ORLANDO, Fla. – What to Know:
- Teachers continue spending hundreds of dollars of their own money on classroom supplies each year.
- Nonprofits, crowdfunding platforms, and corporate sponsors are increasingly helping bridge the gap by funding classrooms, schools, and students.
- The growing role of philanthropy raises broader questions about how classrooms are supplied – and who ultimately pays for the basics.
Walk into almost any classroom on the first day of school and you’ll see the obvious supplies: paper, pencils, markers, magnets, clips, and storage bins to name a few. Look a little closer and you’ll spot tissues, hand sanitizer, timers, sticky notes, rewards, snacks, and dozens of other items that help keep a classroom running.
But here’s something you may not realize: a surprising number of those supplies weren’t purchased by the school district.
Some were purchased by teachers using their own money. Others came from parents. And some came from local businesses, nonprofits, corporate sponsors, and increasingly, complete strangers through online crowdfunding platforms.
Welcome to the reality of public education in 2026.
Schools buy supplies. Teachers buy supplies. Parents buy supplies. And increasingly, communities are also buying supplies. The classroom has quietly become a shared financial responsibility, supported not only by school districts, but also by nonprofits, businesses, and everyday donors.
The question isn’t whether private generosity plays a role in public education anymore. It’s how large that role has become – and what it says about the way America’s classrooms are funded.
Kids ain’t cheap
Back-to-school shopping has quietly become one of the biggest annual expenses many families face, but it’s a lot more than just pencils, paper, and backpacks.
According to the National Retail Federation, in 2026, a family with a K-12 student expects to spend an average of $863.86 on items their children need for school for the upcoming year.
And how does that money for the school year break down:
- Electronics (average of $293.11)
- Clothing & Accessories (average of $250.29)
- Shoes (average of $174.01)
- School Supplies (average of $146.45)
Taken together, nationwide, those purchases are expected to add up to a record $43.3 billion in back-to-school spending.
This year’s average back-to-school budget is up slightly from $858.07 in 2025, but below the $874.68 reported in 2024 and the record $890.07 in 2023. Even so, all four years rank among the highest averages recorded by the NRF.
But that’s only half the story
Parents aren’t the only ones opening their wallets.
Teachers spend nearly as much out of their own pockets each year as parents spend on school supplies for a child – an average of about $900, according to AdoptAClassroom.org. The organization surveyed 3,700 teachers from all 50 states, Washington, D.C., Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. 97% said the funding provided by their schools isn’t enough to meet students’ needs.
Locally, a similar survey of teachers by A Gift for Teaching showed 31% are spending more than $550 to buy supplies for their classrooms.
AdoptAClassroom reported the median school-supply budget for a classroom is just $200.
Enter the crowdfunded classroom
For many teachers, buying classroom supplies isn’t new. What’s changing is that there are now additional ways to fund those purchases.
Instead of relying solely on teachers, parents, or PTA fundraisers, today’s classrooms increasingly have access to online crowdfunding platforms, nonprofit grant programs, and corporate sponsorships designed to connect donors directly with educators and students.
Over the last decade, a growing ecosystem of organizations has emerged to help supply America’s classrooms, including nonprofits, online platforms, and some of the nation’s largest corporations.
Jason’s Deli, headquartered in Beaumont, Texas, recently launched its Community Partners Wish List Giveback, a national campaign that will fulfill up to 50 teachers’ Amazon Wish Lists, providing as much as $500 in classroom supplies per teacher. The initiative, funded in partnership with Dr Pepper, represents a combined investment by the two companies of up to $25,000.
Amazon has also embraced the teacher wish list movement through its #ClearTheList campaign, encouraging customers to purchase classroom supplies directly from teachers’ Amazon Wish Lists while periodically purchasing supplies for selected educators itself.
Other companies have launched similar initiatives. Office Depot and OfficeMax operate a year-round Classroom Wish List platform, while BIC, Staples, and Target all sponsor programs that provide classroom supplies, grants, and other support to teachers and schools.
Nonprofits like AdoptAClassroom, DonorsChoose, and Central Florida’s A Gift for Teaching, allow donors to fund teacher requests directly.
Denise Naranjo, Director of Marketing for A Gift for Teaching told News 6, “Nearly half of eligible teachers in Orange and Osceola County rely on these programs, saving an average of $598 on classroom supplies each year.” Naranjo added “Those needs don’t disappear after the first day of class.”
Schools and sponsorships
Crowdfunding and donations aren’t the only ways schools are closing the gap between their needs and available funding. Many schools and parent organizations also rely on sponsorships from local businesses to help pay for classroom supplies, field trips, teacher appreciation events, and student programs.
Those sponsorships often come with commitments from the school, such as displaying banners, recognizing sponsors on social media, or inviting them to school events.
My School Partner, a Winter Garden-based startup, was created to help schools and businesses keep track of those commitments. The platform allows schools to document when sponsorship obligations have been fulfilled, while giving businesses a way to verify the recognition they were promised.
“It’s a real economy – it’s a real local economy,” said co-founder Mark Kaley. “It’s so important for the schools to find ways to fund activities.” Kaley added schools work hard to find businesses to participate in sponsorships and that the goal of his program is to strengthen long-term relationships and support for local schools year after year.
Though school districts remain responsible for funding public education, an expanding network of nonprofits, businesses, community organizations, and individual donors is increasingly helping purchase everything from crayons and calculators to field trips and classroom technology.
For many teachers, that extra support has become an important part of preparing students for the school year.
A generation ago, helping a classroom often meant donating to a school fundraiser or dropping supplies into a collection bin (or the infamous bake sale). Today, it might mean clicking “Buy Now” on a teacher’s Amazon Wish List, sponsoring a school program, or funding a classroom project online.
So, the next time you walk into a classroom and see the pencils, tissues, hand sanitizer, sticky notes, and snacks on the shelves, there’s a good chance they came from more than one source. Preparing for a new school year has become more than a shopping season – it’s become a community effort.
Whether that’s a sign of innovation, necessity, or both is a question that extends far beyond the classroom.