It costs money to be part of the school's communities
Students from families with strained finances feel pressured by a range of school-related costs that are necessary in order to be part of the class community. This is particularly true where there are large financial differences within a class. Students from low-income homes try to find ways around it – parrtly to avoid putting pressure on their parents, an interview study among lower-secondary students and their parents shows.
“Several people in my class had a lot of money, and I was one of the only ones who was struggling, and my teacher knew that. At one point we were going on a trip to an indoor trampoline park, and my mum had to write to the teachers to say that I couldn't come because it was too expensive, and in the end one of the teachers paid for me.”
The statement comes from a girl in the 9th grade whose family lives below the poverty line in Denmark. It illustrates several of the findings in a new study of parental costs in the Danish folkeskole (state primary and lower secondary school), carried out for Egmont by the research agency Maple.
First, that students find that going to school often costs money – in the sense that families have to pay for a range of both small and large expenses that matter if you are to take part in the life and community of the class.
Second, that within one and the same class there can be big differences in what parents – and therefore students – can afford. Students from families in financial poverty risk being left outside of the communities of the class.
And third, that it is often up to the individual teacher to judge how questions of parental costs should be handled in practice.
“Voluntary costs”
The students in the study describe a wide range of costs directly linked to their schooling which are necessary if they are to take part academically and socially. These include equipment for lessons (e.g. a calculator and PE kit), money for school camps and day trips, and payment for various class events.
According to the study, there are also many small, recurring everyday costs that make students from families in financial poverty feel excluded from the community. These include, for example, money for:
Food during break or after school
Small purchases and pocket money in connection with the class's shared activities
Presents for class birthdays
Social activities with classmates outside school hours, for example pizza nights and parties.
These are typically costs that the school has no direct involvement in – or necessarily any knowledge of. But they still affect students who cannot match their classmates' financial means.
“You aren't forced to pay for the voluntary things, but if you don't pay, then you're not part of the community either, and that can hurt too,” says a boy in the 8th grade.
Inequality is felt in everyday life
According to the study, the feeling of being on the outside because of school costs is strongest among the students who are in classes with significant financial differences between the students.
A girl in the 9th grade explains it like this: “If you don't have money to buy anything in the short break at 9 o'clock, and you don't have money to eat anything at lunchtime either, then you go a whole day without eating. You can certainly feel outside the community when everyone else is eating in the classroom and you're the only one who isn't.”
At schools in more socially disadvantaged areas, students and parents typically experience greater awareness of and consideration for families' financial limitations – both from school staff and within the parent group, the study states.
Students try to find a way round it
The students describe a number of different strategies for coping with the pressure of costs:
First, asking their parents for money, even though the students are very aware of how much they can ask for – and when during the month it is. It is often accompanied by a sense of guilt; they do not want to put further pressure on their parents, who besides the finances may also be struggling with other challenges.
“I try to avoid asking my mum for money, because I know she doesn't have much – so I wait until everything necessary has been paid, and then maybe I can ask for small things,” says a boy in the 8th grade.
Second, the students try to avoid situations where they know they cannot afford to take part – rather than saying that they cannot afford it. Some instead take on a role as audience, by going along to the kiosk or the café without spending any money.
Third, the students earn their own money – 12 of the 18 students in the study have a part-time job. It gives them their own money to spend, for example for social activities, food with friends, clothes and presents. Several point out that this also eases the financial burden on their parents.
Pressure from other parents
In principle, the parents in the study accept that their child's school life may involve costs. They say that the challenge is rarely the individual expense, but the sum of many expenses, some of which come unexpectedly.
The parents also say that they go to great lengths to ensure that their children can take part on an equal footing with their classmates, for example by deprioritising other expenses, borrowing money or applying for financial support. But there are also situations where a student ends up not taking part, because the parents do not want their child to turn up to an activity if they are unable to pay.
“At least in the primary and middle school there has been a lot of pressure for it to be just as nice and just as grand as everyone else's – for a birthday, for example. But not everyone can do that, and it isn't much fun being a parent in that situation,” says the parent of a girl in the 7th grade.
Several of the financially challenged parents point out that some of the pressure of expectations comes from the other parents:
“Well, the people who run the class fund, they have rather high demands. They want money paid into that account every month. It's mostly the parents who have high expectations, I'd say,” says the parent of a boy in the 9th grade.
Financial problems are taboo
The students generally say that they regard the family's finances as a private matter. They hold back from sharing their situation with both classmates and teachers – partly because they do not want it to affect how others see them and their family.
“A lot of people feel sorry, because my mum is on early retirement and a single mum, and because I have a sibling with a disability. Then they get all ‘awww’ about it, and that can be a bit hard, because my life isn't bad, and it isn't sad,” says a girl in the 7th grade.
The parents, too, describe the family's finances as something private that they only rarely share with others. Several say that they do not want to be exposed or labelled as a family with financial problems, and so they often keep quiet about it. They are generally conscious of how they appear to the other parents, and can therefore find it difficult to say no to expenses or to contribute less than others.
How the study was carried out
“Parental payment in the folkeskole” is a qualitative study carried out by Maple for the Egmont Foundation's secretariat.
The student insights and recommendations in the study are based on three focus group interviews of about two hours each, with a total of 18 students in the 7th to 9th grade whose families live on a disposable income of less than 50 per cent of the median income. In 12 of the 18 participating families, the parent is a single parent. Thirteen of the students are girls, five are boys.
In addition, individual telephone and online interviews were carried out with 13 of the young people's parents and with 12 (homeroom) teachers.
The study focuses on how the students themselves, their parents and class teachers handle situations involving out-of-pocket costs, and what this means for the students' participation in the class community.
Maple has analysed the students' statements and recommendations and formulated a proposal for the study's insights and recommendations. These were subsequently discussed and refined with 10 of the students in follow-up focus groups.
There is wide variation in the social composition of the schools and classes described by the students interviewed. Students have thus been interviewed from classes where the majority come from financially well-off families, from classes with a mixed socio-economic composition, and from classes where many come from families with strained finances.
All student and parent interviews were carried out in May–June 2026. The follow-up focus group interviews and the teacher interviews were carried out in June–August 2026.
The quotations from the study are anonymised. Some of the quotations have been shortened and edited for language for use in this article.
The study was developed in cooperation with an advisory group with representatives from Danske Skoleelever (the Danish National Union of School Students), Danmarks Lærerforening (the Danish Union of Teachers), Kommunernes Landsforening (Local Government Denmark), Odense Kommune (the Municipality of Odense), Red Barnet (Save the Children Denmark), Skolelederforeningen (the Danish Association of School Principals) and Skole og Forældre (School and Parents).