Someone complained about pizza parties hosted by school teachers. Then came a humbling takedown

Teachers strive to care for their students, often stretching beyond the classrooms. Each teacher has their own way of giving to students but it's no secret that kids love a pizza party more than anything. These parties usually look like lots of games and fun activities while students snack on pizza slices, chips, candies, cookies, and soda. These pizza parties often end up becoming core memories for kids. A person recently criticized school pizza parties stating that most kids often got just one slice of pizza and a small one at that. X user @dondadaNYC highlighted a key issue with blindly criticizing the pizza parties, pointing out that these small pizza parties often came from the teacher’s pocket.

“Now that I’m older and I realized that they most likely paid for this out of pocket, this made me appreciate teachers more as they are criminally underpaid,” the user wrote in the tweet. This tweet is a response to another tweet by @sznixix, which has been viewed by over 28 million people. In the first tweet, @sznixix ranted about the skimpy meals that teachers usually gave at school pizza parties. “Remember when teachers hype you up about the pizza party to give you this,” they wrote while sharing the pictures of a small pizza slice and a glass of iced cola drink.

Thousands of people flocked in to support @dondadaNYC, agreeing to the fact that teachers in America are so undervalued and underpaid. While some students may remember the small amount of food their teacher got for them at a school pizza party, others appreciate it as a free treat. “This was the gourmet meal we all looked forward to back in the day,” wrote @ivankapeach.

Other people in the comments section affirmed the reality that most of these pizza parties are organized from the teacher’s pocket, and not from the school’s funds. “My mum is a teacher, she spends a lot of her own money for her kids,” commented @iamunmiyaawan. @dokwhart said, “They 100% paid for it all with their own money after buying extra pencils, erasers, notebooks, and markers that weren't provided for them. Teachers deserve better.”

Many teachers also came forward to share their experiences hosting pizza parties at their schools. @tap3000 said, “My students think I am ‘rich’ because I legit give them a pizza party from Papa John’s and purchase chips and donuts for them to choose from as an incident and reward. Yes, teachers do pay for room decor and everything out of pocket while they make less than six figures. Teachers are out here making poverty wages and still purchasing things for their students. Most teachers genuinely have good hearts and are good people.”

A teacher, @frookiefr, said “Costco pizza is a lifesaver for my kids' parties,” adding that sometimes they ask students’ parents for donations for these parties. @themikehawke added that they too got their students to contribute money for the pizza party. @wootsiefootsie suggested an idea, “Want a service where I can donate to schools to throw pizza parties.”

Given their factual and realistic response, this tweet became viral with over 17 million views in less than a week. It was also shared by u/mook69 in Reddit’s infamous community r/mademesmile where it bagged over 64,000 upvotes and hundreds of comments. Here too, people said that the amount of treats or the size of pizza slices doesn’t matter as much as the teacher spent her money to reward students with the treats. The simple response made many people appreciate what their teachers did for them.

u/oliviaboeyinkxx commented, “And the funds for the pizza party were taken directly from the teachers' own money. The schools never covered the costs for any of that.” u/wildaloofrebel1010, whose mom is a teacher for 21 years, said, “She has a pizza party at the end of every year. I can confirm, she pays out of pocket for all of her students.” Talking about the original post, u/noobyscientific said, “If you complain about things given to you for free, you shouldn't get free things.” u/alice_glow had the same message, “You either die a student complaining about the pizza, or live long enough to become an adult who understands the teacher's budget.”