To Pee Or Not To Pee.....

I have just been listening to the prinicpal of a Cork secondary school on the News At One who hit the headlines after writing to parents of pupils asking them to send in toilet rolls! This - though a novel approach - is not a new problem. I have heard of schools rationing and counting squares on toilet rolls with limits on how much a child can have, depending on 'what they are doing'!

Now this is not born from anything in said schools other than that toilet roll purchase can run into tens of thousands of euro worth - in what are becoming ever tighter budgets in schools.

I myself sit on a national school Board of Management and I can confirm that we mostly spend our entire meetings trying to solve problems related to money and the lack of it. Where we should be discussing the pupils and their development.

I noted on the news that the Department of Education sent in a statement to the effect that the school in questions' capitation budget had increased. True - as have the schools costs, helped in no small part by additional costs which have been introduced for schools in recent years - with no subsequent additonal funding to cover these. Costs such as waste charges, water rates (schools are not exempt), wage agreements, along with cost increases in every other area practically that you can think of.

Does the Department really expect anyone to believe that the funding they provide actually covers the cost of running a school? Do they have children in schools themselves? All parents know the energies (and ingenuity) that schools expend on raising funds.

I know schools that tell the children they can afford heating or activities - but not both! And I have no reason to assume they aren't being straight up. Our teachers and schools (most of them) do a very good job but any extra energy should be spent tackling those who fall through the cracks, those who have additional problems -not fund-raising for loo-rolls. If my childrens' school asked, I'd happily stump up some toilet rolls - as I stump up for the many myriad fund-raising activities in their schools. One or two rolls doesn't make much of a dent in a budget but start trying to pay for the amount needed for a school of say, 500 children? That's a different prospect.

That's one big load of ...........