The cost of education can often catch people out

Andrea Mara hadn’t expected her back-to-school bill to be particularly high this year. When she totted it up afterwards , she realised she was wrong.

SHINY new shoes, a schoolbag that’s way cooler than last year’s and the incomparable smell of a brand new pencil case — my memories of going back to school are all good, and revolve around getting new things more than ABCs.

I’m sure for my parents it was a different story — paying for four children to go to school in 1980s Ireland was no easy task.