School Cuts Back On Homework To Save On Paper (no more money in budget for paper)

[Kadie]

Aug 17, 2009 11:19 pm US/Pacific
School Cuts Back On Homework To Save On Paper

NATOMAS, Calif. (CBS13) ― The cash crunch is hitting a local school hard enough that they have to cut back on homework for students in an effort to save paper.

Heron School in Natomas, a kindergarten through eighth grade school, has had its supply budget wiped out by financial cuts. At the beginning of the school year, teachers were given only five reams of paper.

Some students, like seven-year-old Casey Campbell, are happy after hearing that there would be no weekly homework packets handed out anymore, but parents are less thrilled.

"Oh my gosh, he's so excited he has no homework," said Tonya Campbell, Casey's mother. "They said it was because of the budget, they weren't going to have money for paper."

snip...
"Anytime parents could donate time, or paper, pencils, pens or sports equipment, those are all things we need," Doug said.

Doug said some teachers have assignments available on the web or through e-mail, and officials aren't sure when they'll have the money to buy more paper.


more...
http://cbs13.com/local/natomas.school.homework.2.1132880.html

[Liquorice]

1. Why did they start giving seven year olds homework anyway? nt

[eShirl]

4. beats me; we didn't start getting homework until 5th grade

back in the 70's

[Liquorice]

9. I started school in the late 70's, and it was the same--about 5th grade. Seven year olds

really don't need homework, IMO. They should get to have some playtime! It is more like "momwork" (or dadwork) anyway, because kids at that age are too young to be self-motivated and accountable for extra work brought home.

[Kadie]

17. Yep.

If we did get homework before then, it was for something like a science project or book report etc...

Not hours of daily homework.

[Kadie]

15. My 5 year old gets homework.

She just started kindergarten. She loves it now, but it will be a different story if a couple of years.

[phantom power]

2. Before school started, they gave us a list of school supplies...

not just for our kid, but stuff they wanted us to donate. Like paper.

But hey, at least nobody increased our taxes!
:eyes:

[NYC_SKP]

3. When did schools start giving supplies to teachers and students again???

While I was still teaching, our annual supply per teacher for EVERYTHING except books fell from $400/year to next to nothing.

In my experience teachers spend hundreds and thousands out of their own pockets above and beyond what they tell their students' parents what needs to be purchased.

[GreenPartyVoter]

5. My mother was constantly buying things for her classroom. So did my hsuband. I do it too for

my church children and my cheerleaders.

I guess we just want our kids to have the best, even if that means it comes out of our own pockets. :)

[Jkid]

6. Public schools ought to be paying for the supplies for their teachers.

The teachers themselves should not have to pay for anything out of their salary.

[NYC_SKP]

10. They've all but eliminated the tax deductibility of these out of pocket costs, too.

Meantime, a business owner can deduct a Hummer.

[LynneSin]

7. I don't get this at all

First, I remember buying my own paper for school. I mean isn't that why I see all these 'back to school supplies sales' at every store I go to - so I can buy my supply of paper/pencils.

If teachers are limited in the amount of paper available there are options - they can write the assignments on a blackboard and have students write down their assignments.

Not sure if I want my kids to go to a school where they can't think thru a solution other than 'less homework'

[jdlh8894]

8. Hear,Hear!!!!!

Well said.n/t

[Liquorice]

11. They give out these big "packets" of fill in the blank type homework now. It's

a bad trend, IMO.

[SoCalDem]

16. dupe

[Kadie]

18. Yes!

There is a lot of that!

[SoCalDem]

20. Flashing back to the smell of fresh mimeo in the morning

:)

Mimeograph handout memories
Posted: Mon Mar 17, 2008 6:14 am Central Time
http://www.retroland.com/retrotalk/viewtopic.php?t=18024

Before the days of computers with word processing programs, desktop publishing and photocopying machines that make decent photocopies, students were often given mimeographed handouts as part of their assigned schoolwork or homework. The only problem was that the printed word was next to unreadable and any pictures or diagrams were much harder to decipher than ancient pictograms on a cave wall.



Being a student of the public school system in the 1970s and 1980s, I was subjected to mimeographed schoolwork that made me feel like I was being punished and that I could not read very well. But the truth was that I could read okay, I just couldn't read mimeographed material very well. On top of the problems with the written text that looked like it had bled purple blood onto the page, the mimeographed copies had creases in them which meant that parts of the written text were missing because they were folded away in the creases, which looked like giant purple slashes that tore diagonally across the page. From the 8th grade on, I went to an alternative junior high school and then an alternative high school where I never had to read, or do homework assignments off of another mimeographed sheet of paper, ever. Maybe that's why I have a masters degree and I didn't drop out of school.



Also, at one of the elementary schools I attended, there was a hand crank mimeograph machine that was kept in the school clinic. There were horror stories from the school nurse of how the hand crank mimeograph machine had come apart and spilled purple ink all over teachers and teachers aides who attempted to make copies of classroom handouts to give to the children.



I checked out Wikipedia this morning and found out that the mimeograph machine was Thomas Edison's fault. Oops! I meant invention.



If you were old enough to have gone to public school before the mid 1980s, what were your memories of mimeographed handouts?

[NYC_SKP]

12. A lot of kids have crappy parents who spend their money on other things...

...and can't be bothered.

Let me tell you, there is nothing sadder than a kid who would like very much to learn, to be normal, and their parents just get in the way.

There are a few kids like this in every classroom, teachers usually step up.

And they do so out of their own pockets and the goodness of their hearts.

The least the government could do would be to let them deduct these expenses.

[Odin2005]

13. Kids get too much homework, anyway.

Too many teachers even give out more homework as collective punishment when a few kids are acting up in class.

[Dramarama]

14. In middle school

2002-03, the district voted on two ply or one ply toilet paper. Scary

[Kalyke]

19. California gives paper to its students?

Here in Tennessee, parents have to provide notebook paper and pens and pencils.

[Kadie]

21. Most of the paper the teachers use

is for copies. They also provide (or did last year) the lined paper for the younger kids. I think it is around 3rd and 4th grade that the kids start taking in their own notebooks, and supply their own paper.