Teachers are still spending thousands of their own dollars on school supplies. Here’s how to help

School has officially started for most students in Philadelphia and that means for the past few weeks, teachers have been prepping their classrooms.

But for many teachers in the School District of Philadelphia, that prep can involve spending upwards of thousands of dollars out of their own pocket to make sure their classrooms are stocked with enough school supplies for their students, at least according to a Philly.com editorial written by Jan Cohen, a Spanish teacher at Kensington High School.

Cohen, who’s been teaching in Philadelphia since 2012, said that she ended up spending around a thousand dollars for supplies during her first year teaching and has already spent at least a hundred dollars this year for materials such as dictionaries, binders, a pencil sharpener, posters, et cetera.

And while she said things are better now than they once were, she reminds us that our schools still need a lot of help in the foreseeable future if they are to remind students what the value of an education has on their lives as a whole.

“When students attend a school that cannot meet their basic needs, they do not see the value of an education,” Cohen said. “There is a noticeable difference in students when they know they are adequately provided for. They are motivated to learn, they do their homework, and they care about their grades. They believe they can succeed — and they do.”

One way she asks Philadelphians to help is considering donating to a teacher’s crowdfunding project. The crowdfunding site DonorsChoose.org, specifically meant for teachers and students, currently shows 707 projects that Philly-area teachers are currently asking for donations for, including Chromebooks, carpets, dry erase boards and plenty more.

You can check out all those projects here.