Posted on 05/15/2018 8:58:34 AM PDT by EinNYC
Nearly all public school teachers report digging into their pockets to pay for school supplies, spending nearly $480 a year, far more than the federal $250 tax deduction available to teachers.
The findings by the National Center of Education Statistics released Tuesday come as teachers across the country are walking out of classrooms to protest low pay and demand pay raises. Helping teachers pay for class supplies was a key demand during the Arizona teachers’ strike.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
I spent seven of my retired years in very fine company. I was an urban public school substitute. Those are the people who have a gripe about the cost of supplies. Substitutes have to purchase enough supplies to have on hand so that they can make supplies and materials available. Very often, everything is locked up in that classroom. And those substitutes? They're providing for the students from an income that's much less than the teacher.
NEVER ONCE did a teacher offer to reimburse me. But then again, when I was a full-time classroom teacher, it never occurred to me what a burden this was on substitutes.
As conservative as I am, I see no reason not to give every full time teacher a couple thousand dollars a year for classroom extra’s. I think they would love the chance to manage that small budget, and it would certainly help the kids. Now if a teacher F’s it up they should be fired of course, receipt’s aren’t too much to ask for.
The same goes for prison’s and mental health. So much pennywise and pound foolishness.
I would say that, in general, educational institutions are not interested in spending money in the classroom. Not for teachers’ salaries, not for supplies, not for equipment, not for paraprofessionals. Everything that impacts the kids seems to be in short supply.
Hey, the pension funds need to be filled with cash, the PACs in Washington need funding, and the Superintendent’s Assistant needs an Assistant.
It’s about priorities.
Makes me wonder why I have to provide all sorts of classroom supplies on top of the supplies my child needs and all of the property taxes I pay that keep going up while levies and referendums keep getting passed adding even more revenue directly into the stream and raising my taxes even more.
Then, on the last day of school my child comes home with a horde of “classroom” materials that were never used by anyone.
I’m just impressed that this thread has made three posts without some self taught born genius complaining about how teachers are overpaid, under-worked leeches on the public dole...
I’m just impressed that this thread has made three posts without some self taught born genius complaining about how teachers are overpaid, under-worked leeches on the public dole...
DITTO !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
.
Imagine if they just eliminated one feather-bedded position in the School District administration, how many supplies that could buy.
I substituted for years and always carried a bag full of stickers and awards (small candies, crayons, colored pencils, etc). I also bought some supplies for projects I came up with. I never spent much. They all came from the dollar store.
Teachers in NYC are given a small stipend of money most years. Last time I checked (I am, thank you G-d, RETIRED for 18 months now, away from the roiling cesspool of fraud and corruption the NYC school system has become.), it was $250 per year, but many years it is far less. This stipend is called Teachers' Choice. Many schools in dire financial straits demand that their teachers give over their Teachers' Choice money to buy new copy machines and such. Many schools in dire financial straits cannot afford to supply copy paper and so teachers have to spend a lot of that money on paper and other basic supplies. That money is supposed to be for "extras" to enhance learning, not basic classroom supplies. And it is a drop in the bucket for how much teachers actually have to spend in order to teach their classes the way they should be taught. A couple of months before the end of the school year, teachers must submit their receipts for how the money was spent and fill out a form explaining the expenditures.
Are you suggesting the thousands of corrupt unionized teachers in LA, the largest school district in the country, are not overpaid?
Really?
I do...I have my own Japanese program at the HS level, and I had to buy all the used textbooks with my own money in case I leave my current school.
$480? Cry me a river
Big deal
I spent more then that on a new suit.
When I worked in a school district every classroom teacher had $3,000 to spend on supplies for their classrooms, this is stuff beyond what is already bought, like computers, equipment, text books, etc. My department I ran was the IT department, I had a $250,000 yearly budget for the district with one school.
Did some teachers use personal funds to buy school supplies, sure did. But mostly for stuff that isn’t sold in the catalogs. Did some file the form and receipt to get reimbursed? Sure, some did, but others didn’t cause it was a small amount anyways. But they all sure like to bitch about it like $50 was like half of their 80K a year salary and they would end up living in a van down by the river...
And the biggest complainers about their salary were the veteran (as in they were there longest) teachers, they all would bitch about how lowly paid they were, but were actually making around 110K-125K a year. They would compare their salaries at Corporate America, or veteran police officers, and when I would point out that none of those positions get the summers off, every single stupid federal holiday off or weeks off for Christmas break or Easter Break, their faces would get red
The least complainers were your new teachers, the ones fresh out of college, making 47K a year, they were just happy to have a job. Teaching jobs in NJ is very competitive and many won’t get a teaching job. Too many grads, not enough openings.
Get rid of the unions and this problem would solve itself.
Mine did, too, as much as possible. I was always looking for sales and for plans for "emergency" classes for when there were no plans. I NEVER wanted to have to tell on a teacher because I was left with nothing for the students to do. (there were times when I had to)
In most situations, the students appreciated that what I was handing out was 'my" supplies, not the schools.
This experience is why I'm uncomfortable with the protests. The teachers are making it all about them. What about that lower tier of school employees who aren't as well off as they are?
I’m quite skeptical about the claim the average teacher is spending a ton of money out of pocket. The parents in our kids’ school district buy loads of stuff for the teachers... computer equipment, goodies in the teachers’ lounges, latte deliveries, birthday presents, gift cards, ad nauseam. We got committees to organize all the committees for raising and spending money on all kinds of junk. Every year we get a multi-page list of crap to send them to school with. Why in the world would one 5th grader need a dozen glue sticks for a single school year? Two quarts of hand sanitizer!?
My wife spends that on a single "recognition" lunch for her team (out of her/my own pocket)
If she spends on a “recognition” lunch, that’s her choice.
It’s not about salaries. It’s about pensions and health bennies that are unaffordable. Go ahead and shoot the messenger, folks, but states can’t print money and taxpayers aren’t made of it.
Yes, as it is with the teachers.
And when it comes to purchases made by teachers, I wish someone would take a good look at the sales tax exemptions that are taken by teachers making purchases that are supposedly work-related. In my old line of work, I saw plenty that weren’t.
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