Schools are starting again. And so many students quickly do their last shopping this weekend. Pens, calculators, exercise books and cover paper are all on the lists. And the choice is huge. But nowadays there seems to be less and less needed. “Everything is becoming more and more digital,” says 12-year-old Silke from Loosbroek.
She and her mother are in the Hema in Eindhoven. On Monday she goes to first grade. “I already have a lot of stuff, but I still need a folder, pencil case and exercise books,” she says. The list also includes cover paper, but according to her mother, one roll is enough. “There is not much more to cover. Two, maybe three textbooks. And the rest is on the laptop,” says mother Monique.
“I really didn’t like a paper agenda.”
They’re not the only ones in the store. The school department is full of students who do not yet have everything they need. “It’s a kriem, so busy,” says another mother. Her daughter Britt still has some stuff left over from the year before, so luckily not much is needed. “Just a pencil case, glue stick and a diary,” says Britt. She is not susceptible to trends. “I took the simplest agenda I could find. Because it will eventually break.”
She is one of the few who still has an agenda on the list. Nowadays, many schools work with a digital agenda. “The homework is now all online,” says 12-year-old Sem from Nuenen. “I think that’s a shame, because last year in group 8 I had a nice Max Verstappen agenda,” he says.
Guusje (13) and Lynn (14) think it’s fine, that digital agenda. “Last year I had to buy a paper agenda, but I really didn’t like that,” says Guusje. “I forgot to write my homework in it and I always lost it.”
