Fund Raisers - arrgghh!!

It's that time of year again and once again the dreaded fundraisers have come around. The schools are pushing Entertainment coupon books with pies and magazines in the near future (ds) and the Girl Scouts are hawking nuts and magazines (dd2). Meanwhile we have to pay a $100 participation fee to the High School to allow dd1 to be in the musical and $50 to the middle school to allow dd2 to be in the 'select' choir. All this comes only weeks after spending $200 on supplies for three children, new outfits for the first day back (kept to a minimum) and $300+ on ballet classes for dd1. Oh yes... we also had school photos in the first month of school. In a few short weeks it will be Christmas and even more expense. This time of year is hectic enough without all this.

I dislike the selling-for-reward type of fundraising and would like to know what the kids actually learn from this. Even the Girl Scouts! I was a Brownie, Guide and Ranger (at odd times, not continuously) in England and fund-raising of this sort was something we never did with the exception of collecting or raising money for a charity. When dd1 wanted to join the Girl Scout Cadettes I thought it would be worthwhile and she would learn some useful skills and have some fun, but after the first meeting she comes home with fund-raisers! She couldn't even tell me what they were raising money for, but said something about money for a trip to Disneyworld (where are the frowny-smileys when you want them?).

I hate to be one of those "in my day..." people, but I thought Girl Scouts was about learning useful skills, service to the community, becoming self-sufficient, and being helpful. Apparently not. Apparently they are as self-serving as the rest of them. So far, I am not impressed.