Back-to-school delights! Freshly sharpened pencils, pristine notebooks, felts in a rainbow array, protractor sets with all the pieces intact and, if you are particularly lucky, a new backpack with lots of pockets to stash things. At least that’s what my kids looked forward to come September all through their school years.

My youngest graduated just six years ago but the story is very different today. In an incredibly short time, notebook and tablet computers, smart phones, complex calculators and e-readers have become the norm rather than the exception.  These new back-to-school tools are painting a very different financial picture for parents. 

The problem is not so much progress and the increasing move to cyber-based learning. It is dollars and cents: plain and simple. Big back-to-school financial issues just a few years ago were matters of 10 or 20 bucks here and there.  Unless you bought Mont Blanc pens for your kids you had to work pretty hard to spend more than $60, and that included a new backpack.

These days, technology issues the same siren call that a brand new pen-and- pencil set did for the previous generation, but the financial stakes are much higher.

Love your children though you do, don’t rush off to the tech store until you’ve had a conversation with their teachers. This is your first financial line of defence.

Find out which projects actually require tech support and when. Try to distinguish between what your children desire and what they need to accomplish their studies through the year.

I recall my daughter’s Grade 10 year when she told me she needed a graphing calculator for math class. She loved math and I didn’t hesitate to shell out $200 for this incomprehensible machine. Was it necessary? No. As it turned out she only really needed it for one three-week unit. Not only that but one was available for in-class work and also for study period when she could do her math homework.

The pressure to have the calculator came, not so much from her math passion, but because she wanted to fit in to a new school where most of her classmates had the device. Once the unit was finished, the calculator disappeared into her room, never to be seen again.

Yes, kids want their own stuff. And no one likes waiting in line to use something when you could just pull it out of your backpack. But it represents a good dose of financial reality for your children. Especially when there are others waiting in line with them. And in most cases there are going to be some kids who don’t have it all.

Here are some questions to ask your family and your kids’ teachers in order to keep back-to-school tech spending to a reasonable level.

What can we use from last year?
What can we share within the family?
What can be borrowed from the school library or used during school hours?

These questions are even more critical when you have more than one child. And if your youngsters are disappointed to know an iPad is not in the cards, remind them that a new version of whatever they want is just around the corner and if they save up you just might help them buy it.


     

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