In February, I register my son for JK (junior kindergarten). Um, hello-he’s my BABY! How is it that he’s ready for school?
I’ll write more on that I’m sure over the next while, but since that will be stressful enough, at least I know I don’t have to worry about the long, ridiculous list of school supplies that I will be asked to send him with in the Fall.
How come I don’t worry about it, you ask? Because I know my school is already partnered with Best Tools for Schools – so I can purchase everything through them, a portion will be donated back to the school, and I don’t have to run around shopping.
Last year, I wrote about Best Tools for Schools after coming across it on Twitter (via @CandaceDx and @LaurieStJ – the brains behind the business) and thought it was a brilliant idea. Over the past many months, I’ve not only confirmed that but also discovered that the owners, Candace and Laurie, are incredible, smart and very kind people.
In the summer they invited me to participate in a challenge – Shop for the items on 2 actual school lists and write about my experience. Below is a summary of what I discovered (it also can be found on their website). In summary: While I thought that it would save me time by using Best Tools for Schools, I still assumed I could save myself money. Boy, was I wrong. It was a stressful, annoying experience that confirmed one thing – when my son’s list comes home for the Fall, I will be going online, pointing, clicking and not even changing out of my pj’s.
With kindergarten registration coming up, ask your school if they know about Best Tools for Schools. Contact Candace and Laurie to get more information that you could bring with you. Trust me, save yourself the time (and probably money) and more importantly – save your sanity!
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Total cost if I ordered it online: 127.45
Total cost by doing it myself: 126.89 (*plus $4 if I went back and got the right item instead of giving up!) so really: 130.89
Total time it took myself: 2 hours plus
Total time if I had done it online: 5 minutes
Amount of sanity I lost during the process: a lot
When I was asked to do the Best Tools for Schools challenge, I thought it was a perfect follow up to my original blog post about the website. This way, I’d be able to see how much things would cost in comparison to doing it online, and how easily I’d be able to fulfil the list. I went into the challenged with two biased opinions: 1- that I’d be able to get things cheaper 2-that Best Tools for Schools would be worth the extra dollars since it would save me time and headache. I was right about one thing, wrong about another. Read on to find out which was which…
First, a little preamble about the list: I chose 2 lists from a local school for grade 1 and grade 4 which represents the age difference between my children. I was amazed at the items on the list quite frankly. It was long, and in addition to the Best Tools for Schools supplies, there were requests for bookbags, shoes, and for the grade 4 student, a portable USB drive. These lists were longer than when I was in university! My first thought was that they are ridiculous. How is it that schools can ask for much of parents? What about families that are barely able to provide food on the table? How do they spend hundreds of dollars to prepare for school? That’s probably a whole blog post in itself, I digress. Let me return to the task at hand.
Attempt 1: I was doing errands anyway at Zellers so pulled into the parking lot at a Zellers that’s beside a Staples. Perfect, I thought. I can get everything done, or at least a good chunk started. I forgot the list. Parent Fail #1. I’d have to try again.
After a busy week, I was approaching the requested deadline, which I was treating as the first day of school. Fast forward 6 years and my delay in getting the kid’s school supplies will surely lead to whining, and proclamations about me being the worst mother ever. I was starting to stress. This was pretend school and already it was stressing me out! Sure, I had left it to the last minute, but I bet you anything when ‘real’ school comes I’ll be doing that too! So this is quite the true reflection. But this time, I had my lists. I was set. I had to get some other things anyway, so decided to start at the Superstore and then head to Staples. I could have done Walmart, but quite frankly I avoid that place at much as I can. It was the weekend and I wasn’t prepared for the mess that I knew it would be.
Stop 1: Superstore. I remember a time when school supplies were easy to find at Loblaws or Superstore. Now, I wondered around aimlessly. Finally, I found the small small section near the back. I was able to get a few things off the lists. There were the binders, but I figured I’d wait and get them at Staples thinking they’d be cheaper there. The selection was minimal though and there were only a few things I could cross off the list. I got the other things I needed and left.
Stop 2: I was off to Staples, which is really close to home anyway. I go in and of course, there are aisles of school supplies ready to go and grouped. A whole section for Crayola! Excellent, both lists had requests for pencil crayons, markers etc. Oh crap. What’s that? A pack of 10 Crayola ‘broad’ markers. I had bought a pack of 8 at Superstore. I franitcally checked the list. Yup, supposed to be the pack of 10. I thought forget it, what 2 colours could possibly be missing?! Will my kid be shunned if they don’t have magenta and teal?! Parent Fail#2 I started feeling a little guilty. Remember, this is fake school!! Still, I was even more shocked to see the pack of 10 costs $4 more* than the pack of 8. Does that make any sense?
After going up and down each aisles about 3 times, randomly looking at the list, then at the aisles, adding stuff etc. I ran into a few snags:
-Couldn’t find options for lined paper and the packs they had were 150 per pack. I need 250, but I had been wondering the aisles for a while and was getting frustrated so I only got 1 pack. Oops. Parent Fail #3.
-Each list asked for 3 specific erasers. They came in a pack of 2. I had to get 3 packs to meet the list requirements since each list asked for 3. Expensive!
-Do they not sell highlighters separately anymore?! I got a pack of four to meet the list.
I finally started to feel like I was coming to an end. And by this point, I wanted it to be done. I looked at the list and realized that I hadn’t gotten the binders at Superstore. No problem, there was an aisle dedicated to them. Well, all of these were way more expensive! Okay, no problem. Worse case is I don’t have the binders for my report (or the kids ‘first day of school’ Parent Fail#4. Why was I feeling pretend guilt?!). I would just take the amount into account for the report, since I took note of the price at Superstore, and I wasn’t prepared to pay over a dollar more for each one. One last look at the lists and I was done. I was missing kleenex and freezer bags. I was supposed to get those at Superstore! ARGH. Okay, fine. I’ll make one more stop, get the binders while I’m there and be done.
Stop 3: I get the binders. I get the kleenex. At this point I am hot and irritated that my kids are going to school tomorrow. Oh wait, it’s all pretend! Man, I was getting worked up. I get the freezer bags. The best part? As I walk out of the aisle, I see a whole ‘seasonal’ row of school supplies on display. Are you kidding me?! Where was this during stop number 1? I scan quickly in a furry, irritated that I hadn’t come across this sooner but see that I couldn’t have gotten everything on the list anyway.
Done. Home I go. It’s been more than 2 hours. I had to drive all over, return to one place and even then I still messed up.
On top of all of this, if there really was school coming, I’d have clothes to buy, indoor shoes, a combination lock, a USB stick, lunch bag and back packs all according to the list. It costs a fortune!
Remember at the beginning when I said that I went into this experiment thinking it would cost me less but would save me time? The second part is absolutely true. This took me over 2 hours. It was stressful, and quite frankly annoying. I have my own beef about why the list is so long and am truly concerned about how some families can afford this. This is another reason why Best Tools for Schools is great. They have a program where you can donate a box to a student in the classroom who otherwise may not be able to afford it, and 4$ from each box goes to the school. My time is worth something, and spending it running around for all these specific supplies is ridiculous. Also, do you know how busy these stores will be leading into September? Not my idea of a good time.
The other thing I assumed was that at least, if there was a saving grace in all of this, if I were to do it myself, I’d save some money. Guess what? That wasn’t even the case! It basically cost me the same as it would have if I sat in front of my computer, entered my credit card and press ‘purchase’. How is that?! In many places I didn’t even buy the name brand. Could I have found a way to save some money? Maybe. But I’m not all that convinced. The closer we get to school, the more sales there are. But my time is still worth more than saving 25 cents off of pencils isn’t it? I think so. Besides, to maximize all the sales, you’d have to go to different stores as they hosted them. I don’t think that would be very fun.
In conclusion, I have to say that having experienced the pain of running around trying to get all of these things for school is not fun. It’s stressful. A program like Best Tools for Schools is so brilliant for parents. It doesn’t cost more than doing it yourself, and saves you all the difficulties associated with shopping for these supplies. I wasn’t even doing it for a real school year and yet I forgot the list, forgot items on the lists, got mad, had to go back and forth to different stores. There has to be a better way. Fortunately, there is with Best Tools for Schools.
The other thing I realized? I do not want my children to be ready for school…;)
