• Yes flattened-bernie

    Instead of schools just providing materials for the classrooms, each family has to buy their own kid a dedicated set of supplies. You could pool the supplies and distribute news ones as needed, but if you do this for anything beyond tissues, parents start freaking out because “I bought MY child that SPECIFIC crayon set and it’s not fair that OTHER kids gets to use it because THEIR parents didn’t care enough to get them a special set.”

      • Wheaties [she/her]@hexbear.net
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        1 year ago

        What’s even more nuts is that this goes for teachers, too. It’s skilled labor, requiring years of college, in demand practically everywhere; yet the pay is shit and part of it has to go to stocking your classroom.

        Meanwhile, the school board members just voted themselves each a new, fully-paid SUV.

      • Honestly, I don’t know how common or uncommon it is elsewhere. It’s just something that’s never made sense to me and the explanation is always a circular, “we don’t have the funding.” Okay, so rebudget. Get more funding. Tell us who’s gatekeeping giving pencils to schoolchildren so we can get give them a fucking swirly. That’s not an answer on it own.

        I would have done myself a lot less psychological damage during childhood if I’d understood earlier that, in cases like these, my autism is actually correct. It’s not that I have some deficit in understanding why these things are happening. It’s baseless convention and ritual all the way down.

    • JuneFall [none/use name]@hexbear.net
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      1 year ago

      The only problem with that is if people have other needs. I.e. in terms of different paper or texture feelings etc. However this, too, is easier when you know the standard and can see if that fits you.

      • Yeah, there would have to be stuff in place to make accommodations for sure. But we already do that for plenty of materials and needs. And currently most differentiation in materials is because parents want to splurge so their kids can have the “nice” things