Rising costs of a school day: preliminary findings from a recent online CA survey.

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22 August 2024

School uniforms cost money, school meals cost money, travel to school costs money, buying books, art equipment and other ‘school essentials’ costs money. The list seems endless, and that’s just for one child attending one school. Many parents this year will be thinking about what they will have to do without to afford these unavoidable expenses.

We know that the ‘average family’ spends hundreds of pounds each year on sourcing new clothes and equipment or trying to replace worn out or used up clothes and equipment. But exactly how much- we don’t know. So, we at Citizens Advice in Warwickshire asked parents of school-age children how much they spent last year, how much they expected to spend this year, and what sorts of things they would be spending their money on. Below are some of the preliminary findings*.

Preliminary research findings indicated that last year Warwickshire survey respondents with school-age children spent on average approximately £500 per pupil on a combination of school uniforms, school meals, school equipment, school travel and other ‘school costs’. They also indicated that 62% of respondents expect to pay “more” or “much more” for their childrens’ schooling this year than last. No respondents expected to pay less.

When asked what they spent money on, surveyed parents listed the following:

School uniform- 100%
Other essential clothing- 85%
School meals- 69%
Travel to school- 62%
School trips- 100%
Stationery, IT & other equipment- 62%
Other costs- 54%.

In addition to the above, preliminary research findings indicated that 85% of Warwickshire survey respondents with school-age children said they did not know where to go to get support with ‘school costs’. Further, this research found that 77% of respondents do not believe their school is doing enough to help struggling parents with ‘school costs’, while 85% do not believe their local authority is doing enough.

Finally, this preliminary research found that 23% of Warwickshire parents surveyed did not know that claiming ‘free school meals’ allows your school to claim hundreds of pounds per student in ‘pupil premiums’; and all respondents believed enrolment for ‘free school meals’ should be automatic for all those entitled?

These findings are only preliminary and we would like as many parents as possible to complete our survey (see below). Nevertheless, it would seem that parents spend money on a number of ‘school costs’ not just uniforms, they expect to spend more this year than last, and do not believe that schools and local authorities are doing enough to support low income families deal with these costs.

It is also worth noting that a significant proportion of respondents do not think they knew where to get help or that claiming ‘free school meals’ allowed schools to collect valuable ‘pupil premiums’.

The issue of school costs recurs every year as new parents enter the fray and prices, and the expectations of school administrations, continue to rise. If we are to break this cycle of ever increasing school costs, now is the time to mobilise elected representatives behind constructive cost-effective proposals. Citizens Advice, working in partnership across Warwickshire, believes it is time to have a proper debate on the issue.

*If you want to help us with our information gathering please click here and complete our short survey.

Note: This survey was online only and initially available only via the ‘Citizens Advice across Warwickshire’ TwitterX platform (@CAAcrossWarks), further supported by the Family Information Service. The results are preliminary and conclusions drawn from the findings above must be treated as provisional only.

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