By: Ahmed Jallow
NC Newsline
Justin Lane teaches agriculture electives at Carnage Magnet Middle School in Wake County, where students plant, measure and diagram their own gardens. That means his classroom needs a diverse toolkit. Scissors to trim plants, construction paper to draw plants, identifying rulers to measure growth, and a lot of sharpies because they get lost easily.
On Thursday afternoon, Lane was among almost a dozen teachers attending the Wake Ed Partnership’s “Tools4Schools” supply drive to stock up on school supplies.
“Instead of having parents do a wish list and putting extra weight on families, this is just a super sweet gift for both the teachers and the kids,” Lane said. “This is a treasure.”
The Wake Ed Partnership, a Wake County nonprofit which advocates for improving public education, has distributed $1.6 million worth of supplies over the past two and a half years through its “Tools4Schools” program. It has more than 100 collection points, including Staples stores and YMCAs and also uses Amazon wish lists to collect donations.
In North Carolina, teachers now spend an average of $1,632 a year out of pocket on classroom supplies — the second-highest figure in the nation, according to a recent survey. That’s well above the national average of $1,021.
And it’s an amount that could increase this year as inflation and tariffs are driving up the prices of school supplies. An analysis by Groundwork Collaborative and The Century Foundation found that typical first-day school supplies are up 7.3%, nearly three times the rate of inflation. Individual items such as index cards have surged by more than 40%, while binders and folders are up by about 13%.
Tariffs on goods from China, which is a major source of school supplies, are a primary reason behind the spike. The added costs are putting pressure not just on teachers but also on families doing back-to-school shopping.
“If teachers don’t have what they need, they can’t teach, and students don’t have what they need,” said Keith Poston, president of WakeEd Partnership. “Anything we can do to provide them with tangible things is also a way of saying thank you. It’s an appreciation thing.”
Poston said that while the effort helps in the short term, it doesn’t replace the need for public funding. “We recognize that the private sector and nonprofits can’t take the place of sustained, significant investment,” he said. “Our public schools have been underfunded for decades, and things are only getting worse.”
This school year marks Jess Holloway’s fifth year teaching at East Millbrook Magnet Middle School. Holloway said teachers paying for classroom supplies has become so routine that it’s simply expected.
“I feel like it’s so normalized that most people don’t throw a fuss about it, because that’s just been the standard,” Holloway said. “Teachers buy their own supplies. Teachers work outside of our contracted work hours.” She said this was her first time attending a supply drive, describing it as a critical resource with her next paycheck still weeks away.
“It does feel good to walk in and have what I need. It shows the community values what we do,” she said.
