...one branch of the Department of Education that Betsy DeVos hasn't gotten around to dismantling yet—finds that 94 percent of schoolteachers spend their own money buying supplies for their classrooms and students. On average, the teachers spend $479 a year.
(Having accompanied my daughter on several occasions to a Staples outlet during her years of teaching in inner-city Brooklyn, I can personally attest to the study's findings that teachers—and on occasion, teachers' parents—buy such basics as paper and pens when their schools run short.)
Rather than adequately funding public schools, our federal and some state governments have allowed teachers to take tax deductions, up to $250 annually, for their out-of-pocket school expenses. In their budget-balancing zeal (joke), Republicans initially proposed to eliminate that deduction in their tax bill, but were compelled to drop that proposal. Now, House Democrats have introduced a bill that would raise the allowable deduction to $500—not that the bill is going anywhere so long as Republicans control the government.
It makes you wonder if teacher colleges offer a course in school-supply shopping.