I am allowed to dispense cough drops per standing order in my school. I buy cheap ones in boxes of 1200.
In the month of September I went through 1 box plus some of cough drops. So probably about 1400 cough drops. IN ONE MONTH!!!!!
I went through 1 box (1200) for the entire school year last year.
I have students stop in ALL DAY LONG asking for cough drops. They leave in the middle of class just for cough drops. They come to my office between classes and get cough drops. They even come after school for cough drops.
Sometimes it's the same student. Sometimes it's all different students. Sometimes it's an afterthought. Like "Can I have ibuprofen for my headache? Oh! And can I get some cough drops?" I even had one student come in and take some "for the weekend, because we can't afford them." I was in the middle of something else when she said this so I didn't have time to stop her, plus I felt kind of bad.
I have started telling people I am out of cough drops (even though I am not) to see if this will curb down on the visits. But it hasn't.
So what do I do? Keep giving them out? Stop giving them out all together? Limit to 2? Then they'll be back for more before class even ends (We have 80 minute blocks in our school).
