Back to School Must Haves for High School & College

After schooling six kids at home and sending five off to college (so far) I’ve learned a few things about what products are truly useful and what are nonsense. Here are the back to school supplies that we’ve found to be the most useful in the day-to-day lives of high school and college students.

The FishKids went back to school last week: three in college and one in high school. We’ve come a long way, baby, since the days of homeschooling lots of little ones.

Over the years technology sure has changed how we do back to school. It’s wild to think about the kids having to share (and fight over) one rickety desktop computer that sometimes worked.

Almost everything has gone digital, it would seem. Even my college kids’ book expenses have dropped dramatically over the last decade as professors seek out free content on the internet instead of $150 textbooks that you can’t ever sell back.

Old timers here at Life as Mom will remember the year I got everyone a Kindle fire. That was an epic year for Mom getting everyone cool stuff — and it was so much easier to manage their assignments from my computer!

Nowadays the FishKids have the freedom to choose what works for them. Surprisingly, many of them prefer book-books over Kindle and choose a fair number of analog options.

I have won over a couple of them to digital planning, but I’m overall pleased to see them trying different methods to see what suits their individual lives and personalities.

Here are our collective recommendations for must-have back to school supplies for high school and college:

For the Techies

iPad with pencil – This can pretty much take the place of pen and paper, especially with a solid PDF annotation app, like GoodNotes6, OneNote, or Notability.

I can’t imagine going back to notebooks after using my iPad and pencil! And I’ve seen my college kids’ need for paper and pens reduce along with how hefty the backpacks have to be to lug everything around.

These purchases can be pricey, but worth it. For longevity, I recommend making sure that the iPad can support iOS 16 or higher and uses a generation 2 pencil.

FisherMan22 bought his set up refurbished from Amazon last fall. Recently we bought FishChick16 this iPad on a tremendous sale. It’s a really good sale, but I don’t know how long it will be around.

Who knows? You may have a family member with an Apple pencil or even a newer iPad they don’t even use! This has been the case for several of my friends. So start asking around.

Pro Tip: Not every iPad and Apple pencil are compatible with each other. Read the specs very carefully to avoid loads of frustration. The confusion is real! This iPad goes with this pencil.

a good laptop and charger – We bought the three “littles” each an HP laptop 4 years ago from Best Buy. Those computers are still going strong, so the $250 investment was worth it, especially seeing as two of those are now being put to use in college.

We have docking stations at home with larger monitors that they can use so that they’re not squinting all the time.

While Chromebooks can be really affordable, they also don’t have a ton of local storage. It can be a problem to rely solely on the internet for backing up data. The internet breaks sometime, so I like my kids having the option of backing up locally.

• Before you invest in a computer, check to see what physical outputs/inputs your device offers. Many newer ones limit what type of cord can connect.
• Know what you’re getting into so that you can limit the need to upgrade all the things you might attach to your computer like headphones, chargers, etc. For example, the latest iMac has only thunderbolt connectors. This can be a problem when all your external devices are USB-C or USB.

If we were buying laptops for kids this year, I would likely be getting something like this HP, very similar to what our kids are currently using.

GoodNotes6 – Since there are several different annotation apps to choose from, GoodNotes6 gets its own listing. I did a lot of research in 2023 before I invested my digital planning in one particular app.

(They have no affiliate program; I am very truly a fan.)

For my purposes, I chose GoodNotes. It was in its 5th iteration at the time. When GoodNotes6 was released, I purchased the one-time $30 upgrade as did Bryan and FisherMan22.

The alternative is to pay $10/year. Since we are still using ours, the purchase will have paid for itself by this time next year.

good headphones with mic – Students will appreciate the privacy that good headphones can provide, as will those around them!

Since our kids have been doing online classes for a very long time, we’ve had lots of experience with good headphones. While not the most low profile, these headsets are long lasting and Bryan has even purchased replacement pads for them as they begin to wear down.

Noise-canceling headphones are also a good purchase. I love my AirPods. FishChick17 recently invested in these.

For the Analog people

Analog certainly has its benefits, so I throw no shade on kids who want to do things old school. These are the items we use in our house:

Spiral notebooks – these are almost a dime a dozen at back to school time. You may be able to sneak by with some last minute sales. Load up on more than you think you will need.

mechanical pencils – After years of struggling with broken pencil sharpeners, the FishKids are unanimous in their love of mechanical pencils. No need for a sharpener.

For Everyone

A solid backpack or messenger bag – whether your student is commuting on a regular basis or not, he or she is going to need to transport stuff at some point. A solid backpack or messenger bag is essential.

FishChick17 has this backpack while the boys have Tom Binh messenger bags and backpacks.

phone charger – To make life simpler, it’s a good idea for students to have a phone charger to take on campus as well as one to leave at home. An external battery pack could be handy, especially if there aren’t ample outlets for charging on campus.

comfortable shoes – Our college freshman works on campus so she covers a lot of miles to and fro. Having comfortable (but cute!) shoes is a must.

a sturdy water bottle – Funny how we rarely had water bottles when I was in college and now they are almost fashion accessories! The younger generations certainly know how to hydrate.

Each person in our fam has several stainless steel water bottles. I love this IronFlask.

hand sanitizer – The germs don’t get any better as your kids get older, so be prepared with hand sanitizer. I love this brand of hand sanitizing spray.

For the Ladies

Ideally, the girls have space for all these everyday essentials, however at the very least, she needs what FishChick17 calls an Emergency Girl Bag with pads, tampons, hand wipes, deodorant, etc.

So, that’s it for us. Since our kids live at home and commute to campus, I can’t speak to dorm room essentials, but as far as educational tools are concerned, we gotcha covered!

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