The School Stealth Tax

I’m generally a fan of education. I liked most of it, apart from foreign languages, which I was rubbish at. I never liked the way Mr Astin sat on the corner of peoples desks in 3rd form French and scratched himself with your ruler either come to that.

In retrospect I’m also liking the way our family weren’t stung for money at every single possible opportunity either. The boy is at nursery now, and will be moving up to reception in September. The odd outing or sponsored this or that is understandable but there seems to be something every single sodding week at the moment. And of course none of it is compulsory. Unless you want to upset your child and leave them marginalised when everyone else has paid their 50p to soak a teacher. The Water Aid soak a teacher thing has happened in the same week that every child has been given £20 of raffle tickets to sell and the school photo form to choose from. The raffle has a £400 first prize for goodness sake.

We’ve had two paid events, sponsored spells, sponsored dress ups, sponsored reads, sponsored this, sponsored that. I like to choose which charities I support but I also like to see the boy included in what’s going on, and by the look of it so do most parents, since the vast majority seem to take part in everything.

The school photo thing is genius too, first time I’ve actually seen a premium being charged for ordering and paying over the internet!

Obviously I am aware that their is a cost to attending school and not just in uniforms with a school logo transfer on them that seems to add £5 to the price, but a bit of common sense needs to be exercised in my humble opinion.

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