New research shows that 94% of staff pay for essential classroom materials. Five teachers describe how the schools funding crisis is leaving them out of pocket
Would you expect a nurse to have to pay for paracetamol for their patients or a firefighter to foot the bill for the water they use in putting out fires? With the schools budget in England slashed by £2.8bn since 2015 – an average of £53,000 and £178,000 for each primary and secondary school respectively – this is increasingly the reality for teachers.
New research from the National Education Union (the newly merged National Union of Teachers and the Association of Teachers and Lecturers) and TES has revealed that 94% of teachers are having to pay for school essentials such as books, while 73% are regularly paying for stationery supplies, because their schools are underfunded. For some, expenses total £1,000, while two-thirds have made cash donations – and this comes on top of the 42% of parents who were asked to donate to their children’s school this year. Other parents and carers had been asked to supply teaching equipment such as stationery and books, in addition to essentials such as toilet paper.
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