Average Wake teacher spends more than $900 on school supplies. How to help

Teachers have long spent their own money on school supplies for their classrooms. But as consumer prices increase, state funding for school supplies is going down, and teachers are being forced to fill in the gap.

Tre Woods, a teacher at Millbrook High School in Raleigh, said he took the job simply because it was his passion.

“I love my job,” Woods said. “It’s always what I wanted to do growing up, and to have the opportunity to do it is everything I could imagine.”

Even though he didn’t become a teacher for the paycheck, Woods said he never anticipated how much money he would have to spend out of his own pocket just to stock his classroom.

Woods said he spends around $400 of his own money to prepare his classroom each school year. Other teachers spend even more.

According to WakeEd research, Wake County teachers spend an average of $926 out of their own pockets for classroom supplies each year. Since Tools4Schools began, more than $1 million in new classroom supplies have been given to Wake County Public School teachers through its free classroom supply store.

State funding for school supplies has been declining. Since 2011, the funding has been cut in half from about $61 per student to about $30 per student.

County funding and grants help, but Keith Poston with WakeEd Partnership said it’s still not enough.

“A lot of teachers will go back-to-school shopping for their own kids in one cart and then have another cart where they’re buying the same thing for their classrooms,” Poston said.

Tools4Schools, a free store for teachers at 1816 Capital Blvd., will help fill the gap. The store, which opens to teachers in August, is a one-stop shop for teachers to buy school supplies at no cost.

Staff members and student volunteers have been busy stocking the shelves with supplies ranging from earbuds to clipboards, dry-erase boards and pens.

“I think that it’s so important to give back to them and make sure that they have what they need to be able to teach us,” said Shiloh Eagle, a student volunteer.

Poston believes Tools4Schools is only a temporary solution to a long-term problem.

“Teachers shouldn’t have to have a place like this,” Poston said. “But they just don’t get the amount of school supplies funding that they should so they have to go out and buy their own supplies for the classroom.”

You can help students and teachers through Tools4Schools in four ways:

Brown is grateful for the effort from the community.

“To have nonprofit partners and community organizations that want to help support us for free … it’s awesome,” he said.