Should students have to pay to play?

Does your school charge for road trips?

A national school administrators group says it's worried about what it sees as a growing trend of "pay for play" trips that effectively discriminate against the poor -- a trend, it believes, that will only be exacerbated by the country's economic problems.

In a position statement issued Monday, the National Association of Secondary School Principals wrote: "The pay-for-play trend has triggered a legal, philosophical, and educational equity debate. The question centers on whether co-curricular activities are part of the free public school system to which everyone is entitled by law." The activities it has in mind include athletics, music, drama, clubs and so on. The statement says that California is among four states that require that any "school sponsored curricular or co-curricular activity be offered free of charge."

Is anybody seeing otherwise?

-- Mitchell Landsberg