No names were drawn either. The way it worked was: A parent purchases a book at a $5 value and the books would be brought to the school the Wednesday before the party (she knew two days before my son would not be there, we took Monday-the whole Christmas vacation off). I'm assuming she bought a book in Kaden's name for $17 (titled Olivia - the character from Nickelodeon) either on the Friday before the week he was supposed to be gone, or the Monday/Tuesday he was gone and gave it to this student.
Kaden's family made a name for themselves? Ha, not really. She had prior knowledge to this, did not ask my permission to purchase a book in Kaden's name, and most certainly had no right to charge us $17 for it when the value was set at $5. If anything, this school has set a name for themselves.
I understand why the teacher did that. Most likely there was a child who was going to end up with the book that he/she brought in for some reason, and the teacher substituted one of her own and then sent the extra book home for Kaden. However, I do believe it was more than a bit outrageous on the teacher's part to ask you to pay for a 17.00 book, when the exchange was for 5.00 books. The teacher may have been stuck between a rock and a hard place, because that 17.00 book may have been the only book she had available, or she perhaps even gave the child a choice, and unfortunately the child chose the expensive book, but still, it was tacky on her part.
Here is the big problem though...no matter how you slice this its very likely to spill over on Kaden a bit. If you don't pay it the teacher is going to feel a little resentful and no matter how hard she tries, it may spill over a bit on Kaden. If you do pay it, then you are going to feel resentful and no matter how hard you try, that may spill over on Kaden a bit.
What I might do in a similar situation is see if I can find a copy of the book on sale somewhere and simply replace the book.