Back-to-school shopping continues to be a financial stress and headache for many parents on a tight budget.
In the gymnasium of a school in the Hochelaga-Maisonneuve neighbourhood, Operation Backpack distributed school supplies this week to 413 children from low-income families in the neighbourhood. Families followed a short route through the large room, first choosing a backpack, then adding the various pencils, highlighters, school bags and notebooks that were on the list of items requested by their school.
“Thank you so much,” Davidson Irivuzimana tells the volunteers as he leaves the place with his arms full of supplies for his six children. “It’s not just useful, it’s very useful,” confides this single father of Burundian origin. “For us, the parents on welfare, it helps a lot.”
The free distribution is organized by the educational success support organization Je passe partout, one of about 30 local partners of Regroupement partage, which purchases school supplies in bulk, at preferential rates, for 10,000 children in Montreal and some other regions. The market value of each well-filled backpack is $150, says Audrey Renaud, executive director of Regroupement partage, which has been running Operation Backpack for more than 20 years thanks to private donations.
“This is a record number of children that we are going to help,” she said. Last year, 7,400 children received school supplies, compared to 6,200 in 2022. Mme Renaud notes that the demand for this service increases every year. The cost of school supplies — and, above all, of life in general — weighs on the shoulders of parents.
“Everything has become expensive: groceries, school supplies, clothes, shoes…”, reports Mélissa Quesnel, who was encountered during the operation in Hochelaga-Maisonneuve.
She pulls out the lists of items she needs to buy for her four children who attend school. In high school, the bill for textbooks, agendas and other educational tools that she has to buy through the school is close to $150 per child. A list of school supplies — binders, markers, etc. — is added to that. This is where Operation Backpack provides relief. “It gives a helping hand,” says M.me Quesnel.
According to the Consumer Price Index published by Statistics Canada, the increase in prices for textbooks and school supplies reached its highest level in 10 years over the past year. In June, the annual increase was 3.7%, compared to 2.8% the previous year. In school supply stores surveyed by The Dutywe are seeing increases of this order or slightly less this year. They had been much higher last year, particularly due to high transport costs from Asia.
The Regroupement partage, for its part, had rather noted last year an overall increase of 40% in all purchases of Operation Backpack, including food — a component abandoned this year. The final figures are not yet available for the current school year, but Mme Renaud has seen an increase of around 20% so far.
A plastic bag and some old pencil scraps
In Hochelaga-Maisonneuve, any surplus will be sent directly to schools, explains Samuel Carrier, general manager of Je passe partout. Because many families are not aware that help is being offered, and some children arrive at the start of the school year without the necessary equipment.
“We see students showing up at school with a plastic bag and old pencil stubs,” laments M.me Renaud: School staff usually try to remedy this. The supplement for the purchase of school supplies of $121 per child sent to families by the Quebec government is welcome, but in many families in precarious situations, this money is redirected towards housing or food, she believes.
In the current economic context, it is not only families living below the poverty line who are feeling the budgetary pressure of the start of the school year, believes Mélanie Laviolette, president of the Fédération des comités de parents du Québec (FCPQ). “Parents feel like it is the big additional expense that hurts,” she points out.
Strategies to reduce the bill
In this context, parents and schools are trying to limit the cost of back-to-school as much as possible. At Léo stationery store in Montreal, the owner of the place has noticed that the lists of required supplies have shrunk slightly. “There are fewer extras. They take the bare minimum,” says Monica Popa, who takes the time to chat with The Duty despite a large influx of customers. She estimates that the average bill for all the items on these lists, which her business prepares turnkey for parents, is between $110 and $120.
The FCPQ emphasizes that a watch was recently put in place by the school boards to “ensure that the fees charged to parents were real and that the items requested were actually going to be used.” Basically, the “just in case” has been eliminated. So that the material from the previous year can be reused, flexibility is also being asked of teachers regarding colors and formats, reports M.me Laviolette.
Met at the Léo stationery store with her two children, Carthia Fleurial says she was able to reduce her bill by reusing. “We’ll use this money for something else, like shoes for the start of the school year,” she says.
For its part, the Retail Council of Canada has noted, through a survey, some changes in Canadians’ back-to-school shopping habits. They are planning their purchases earlier and are prioritizing their purchases in-store rather than online more than ever. Nearly 46% of respondents said they consult flyers when doing so.