How much is your school’s suggested donation?
SiO2 Says:
November 4th, 2009 at 7:34 amLas Lomitas elem school foundation has a suggested donation of $1100 per child. AFAIK this is the highest among RBA schools. Most are around $700.
Hey everyone. Do you know of a higher suggested donation? Is $1100 the highest? That seems really low for the Bay Area. I mean, these are public schools – the annual fee shouldn’t be crazy like $30,000 like the private schools, but it should be higher.
Also, are these published anywhere?
Let’s get some more information!
November 6th, 2009 at 6:54 am
The amounts are usually published in the foundation’s newsletter.
Saratoga and Los Altos elementary are around $700.
The donations pay for things that are now extras in elem school, like art, music, P.E. Districts that don’t have the foundations may offer these but will charge the parents. Or they may not offer them at all.
On the bright side, property taxes are low if you held your house for 20 years. And those folks probably don’t particularly care about schools anymore.
So CA school spending is around $5500 for most schools (revenue limit) but is higher for ones that are funded by local prop tax (e.g. Saratoga, Los Altos, Los Gatos, Palo Alto) – these range from $8000 to $12000. I’m not sure if those figures include the foundation donations are not.
Whereas in NJ (Burbed’s favorite) school spending between $12k and $20k per student!
It’s puzzling why it’s so low here. Our taxes are not as high as Rush Limbaugh would have you believe, but they are not particularly low either. The only thing I can come up with is that there’s relatively more children here per taxpayer. Or we spend money on other things – but we are low on spending on roads and infrastructure too.
November 6th, 2009 at 7:55 am
Los Gatos suggests $600 for family with 1 child, and
$900 for family with multiple kids.
November 6th, 2009 at 8:17 am
Los Gatos Education Foundation
http://www.lgef.org/campuscampaign-09.html
Saratoga Education Foundation
http://www.saratoga-sef.org/why-give/donor-levels.html
November 6th, 2009 at 10:12 am
Ahh, a subject near and dear to my heart. The PIE foundation for my kid’s schools in the slums of Palo Alto recommend $650 for one, $1350 for two and and $1950 for three.
Either someone can’t do simple multiplication problems or they really believe that multiple kids per family are more burdensome to the system than one.
This is all in addition to the PTA requested donations, which vary between schools, but average around $350. So I guess the total is $1000 per student in the slums of palo alto.
But don’t forget the library donations or the pertpetual fundraisers (you would think they could pick decent restaurants, but they don’t.)
November 6th, 2009 at 10:18 am
SiO2:
Education is a funny business. In non-education, non-government world, spending less and still getting a good product is considered a very good thing.
But in education, if it isn’t expensive, it can’t possibly be good. And if we aren’t spending as much as the neighbors, then our kids can’t possibly educated as well.
Not saying that it doesn’t matter, but test scores–as bad an indicator as they are–are a better measure than dollars per student.
November 6th, 2009 at 11:15 am
If I ever have kids I’ll probably move back to Northern Virginia, there are good schools there, and the houses in the best school pyramid cost only $300-$360/sqft. The schools here aren’t that good, I tutor kids in math in the Foster City-San Mateo school district, I don’t like the way it is taught sometimes, and I don’t much care for these “California” books, you know, the one’s with the state outline on them.
If I ever have kids, I’m out of here.
November 6th, 2009 at 11:51 am
The schools here aren’t that good, I tutor kids in math in the Foster City-San Mateo school district, I don’t like the way it is taught sometimes, and I don’t much care for these “California” books, you know, the one’s with the state outline on them.
Wait a minute, that’s supposed to be one of the prestige districts in the Bay Area!
Please do share your experiences. What’s going on?
November 6th, 2009 at 11:52 am
The donations pay for things that are now extras in elem school, like art, music, P.E. Districts that don’t have the foundations may offer these but will charge the parents.
How does that work? Do they send an invoice home with each student?
November 6th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
Burbed,
They do send an invoice home, it just reads like this:
“If you don’t donate money so your child can play the recorded in third grade, he or she is doomed doomed doomed to a poverty stricken life as a florist in some god-forsaken town like Austin.”
The guilt trips are amazing.
November 6th, 2009 at 12:58 pm
The PIE foundation for my kid’s schools in the slums of Palo Alto recommend $650 for one, $1350 for two and and $1950 for three.
——
Although it is nothing but funding your kids education, at least you will be able to brag about it as “donation“ by pretending that you are actually doing charity for some poor school in Africa.
November 6th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
To get maximum donation, they need to start issuing some kind of prestige license plate, like this, this, or this.
November 6th, 2009 at 2:01 pm
Burbed,
It doesn’t seem that bad at the high school level, and I know they can’t tailor the courses to each student. But last year the 8th Grade Algebra at Bowditch, they seemed to have word problems that were suited to using two variables, back when they had not yet dealt with such system of equations in the class yet. There were other more minor issues, I didn’t like the way the “California” algebra book had arranged some problems, and how some problems appeared. The Geometry book is not bad per se. The Pre-calc book is fine.
The high school I went to definately dealt with this stuff at a faster pace though.
I really don’t see the point of spending $800K and up to have your kids go to an OK high school, and then be asked for money every year.
November 6th, 2009 at 2:02 pm
Because you’ll only donate more if you can tell the world how generous you were?
November 6th, 2009 at 2:03 pm
“To get maximum donation, they need to start issuing some kind of prestige license plate, like this, this, or this.”
Those aren’t prestige license plates, DA.
November 6th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
Those aren’t prestige license plates, DA.
—–
Get the facts in RealEstater’s way:
Dreaming of buying investment property is equivalent of being real estate investor.
Paying for your own kids education is equivalent of “donation”.
Having cheap license plate frame is equivalent of having prestige license plate.
November 6th, 2009 at 2:55 pm
They do send an invoice home, it just reads like this:
I’d love to feature some of these.
Please bring them to class for show and tell… uh, i mean this site…
November 6th, 2009 at 6:04 pm
Pralay says,
>>Having cheap license plate frame is equivalent of having prestige license plate.
Membership at the foundation is $5000. Pay due respect when you see that license plate. Cops will let you get away with speeding if you have the plate.
November 6th, 2009 at 6:30 pm
Yes, Pralay.
Please pay respect where respect is due.
November 7th, 2009 at 2:07 pm
Next week family and I are leaving the Bay Area to move back to the East Coast (I’ll miss you Burbed!). I just checked my new county’s per pupil spending: $15k. That’s almost 50% more than my RBA city. I can’t even imagine what kind of teachers you can hire in the RBA on $10k per student.
November 7th, 2009 at 2:58 pm
Well Woodie, we all wish you well. Thanks for contributing to the bay area exodus.
With respect to your comment about the amount a school spends on students, please remember this: Because the school is not in the bay area, people are not as intelligent. Therefore, they require more money spent to obtain the same amount of education.
November 7th, 2009 at 8:59 pm
@ anon #20
HA HA HA! Still hysterical : )
November 7th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
Well in Bay area we don’t have to spend on Asian students for Math.
November 9th, 2009 at 5:32 am
Realestater is a moron. The CHP 11-99 liscense plate frame pisses CHiPs off as they caught on to the scam years ago. If he really drove a Porsche (and is an active member of the Porsche Owners Club) he’d know that.
November 9th, 2009 at 5:40 am
Oh…and it was $1800 for a lifetime membership (with frame and accompanying badge) and $500 for an annual membership (no frame or badge). It was never $5000.
They no longer offer it so now you know he’s full of shit.
November 9th, 2009 at 8:19 am
Burbed #8-
To do the art, music, etc, (in non-foundation districts) you do have to pay. I don’t know if you prepay or if they invoice afterwards.
gallileo #5 -
“Education is a funny business. In non-education, non-government world, spending less and still getting a good product is considered a very good thing. ”
If you look at the test scores around here, there’s definitely a correlation between per pupil spending and test scores. Saratoga, Los Gatos, Los Altos, PA – higher spending, higher test scores.
Plus, there’s more to life than test scores. In these districts students can have art, music, etc – in other districts they cannot. These activities are not free.
Yes, in the private sector, spending less and getting more is good. But even so, spending more generally gives better results. Flying business class is better than coach.
Having said this, spending is not sufficient. Parental involvement is more important for sure. Cupertino elem doesn’t spend a lot, but has high test scores. The parents have a lot to do with this.
November 9th, 2009 at 8:22 am
Cardinal2007 #12-
“I really don’t see the point of spending $800K and up to have your kids go to an OK high school, and then be asked for money every year”
If you have two kids, RBA is cheaper than nonRBA + private school. Even with the donations (which at least are tax deductible). So that’s why one someone would do this.
Woodie Gutrie #19-
Good luck. It does surprise me how much more east coast areas spend on schools.
I wonder how much school buses cost to run? Few districts here have school buses, but they are common in other areas. Sometimes kids can walk or bike to school, but it’s often too far. So parents end up driving, and taking on that cost in gas and maintenance. Same with field trips. Lower prop taxes through prop13, higher expenses through donations and self-driving.
November 12th, 2009 at 9:06 am
Here is some interesting reading about the state of CA’s public schools:
http://www.ed-data.k12.ca.us/Articles/article.asp?title=California%20comparison
November 12th, 2009 at 1:20 pm
Silica #26:
“If you have two kids, RBA is cheaper than nonRBA + private school. Even with the donations (which at least are tax deductible). So that’s why one someone would do this.”
But nonRBA is cheaper than RBA, and the schools are better. You’re all deluded because CA schools are ranked 48th, so you compare them to regular CA schools. Go to other metro areas and compare the schools there that don’t ask you for money, that you can buy a house for $500k- $600k and so on, and you will see the real difference. If I ever have kids I want them to go somewhere were they can be challanged, I don’t think the setup of schools here would do that.
November 12th, 2009 at 5:07 pm
#29 – I was comparing RBA (Palo Alto, etc) to nonRBA (San Jose)+private school not nonRBA (New Jersey).
It’s likely that a CA private school (Harker etc) is better than the RBA public school. But there’s other advantages to living in RBA over NonRBA (SJ).
Is an RBA public school better than a top NJ public school? that’s a good question. I honestly don’t know. NJ spends more, that’s for sure.
November 12th, 2009 at 5:25 pm
Tenafly vs Palo Alto smackdown! I don’t know if Tenafly is a top school district in NJ but it comes up on this blog frequently.
Palo Alto average SAT scores:
http://pausd.org/community/board/downloads/item_011.pdf slide 11
For class of 2007
Critical Reading (formerly Verbal): 624
Math: 655
Essay/Writing: 615
Total: 1894
Tenafly:
http://education.state.nj.us/rc/rc07/dataselect.php?c=03;d=5160;s=050;lt=CD;st=CD&datasection=all
First of all, the most recent data is class of 07. What’s up?
Critical Reading (formerly Verbal): 572
Math: 619
Essay/Writing: 570
Total: 1761
Take that!
Obviously there’s more to a school than SAT scores but this is mildly interesting.
If you look at SAT point per $, PA really kicks butt.
Some other interesting things about Tenafly:
Hebrew is the 3rd most common language spoken at home, 5.3%.
Has 21 AP classes. That’s pretty cool. PA only has 16.
Tenafly’s per pupil spending is $14.8k vs $9.7k for PA.
Average class size is 18.8, vs 25 or so for PA.
November 12th, 2009 at 5:30 pm
According to this, Tenafly is the #3 school in NJ
http://njmonthly.com/articles/towns_and_schools/highschoolrankings/top-new-jersey-high-schools-by-rank.html
From my cursory analysis I’d say it’s comparable to PA.
So, Cardinal2007, it’s true that Tenafly is cheaper than PA, but the schools are comparable.
It would be interesting to know what a median NJ school is like vs a median SJ school (say, Campbell or something like that.) But not so interesting that I’m going to dig it up.
November 12th, 2009 at 6:05 pm
#30,
I was thinking more of Fairfax Co, VA, specifically Great Falls and McLean, VA, granted I under-estimated the costs a bit. A decent house would cost $750K, 2700sqft, 5bd, 3bd, .31acre lot, nicely remodeled. As for high school I would have my kids (if I ever have any) go to Thomas Jeffeson High School, according the sources I find Average:
Reading: 722
Math: 749
But those are not important, that’s the high school I went to, and if I ever have kids I would want them to go there, or a high school that’s similar in many ways, particularly the focus on academics. Also while I might theoretically afford a $750K house if I marry someone with a similar income as me, $1.2-2M is way out of my league. I could also move to a less expensive part of the county once the youngest child is in high school due to the setup of the schools there.
November 13th, 2009 at 7:22 am
#32, Thomas Jefferson looks like quite a school. Selective admission will give a very good class characteristic. There’s not many schools like that around here. I think there’s one in Santa Cruz, and some in LA. But I can’t think of a selective admission public high school in Santa Clara County.
So I must agree, TJ is better than PA, LG, Saratoga, etc, due to its selectivity. It is an unusual case however.
November 13th, 2009 at 9:15 am
lowell in SF
December 21st, 2009 at 11:53 am
Adopt-A-Classroom is a nonprofit organization that’s had a lot of success helping elementary schools fundraise in order to get school supplies in the classroom… some classes lack even basic materials. This may be of interest for teachers, parents, and PTA / PTO groups that want a transparent and accountable program. Any school in the US can participate and schools in San Francisco are here: http://www.adoptaclassroom.org/adoption/LocatorCity.aspx?State=CA&City=San%20Francisco&Private=0&inter=0
February 7th, 2010 at 1:18 pm
[...] continue this discussion! How much is your school’s suggested donation? | SF Bay Area Home Price and Mortgage Insanity Blog … How much is your school’s suggested [...]
June 21st, 2010 at 9:44 pm
Expected donations sounds like a big marketing scam.
Maybe those who are not paying their fair share of taxes should donate a tad more. Poor families paying 20-30k for “great schools” and than pressured to donate more while those who don’t pay much just milk it. 2M for zero land and average home w/ GREAT SCHOOOOOLS, hope you have good investments to pay for retirement.
February 8th, 2012 at 2:06 pm
[...] continue this discussion! How much is your school’s suggested donation? | SF Bay Area Home Price and Mortgage Insanity Blog … How much is your school’s suggested [...]