Sending Our Children Back-To-School: Nuisance Due to the Government

Has sending our children back-to-school become more of a nuisance in recent years? I remember just a few years ago when the teachers would send a basic school supplies list before school started with such things as pencils, erasers, scissors, crayons, and notebook paper. Now it seems as though parents have to buy everything for the class to run smoothly for the year. For example, my children received their school supplies list a couple weeks ago and it had such things as five reams of printer paper, thumb drives, red grading pens, stickers for good work, etc... What has going back-to-school become? For me, a nuisance rather than an exciting moment.

I don't blame the teachers at all for this money fiasco; in fact they are in the same boat. Teachers are just as much caught up in all of these economic problems as anyone else and is therefore the reason for such requests before the school year starts. I blame the economy for such a mess. Not just the national economy but also the local state economies as well. The local state government and U.S. government are more worried about spending money on free soda pop for prisoners ($773,000), unused government flight tickets ($100 million), U.S. government bail out package for football ($20 billion), and executive bailout AIG bonuses ($165 million per executive bonus) than spending that money on education programs for our children. Do you have any idea how much just a couple useless government spending programs would assist the education system throughout the U.S.? What happened to the importance of educating our future? It seems as though sending children back-to-school and educating them throughout the year is more of a nuisance for the local and state governments.

I get on the Internet and read the news and see the headline links throughout the pages and see things like "Obama's Moms Back to School Initiative" and "Government Grants and Loans: Adult Education" and think if the government is going to create programs and spend millions of dollars to send adults to college then why isn't the U.S. government giving our schools more money for supplies and to pay the teachers that give our children a future. Where are the priorities in life today? I see more people getting paid millions of dollars and buying their big houses and expensive cars, but less on educating our young. There are more schools closing and teachers being laid off than ever in history. So is sending our children back-to-school a nuisance or is the education and government systems a nuisance full of frivolous government spending programs that don't benefit anyone accept the people padding their pockets?

I honestly don't mind purchasing five reams of paper and stickers for good conduct for the use within their classrooms, because teachers shouldn't be purchasing that stuff either. The education districts and the local state governments should be purchasing these items and all items to educate our children throughout the year. That is what fiscal education funding is for: paying teachers for what they do, supplying school purpose items, and up keeping our children's education just as theirs was when they were younger. Let the government officials not forget where their knowledge came from.

Illegitimate and wasteful government spending should be put to a halt and the money going towards that spending should be redirected elsewhere where it needs to be used, like youth education. Is back-to-school a nuisance? Yes, to a point. I care about my children's education so I will spend what I have to in order to give them the opportunities I have had and to ensure their intellect be built upon, but remember this is what the U.S. and local governments want us to do as they can keep spending money on useless programs that benefit only them in the long run. On the other side of the spectrum I am privileged to spend my money on sending my children back-to-school, as it will only make them smarter and allow them to prosper in needed knowledge to help them grow and create a history of their own. So in this aspect, no it is not a nuisance to send my children back-to-school this year or any year thereafter as education is one of the most important impacts on any society.