Last week I finished all the paper work and made all the payments so they can go to school.
Yes I said "payments". I guess that's normal here in Illinois for public schools. I have no idea how it is in other states. All I know, is that in Michigan, I never paid anything for my kids to go to public school. I kinda thought that was why it was called "public" school.
I'm a little irritated by all the fees I've been charged. But I guess I need to get used to it because I will be paying them every year.
Here's a little breakdown for you. These are the mandatory fees...
Registration Fee (or they call it "Instructional Fee")
~Bud $105
~Mac $105
~Tony $85
Locker Fee
~Bud $6
~Mac $6
~Tony $5
Gym Uniform Fee
~Bud $24
~Mac $24
~Tony $23
Heart Monitor Fee (every kid needs one)
~Bud $5
~Mac $5
~Tony $5
Student Activity Fee (whatever that means)
~Bud $50
~Mac $50
~Tony $25
Assignment Notebook Fee
~Bud $6
~Mac $6
~Tony $6
Senior Fee
~Bud $40
Foreign Language Fee
~Mac $15
Drafting/ CAD
~Bud $20
Misc Optional Fees
Yearbooks
~Bud $45
~Mac$45
~Tony $22
PTO Donation (so you can get a directory at the middle school)
~$20 +$5 for directory
High School Directory
~$30 (this thing better be bound and with gold leafing!)
Parking Lot Fee
~$100 (this one really irritates me!)
Right now none of my kids are in high school sports that would cost me $140 per kid per sport
or art class $40 to take that class and $100 for AP. Want to be in band that would cost you an extra $60, choir is $10. Business $14-25, Health class $10, Home Ec. $12- $53 depending on the class. I could go on and on....
If you want to take the bus and you live in an area that the bus doesn't normally stop $350. (I don't even want to know what that means....)
Grand Total...I don't even want to add it all up( I know it's in the $800-$900 range). We did the private school thing for 13 years, so I'm well aware of those costs...but this is public school for goodness sake (and you would not believe the taxes we pay here--ughh!). We were spoiled in Michigan I guess. I'm just curious, if you are reading this and live in another state and suffer the same "nickle and dimeing" or not let me know. Leave a comment and tell me what state you live in and if you have to pay crazy amounts of money to send your kids to public school.
Thanks and have a great school year!
thanks 
thanks 
6 comments:
Ths for stopping by today! Those fees are nuts! Maybe you are right about waiting! :-)
When we lived in Kansas, we had some similar fees, but not quite this bad. I think they charge the fees to pay for programs that they no longer can afford to pay via property taxes. Of course, it irritates me a lot that they fund schools through property taxes anyway, as if the only people who have children are property owners. It seems to me that if the schools are "public," the entire "public" ought to be contributing to their financial support. You have my sympathy, my friend.
Well Tori, as you know we're in Nebraska. We have fees to play sports, parking fee ($35 if you don't have this its $5 each ticket). Of course if your in cheerleading, swing choir band there are extra fees. Our yearbooks are $50 for the basic, if you want your name on it, it is more. Our property taxes is two and half times more than what we paid in Michigan and we had more land in Michigan. We have contemplated moving to Iowa when the kids graduate!!!
Yeah Tori, when we lived in WI we had fees also. The girls were only in Elementary school but there was the registration fee X's 3 and some others I don't remember. When we moved here to MI and they didn't ask for money I thought yeah right, "the school money police will hit me up one of these days" but as you know they never did. I don't understand what the city taxes go for, obviously NOT to the schools.
Ouch! I live in RI and I am not going to complain anymore about the "fees" we have to pay. They are not ANYWHERE near what you describe. I don't blame you for being upset.
Hey Tori.... Fun Blog!! We do pay fees in Indiana. But I don't think they are as much as yours... although Josh isn't as involved as other kids in things!! But even in the Christian school Nate is going to I am finding there are lots of "extra" fees on top of the already high tuition!!! What happened to life being simple!!! :)
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