School fees

[velvetpage]

I just read a website for the Calgary Board of Education. I skipped over most of the academic stuff, because it's actually very similar to what's on my board's website in relation to standardized testing, but I was intrigued by the page about school fees: Parents may find that there are about five hundred dollars' worth of school fees if they have two kids in high school.

Now, from my perspective, I think this is a good idea. I think it's crazy that the Ontario government provides every single pencil for its kids, for example. Careful shopping and sticking to a short list would make it possible for most kids to get all their basic supplies for $30-$40. This way, teachers can order exactly what they want their classes to have, everyone pays the same amount, and there is a waiver for parents who can't afford it.

I absolutely love the idea of a lunch supervision fee. One of the reasons our boards are crunched for cash and putting caps on supervision time is the changes to lunch supervision since the Harris government. Back in the late eighties, many Ontario boards hired supervisors to watch kids eat, so that teachers would have that time free. The decision at the time was that, if they were paying the supervisors anyway, it was okay to let kids stay for lunch even if their parents were home. Then Harris came, and with him came the financial crunch, and suddenly the lunch supervisors were gone. But a whole generation of kids had grown up expected lunch supervision for their children, free of charge, and someone had to provide it. So it fell back in teachers' laps.

What do you think? Is there a place for school fees, with a family cap on them and a waiver system in place, in Ontario?

Comments

[forthright.livejournal.com]

I don't see any point in fees. We already pay fees: they are called taxes, and it is the essence of public education that even if you don't use a service (e.g. if you have no kids), you pay for it because of the larger benefit to the community. If these are things everyone has to have as part of a basic education, then fees serve no purpose. Why set up an entire extra level of accounting for all these separate fees? If they are things that only some students have (e.g. lunch supervision) then either it is worth funding publicly without fees, or it is not worth having at all.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

If it's something that everyone has, I can certainly see that point, but when it comes to lunch supervision, I have more trouble with it.

Before the era of teacher-supervised lunch at school, kids went home for lunch. All of them. If they couldn't go home for lunch, their parents made arrangements for them to be babysat at someone else's house for lunch. Either way, teachers weren't providing that supervision because, not to put too fine a point on it, teachers' time is more valuable than that. The fee that is being charged in Calgary is $240, and it's only applicable to students who live close enough to walk but choose to stay at school for lunch, probably because their parents work. That means that those students aren't paying a bus fee. There are 198 school days in Ontario. A fee of $240 for the year is about $1.25 a day for an hour of babysitting. That's a pretty good rate.

Lunch supervision is not a part of education. It's a part of childcare, an element that falls outside of what is defined as "instructional time." While I can certainly see the argument that, if it falls within instructional time, it should be publicly provided, I find it harder to justify items that fall outside instructional time. Transportation is something you pay for when you live a distance from your job; I know several families who have very carefully managed their living arrangements in order to minimize that cost. But transportation for their children should be provided free? In the rest of their lives, they're going to have to find ways to get to and from where they need to be, on their own dime. I think the only reason we see it differently in Ontario is that we've been used to having it for free.

[forthright.livejournal.com]

But that $500 for high school students isn't lunch supervision: it's instructional materials, music fees, and other things that get defined as 'incidentals' but are not incidental at all.

I strongly, *strongly* disagree with the notion that anyone should be paying for bussing of their kids to school. Maybe in an urban environment there can be some realistic expectations in terms of parental expectations, but at my high school, kids were coming from as far as 40 km away. How on earth are they going to get to school otherwise? A particular job is not a basic right; an elementary education is a right.

The same with lunch supervision. The people who can afford lunch supervision are people who can afford to have one parent staying at home, or who have a caregiver. But if you have two working parents, there is simply no way that most people can make arrangements. Again, with rural areas: exactly whose parents are going to be doing this? How are the kids going to get to this mythical friend's-parents'-house? I don't expect teachers to do it, but a minimal level of lunchtime supervision needs to be publicly funded.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

If it's publicly funded, the next government to come along with a mandate, real or imagined, to cut costs in education, ends up cutting out the lunchroom supervision and then teachers end up doing it.

The whole point of the lunch fee is so that parents have a cheap option for their kids: they can send them to school for the entire day, but they would have to pay a small sum in order for that to happen.

(You realize I'm playing at least a little of the devil's advocate game here, right? I don't have a philosophical objection to school fees, but neither am I attached to the idea. I know exactly what happens when items that governments see as "extras" get cut from budgets. It's been a part of my reality for my entire teaching career. I spend an hour a week, more or less, supervising kids during non-instructional, non-entry/exit times, about half of whom live close enough to walk and have babysitting arranged, or a parent at home, for after and before school. The parents don't seem to value it, and there's a part of me that really wishes they would.)

[forthright.livejournal.com]

I absolutely agree that it is a travesty that these things are defined as extras and then cut from budgets, forcing teachers to do things that they are not contractually obliged to do. But the solution is not to play into the discourse of government cost-cutting and accept that they *are* extras. After all, by this definition virtually anything in public education can be considered as an 'extra'. This is certainly what you see in some American states where there is a barely-disguised all-out attack on public education as a concept.

The problem you mention with parents, I think, is that many of the parents who are most uppity about funding issues are those who have money and time - urban, well-to-do parents who will go all-out to fund a new computer lab or some such thing. These parents don't mind shelling out for music instruction, lunch supervision, etc., because it is a small inconvenience. But for the parents who can't afford that, or who live in rural areas and can't arrange supervision, these things are more basic than the standard government discourse currently allows. You see the difference quite clearly in a rural environment. My dad was the principal at three different rural schools, up to and including parts of the Harris era, and there was simply no way that lunch supervision or free bussing could be cut: all the parents were agreed that these were essentials.

To put things in a different light: elsewhere you recently talked about your discomfort at your students being in a home environment where their mothers are living with criminals. Are you similarly uncomfortable with your students (and their friends) spending lunchtime there?

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

It seems to me we're not really discussing what I expected to discuss - because I've made all the arguments you're making, and defended them. I know exactly where you're coming from. But I find it interesting how people in other jurisdictions make all the same philosophical arguments, even while paying for very different things. One lady further down thinks it's crazy that our government provides basic school tools, pencils and notebooks, for kids, but in other ways she completely agrees with you - and philosophically she's on a similar page. Yet the things she pays for, and expects to pay for, are very different.

Forty years ago, it was an accepted fact of life that people had to budget for their children's school supplies, even their books, because that was simply part of having children in school. I can certainly see the point of advising high school students to buy the books they're studying in language classes, for example - for twenty bucks per term, you get to study the books, and keep them for your personal library, you can mark them up if you wish to, let them get dog-eared, and no future student is going to have to put up with your markings unless they choose to buy a used book from you. (I don't like this idea for anything other than literature books, though - those are generally available in cheap paperback editions. Science and math books really are expensive, they're built to be durable, and they should be loaned out by the school each year.)

We've gotten to the point in Ontario where every single aspect of education is the school's, or the board's, or the province's jurisdiction. We provide their notebooks, their pencils, their textbooks, their babysitting over lunch hour even if a parent is available - everything. We've organized our school days so that there isn't time to go home at lunch, so that kindergarten is all day, five days out of ten, instead of a more humane half-day every day program for our littlest students. The reason for that? It's cheaper for the busing. We do all this, make public education entirely the purview of professionals in a school setting from eight-thirty until three, and then we're surprised when the parents don't feel comfortable in the school. We're surprised when the general public, especially the Ministry of Education, expects us to be entirely responsible for every aspect of a child's education. We complain, with good reason, that we're being held responsible for things about our students over which we have no control, but philosophically we've set ourselves up for that. When we take absolutely all control out of the hands of parents, we shouldn't be surprised if they expect absolutely all results to come from us, too. And yet that's not reasonable. A child's home life as at least as much, and most studies say more, to do with their success as anything we do in the classroom.

Parents have a responsibility to see to their children's education, in whatever environment that occurs. For most, that means supporting what goes on at school. We could go on forever about the poor little kids who go home to crappy home lives and oh, isn't it sad. Of course it's sad. Of course we, as a society, have a responsibility to help as much as we can. But I'm not convinced that taking on responsibilities that are traditionally parental, and making them part of the public school system, is the best route to go for that.

[melstra.livejournal.com]

I am still thinking about this topic, so I think I'll post something more thoughtful later, particularly in regards to the fees for materials....but first a question about lunch. How much time do kids actually GET for lunch at the various levels? What percentage actually do go home?

I know that kids at any level haven't gone home for lunch in my lifetime in any US area I'm familiar with. In fact, at the high school level, lunch period can be as short as about 20 minutes--hardly enough time to go home and come back, even if you live next door. Some schools allow juniors and seniors in high school to leave "campus" if they have good grades, particularly if they have a study hall on one side of the lunch period. I don't know what elementary schools are like here, but I suspect that, like at the HS level, lunch time is slowly being shortened in favor of more instructional time.

When I was in elementary school, it was rare for teachers to do the supervising at lunch--generally there was a cadre of a few mothers who did the recess and lunch supervisions. It could have been voluntary, but I think they were paid a small pittance, like the crossing guards.

My first thought is that if a substantial percentage actually do go home, then asking parents of the others to pay (with a waiver system in place) is probably reasonable. However, if you've got most kids there all day, it becomes as much a part of the "instructional period" as the 1/2 hours before and after school when the school is generally held responsible for coralling the kiddos on their grounds. I *think* some schools in the US have afterschool programs on their grounds, and obviously those aren't free.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

The problem is that each board, in fact each school, then has to decide whether or not their lunch supervision is essential or a frill for their particular students, or even sub-groups of students. In my school area, about half the kids live far enough away to make walking logistically nearly impossible, and those happen to include almost all of the poorest students (the buses go to and from a subsidized housing area.) But there are three students I know of in my class alone who live close enough to go home for lunch, and whose parents could arrange it around their current schedules, mostly because they're home with younger kids anyway. There are at least three more in my class of twenty-three, who have a babysitter who lives nearby, who is paid to take care of them before and after school. That's six kids out of twenty-three who we are supervising at lunch hour when other people are available who would have had that responsibility within my lifetime.

Clearly, in rural areas, neither busing nor lunch supervision is, or should be, on the table. I'm not so sure about urban areas. In particular, I think full-day junior kindergarten is ridiculous. Most four-year-olds simply can't handle that day. Our kindergarten teachers dread the last hour of the day, because it's the hardest time of the day to corral those kids and keep a lid on their behaviour.

[failstoexist.livejournal.com]

in our schools, you pay for your own supplies all through--some teachers have extra pencils and stuff in class, but you are expected to return them at the end of class. one teacher went so far as to take your shoe for a pencil so you wouldn't leave with hers. that was middle school, where everyone had their own...in elementary school I believe they have a lot of extras, but it just comes out of the budget, i suppose.

the only real fees we have are for parking. transportation is and must be paid for by the school if you live outside a certain distance range (.8-1.2 miles or something, depending on your age group), inside you can walk or get a ride from someone. We have aides who monitor the lunchroom...sometimes subs get that as one of their periods, or the assistant gym teacher. anyone who doesn't teach the full amount of periods per day.

I suppose that if those things aren't built into the budget in Ontario, it's better to have some fees that are fairly low, just to subsidize it a bit. it's a lot to expect people to suddenly go from paying no fees to $500, for example. it's something that would probably need to be introduced slowly to reduce the amount of waivers needed because people just couldn't afford it.

[failstoexist.livejournal.com]

ooh, you know, i forgot something on lunch supervision...in elementary school the teachers each take 1 day per week doing it. just lunch, not recess...they have recess off to eat their lunch and do their planning and whatnot. none of them really seems to mind, and that way each grade has 1 teacher present, along with the aides and stuff. I think it's just fine that way, since they still get a (longer) time off for recess just afterwards while the aides watch the kids.

I think fees ideally should be replaced by taxes for things like that, though, since everyone has an opportunity to eat in the lunchroom. parking? hell yes, you should pay for that. supplies? everone should buy their own. but teachers/aides/whoever's time should be paid for out of the budget...a fee could be introduced while budget/tax changes were being worked out, but it shouldn't be a long term thing.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

School supplies? Parents buy. Lunch supervision? Pay for that? That is part of running a school. It's like saying you should pay fees for the secretary, the nurse, and the janitor. You need them in school all day, they need to eat, they need the supervision. It should be considered part of running the school.

We buy our own supplies here, even including things like paper towels, soap, tissues, and quite a bit of art stuff and the like, and fees aren't too high. The only extra fees my middle school kid had was a $4 fee for the one term they had skating, and for her gym uniform.

Someone on my flist has a great PTA that buys supplies en masse and makes up packages, and you pay to get one fully stocked package of school supplies. Here we also have a church that solicits funds from local businesses and buys cheap backpacks and fills them with the basics. Pretty cool. Kids eligible for free lunch are usually eligible to get those, and free shoes from payless. We are really good to those in need round here.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

We haven't had school nurses in every school in Ontario for at least a decade, and I think it's been closer to two.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

Wow even in NYC we had school nurses.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

Our secretaries and a few teachers are trained in First Aid, and that's about it.

[blue-comet.livejournal.com]

Here, the cram all the kids into the gym for lunch, give them 15 minutes to eat, and boot them outside. It's pandemonium.

I'd happily pay a lunch supervision fee if it meant my kids could eat in a peaceful, civilized environment.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

It's not too different here, 15-20 minutes in the gym, and then outside (unless it's below 20f i think) but they have supervision, and it's not crazed. I've seen for myself.

[velvetpage.livejournal.com]

In my experience, the level of pandemonium is inversely proportional to the level of training in basic routines that the kids get. Schools where kids know the rules and have them enforced do not experience pandemonium. Schools where the rules, or the consequences, are lax, are the ones with pandemonium.

Which is just another way of saying that the principal and the teaching staff set the tone for student behaviour.

[kibbles.livejournal.com]

Many afterschool programs in NYC are free, by the way. Here in Dubuque the Y or St. Marks runs them and there is a sliding scale fee.