Nickel and Diming

When my oldest daughter started preschool this fall I paid them a pretty good chunk of money. They had an option to give us a 5% discount on tuition if we paid for the whole year up front. I had been socking away some money for a while and had enough to manage this, so I went ahead and did it. Better making 5% on the money than 2% in my savings, right?

I felt really lucky to have had the money to be able to do this. We’ve been through some tough financial times in the past, and I think we learned some really valuable lessons about debt and savings. That’s not what I want to write about today though.

What I want to write complain about today is how this preschool has been squeezing us for more and more money, and it hasn’t even been 2 months yet! Just off the top of my head, here are all the things they’ve said we need to pay for on top of tuition:

• Ice cream day
  
• Field trip
  
• School shirt to wear to field trip
  
• School pictures
  
• Yearbook
  
• Book Order
  
• Candy to throw from parade float
  
• Birthday treats to share with the class
  

I am not a stingy person. I want my daughter to have things the other kids have, and I want her to be happy and enjoy school. However, this is just completely over the top. We paid for preschool already, not to mention paying an ENROLLMENT FEE and a great big BOOK FEE. This isn’t even a fancy shmancy preschool. It’s a nice church-based program.

So what gives? ME. Hahahaha.

Ha.

Really – does a 4-year-old need a yearbook? It’s ridiculous. Matching t-shirts for a field trip? That’s what they tried to get me to buy this morning and it finally set me off.

The note says, “All students are to wear their L.S. Preschool T-shirts and/or hoodies.” I didn’t even know they had L.S. Preschool gear. And of course the field trip is tomorrow.

Did I pony up the money for the t-shirt? I know you’re wondering…

I did not. I refused. I told her teacher that it was too last minute and I didn’t have the money for it. She’s a good woman, and I caught her nodding her head when I inadvertently (I couldn’t stop them!) rolled my eyes about buying shirts for a field trip that we are chaperoning.

Later I complained to my husband about how that school is nickel and diming the heck out of us. He agreed and was very sympathetic while I ranted about how all these $5's and $10's are adding up. Even though he hasn’t been the one forking over the money on a practically weekly basis, he is dealing with preschool while he’s off work this week, and he’s the one going with her on the field trip tomorrow. So I told him it was his call.

And guess what?

He is going to buy her a t-shirt when he picks her up today. He says she can use it multiple times throughout the year and it’ll be fun for her to have a shirt with her school’s name on it. I totally bet he gets the hoodie too.

In the words of Precious Roy…. SUCKER!