As+supply+costs+rise,+school+districts+conserve,+look+to+parents

= = =By Matthew Santoni= =//Published by the PITTSBURGH TRIBUNE-REVIEW//= =//8/18/11//= = = = = =Now's the time when students are getting a reality check: Summer vacation soon will end.= =Their school districts have notified them to get pencils, binders, maybe even calculators. Retailers are promoting back-to-school sales, to which their parents may be dragging them.= =A few suburban districts still are saving students and families some hassle by providing all supplies, and some with budget constraints are trying to avoid passing more supply costs on to parents.= =Earlier this month, Columbus-based Huntington Bancshares Inc. released its annual "backpack index," which samples school-supply lists across six states, picking the supplies most schools use and adding up the price of buying them online through retailers such as Staples and OfficeMax.= =Huntington spokeswoman Maureen Brown said the majority of the increases in the index were because of more schools adding or increasing "pay-to-play" fees for after-school sports and activities, though some schools were asking students to bring more of their own supplies.= ="There are some increases in (the cost of) supplies ... and there are more supplies being added. Instead of two notebooks, the schools may be asking them to bring three," Brown said. "The costs are up very slightly, maybe a few cents more, but when you add it all up, there's an increase."= =More schools are asking students to bring in paper products, such as tissues and paper towels, as districts try to reduce the cost of buying them themselves, Brown said.= =Mt. Lebanon School District spokeswoman Cissy Bowman said tissues are among the few items elementary school students are asked to bring at the height of the winter cold season; the district provides most other school supplies. Mt. Lebanon students are expected to provide their own backpacks, binders and, for high school students, graphing calculators, which can cost $100 or more, depending on their complexity.= =The district's budget for supplies has shrunk year after year, down 2.7 percent in 2011-12 to $1,325,716, said Bowman.= ="Our supply budget's gone down; it keeps getting sliced and sliced," she said, but parents haven't been expected to pick up the slack yet. The district has been able to maintain its current system through a favorable contract to buy supplies through Office Depot, Bowman said.= = **Also on the list** = =Pine-Richland elementary school officials ask most students to bring in tissues and a bottle of hand sanitizer, while kindergarten students at Wexford Elementary are asked to provide napkins, paper towels, plastic utensils, disinfecting wipes and hand soap.= =To keep Pine-Richland's supply budget down, the district has been ordering supplies only as needed and returning unused supplies to its central warehouse, said spokeswoman Rachel Hathhorn. Teachers then submit lists of needed supplies to the building principal, who looks over the budget and available stock to determine how to fill each request. The district is reducing printing costs by only posting its school calendars online, she said.= =Carol Bonnar of West Allegheny schools said her district is continuing to provide school supplies but is cutting costs by running a smaller number of printers and copiers; promoting e-mails over printed memos and communications; and cutting down on employees' use of "small personal appliances," such as coffee makers.= =Keystone Oaks spokesman James Cromie said his school district provides most school supplies, including things like calculators if the teachers request them.= ="We provide writing utensils, paper, books and other supplies, depending on the teachers," Cromie said. "Our only expectation is for students to bring a few pencils, and maybe a notebook."= =Reducing school supplies was one of the public's cost-cutting suggestions when Keystone Oaks was considering closing two of its three elementary schools, though Cromie said any savings there would only be in the "thousands" of dollars.= =In the North Hills School District, "we provide most things that students need," said spokeswoman Tina Vojtko. "But there's always specialty items that teachers request on a class-by-class basis."= =Even though North Hills provides basics such as pencils, paper, glue sticks and crayons, the typical shopping list for parents includes three-ring binders, extra erasers, highlighters and, of course, tissues and antibacterial products.= =Having families buy some supplies has an added "psychological" effect of preparing students for class, Vojtko said.= ="I don't think there's been a lot of fluctuation in our lists. The only difference I've seen is the addition of hand sanitizers and Clorox wipes," she said.= ="There's a lot of things on these lists that would have been there when I was a student."= = Read more: [|As supply costs rise, school districts conserve, look to parents - Pittsburgh Tribune-Review] [] = = = = = =News= =home=