setting. Majority of kids who do do school swimming don't learn from it - 30 kids in the pool with 1 or 2 coaches who have to spend alot of time fixing goggles, swim hats, Mary kicked Joan type of problems, etc, 6 or 8 lessons a year - have never yet seen a child learn to swim from this type of class.

I did.


Swimming lessons in schools are a very good idea and worth the money. All children should know how to swim properly.

coffee_cake

OS119 wrote: »

not if the politicians - those grubby folk who accost us in the street around election time and pretend to give a monkeys what we say - re-write the law.

this is not some inviolable commandment that comes down from god himself and must remain forever more, its just a situation that's been allowed - by politics - to evolve because nobody rose a sufficient stink about it.
.

Indeed if they can fight for girls being allowed to wear trousers then they should be able to fight for this too.
It's ridiculous and that separate-crest idea should be promoted for all the schools

metrovelvet

Can you vote with your feet? For example can you shop around before you enroll your child to see what the deal is with all this stuff first before you decided to enroll or do you have to send your child to a school according to your area?

Nevyn

metrovelvet wrote: »

Can you vote with your feet? For example can you shop around before you enroll your child to see what the deal is with all this stuff first before you decided to enroll or do you have to send your child to a school according to your area?

90% of primary schools are sorted by parish as the catchment area as they are Catholic schools.

If you live in what is a certain defined parish then the child is expected to attend that 'local' school and getting you child into one which is not the parish catchment area you live in (even if you and the child are not christian) are be more tricky as the majority of those school give preference to those in the parish catchment.

Educate together schools and those which are not catholics are usually more flexible.

SerialComplaint

thesimpsons wrote: »

schools should not be run by BOMs consisting of the local great and good, parish priest and teachers - in almost all cases these people are not business people and they do not actively go out and search for good value for money, good business techniques, etc. 3 local schools I've been on BOMs and where they are looking at prices for painting, for reroofing, for new photocopiers, anything - they aren't able to actively seek out and negotiate good business deals. Money is being wasted on stupid things. I tried and tried a number of times to get things done another way and nothing ever changed. They don't want to cos "its always been done by X supplier, by x contractor, or whatever". A case recently where a contractor installed a piece of expensive piece of equipment, it didn't work properly, every year they griped, complained, and muttered but I could not get a single agreement to go back to contractor for the item to be replaced. In the end, the school replaced the item from school funds (vol contrib). What business would tolerate this kind of behaviour from a contractor. With the volumes of public money and vol contrib flowing through schools, they should be run like businesses.

This is very dissapointing. However, we can't give up - we really need to take this battle head on. Parents may need to get relentless in their dealings with the school on this. We need to influence all members of the BoM, and the Parents Association, and the Principal, and even the class teacher.

Take on the battle. Bigger battles have been won in the past, and people power is rising. Start with the Parents Association AGM in Sept/Oct and take it from there.

thesimpsons

SerialComplaint wrote: »

Take on the battle. Bigger battles have been won in the past, and people power is rising. Start with the Parents Association AGM in Sept/Oct and take it from there.

after 14 yrs of involvement in BOMs and PAs I've decided to give it a miss this year - theres only so many years of banging your head off a brick wall you can take :eek:. time for someone else to take up the battle and keep trudging along trying to get some sense sensible thinking into schools

lily09

most teachers and schools do not want to bring children swimming its nearly a whole day gone if you have to travel and a complete nightmare, most parents want it.

Fittle

Can I ask if anyone knows when swimming became obligatory, and was put on the school curriculum? I have to say I was amazed when my child went into first class and we were told we HAD to pay an extra 60euro that year, for swimming. I was already paying for swimming lessons on saturdays for him.

And while I agree that all children should know how to swim, I disagree that it should be forced on parents. We have some parents in our class who don't allow their children go to the swimming lessons, but as the school dont have the staff to supervise those 3 children,(while the class go to the pool) they have to go along to the lessons and sit at the pool, watching their peers! How they can't put them in another class for that hour, amazes me.

Nevyn

It is on the curriculum but I don't think it's mandatory, at least it hasn't been for the last 8 years I have had kids in primary school.

thesimpsons

as confirmed to me by 2 principals of primary schools

thesimpsons wrote: »

Swimming lessons aren't mandatory - schools would have you think they are but whats on the curriculum is called acquatics. All it involves is the school providing education in how to behave around water, water safety. This can be done in a classroom setting.

its easier for schools to say its mandatory cos then all the kids are in the one place. Anything that costs the parents this kind of money though shouldn't be mandatory though. Its also not appropriate for some girls coming up to age of puberty that they have to endure the embassassment of changing rooms and having to sit out a class (in full public view of their peers) when they have their periods.

Fittle

thesimpsons wrote: »

as confirmed to me by 2 principals of primary schools




its easier for schools to say its mandatory cos then all the kids are in the one place. Anything that costs the parents this kind of money though shouldn't be mandatory though. Its also not appropriate for some girls coming up to age of puberty that they have to endure the embassassment of changing rooms and having to sit out a class (in full public view of their peers) when they have their periods.

Another reason I'm glad I have a boy, and one I hadn't thought of for the girls.

Our school just include the swimming lessons in the cost of the 'back to school' (photocopying/arts materials etc) stuff - so you're right, they make it look like it's mandatory.

I just calculated how much my school (a normal school on the northside of dublin) has received up to today, in this 'extra costs' from the parents. The list breaks it down into photocopying/arts & crafts materials etc etc. It comes to 122euro per child. 122 x 394 children = 48,068euro.

Today was the closing date for this 'fee', so since last wednesday, the school has received almost 50 thousand euro for photocopying paper............and next week we are being asked to contribute 5euro per child towards the cost of a new, interactive white bord!!!

I think I'll need a second job!