If I get good grades on my exams and on my report card when we get it in march or so I just might get a 20 gallon for my chinese algae eater, 2 black skirt tetras, white skirt tetra, pistilla tetra, and glolight tetra who r now living in a 12 gallon tub. If I do then I might save money for a good flourescent canopy so that I can plant the tank. And then I might add 3 neon tetras or something similar cause the current tetras r extremely shy and I would have enough space for another bigger tetra

Acually if you do a Watson style tank with soil and gravel you can have a nice planted tank without any special lights.
Go study so you can get that tank. lol

really? I was gonna put sand in the tank for the algae eater cause thats what they have now. I've been thinking and I might rather stick with silk and plastic plants with some low light plants such as java fern. But I really would like a planted tank but I wouldnt b able to get any C02 injection thingie and I probably wouldnt b able to get the stronger lighting either. Is there any toehr way I can do it?

Cool your gonna get a tank for good grades? I would've too, but today I learned I had a 89.6% in science, so no tanks for me, and a stern talking too...
But hey! good luck and when you get that tank set-up you need to show us all some pics, k?

ofcourse I will! How about the new seachem flourite black sand? Its really pretty, would that work?

Sure you can try some of the stuff for growing plants like eco complete but they get expensive. Also keep in mine the higher the watts on the tank the more likely you'll need to add co2 to keep up with the growth rate. I have low light plants in my 20 gallon with the soil/gravel done like Diana Watson recomends.
If you pm I can send you some links on this.