Skiatook High School Fee Causes Confusion - KTUL.com - Tulsa, Oklahoma - News, Weather & Sports

A $25 class fee is causing confusion in Skiatook. The principal says it's meant to help parents not punish them. "It's not to buy books, it's not to buy pencil and paper," said Skiatook High School Principal Donna Brogan.

Principal Brogan says $25 fee paid every year will be used for all things outside of the classroom. "It's regarding if they will do a float for homecoming then the class fees will help pay for that, the class activity fee. Uh, door decorating, you know we buy the things to decorate the doors or the hallways," explained Brogan. It would also make prom cheaper for students, costing $30 instead $100.

Until now, students went door to door to raise money. Joshua Sinkhorn couldn't stand it. "I didn't like it," he said. Principal Brogan who happens to be a mother of four also thought it was a pain. "We sold cookie dough every year and I drive them around, sell the cookie dough, and take their orders and then we get the cookie dough and I have to deliver it. So, with the gas costs and the time and effort it took me, I was grateful to hear that we could do class fees," she said.

But one Bulldog dad is against both of the ways Skiatook High tries to raise extra money. In an email sent to Tulsa's Channel 8, Patrick Daniels wrote, "building a better prom should not be such a focus that the school must require community participation in those terribly overburdening fundraisers, on which the school board keeps hanging their arguments in support of this class fee. "Extra"curricular means just that - Extra. If you can't afford it, you don't do it."

Seniors are exempt from paying the fee this year.