To think schools should get with the times re working parents.

Although there is a valid point to be made about childcare issues, "schools should get with the times" is a very goady statement.
You're saying that schools- all schools? - are behind "the times"?
If you've never worked in school management you have no idea of the layers of complexity involved. The budget decisions are increasing difficult.
If people want low cost, readily available, subsidised childcare like the Swedish model, fine - but are you prepared for the tax hikes?.

Do you mean pass the buck? Can’t figure out what this means?

do you think parents shouldn’t work and kids not go to school then so they can hang around together 8-6?

how does that work? Who pays rent and food? As a society if everyone stopped work and homeschooled?

If you don't want to extend the actual educational part of the day, that's staffed by teachers OP, then of course YANBU. Schools should have wraparound provision for all who need it. Thankfully where we live all primary schools do already open from 8am-6pm (often longer, 7.30am seems the usual start time). Of course it comes at a cost, there's no getting away from that, someone has to pay for it, and for that reason it won't be accessible to all. But I have friends and family who live in areas where wraparound care is practically non-existent, or so limited it's only available to a small % of those who need it. Given the government's commitment to this years and years ago, that's really not acceptable. What are working parents supposed to do? For some of them it really isn't an option to reduce their hours at work or find a more flexible job. The government need to provide adequate funds and resources so all schools can provide wraparound care that meets the needs of their communities. It's not OK for schools to simply opt out, or have very limited provision so it's only available to a minority of families. If a parent needs to give up paid employment purely because the wraparound care they need doesn't exist, that's a huge loss to individuals, families and the economy. Yes employers should be more flexible, but not all can be, and that's not appropriate for all roles. Regardless of all that, it was a manifesto promise, it should be happening. But given the track record of our current government, I'm really not at all surprised that the reality falls very far short of their promises.

Many workplaces need someone there for their opening hours. Imagine if the supermarket closed early as they had already served their quota of customers. Also, they'd have to significantly increase minimum wage for people to be able to make ends meet on fewer hours.

Basic not nice 2 bed apartments where I live and come from start at 170k and houses about 220k. I am not commutable distance to London. Only someone on an average salary and 5 times that multiple would be able to afford the flat… based on zero deposit and as I say aren’t nice. Of course 2 people need to work to buy somewhere to live as not everyone is even on the average. Renting isn’t far different. The poor standard of the 170k 2 bed apartments don’t appear on rightmove for rent. The ones, which do cost upwards of 200k to buy and just over 1k a month in rent.

I don’t think schools should be forced offer wrap around as standard. But I’m not unaware of how hard things are for some.

I’ll get flamed but I think it’s sad that parents put the buck, or need to put the buck as their priority - instead of seeing their children 8-6 daily.

There just aren't that many people who want to work in wraparound care in schools. The roles aren't attractive. They're inflexible, because of their nature they have to be a set time and place. They're not that many hours, but they still tether you to school holidays and the associated crowds and prices for your annual leave.

The government could fix some of this with better pay. If it paid the same as the average full time role for 4 hours a day, I expect there'd be more candidates. But that's not realistic, especially not when there are so many other areas of school that are crying out for funding.

Basically, a lot of this is just a consequence of living in a society with a tight labour market. The poster upthread made a good point about demand being lower than you'd think too. The way the birthrates have been going, we're likely to see more of this.

Some local authorities want to shorten the school week!

Before the Conservative party got in there were many proposals in my local area new schools being built because we went two tier (never happened local schools are now overcrowded) and extended wrap care provided by outside sources at the school the idea was you pay (ofstead registered legit people) to watch your child at the school then they go to their classes from the wrap care this would be seperate from the schools in the financial sense so not using their budget etc coupled with free breakfast clubs (government paid for) it was designed to streamline the whole work/school balance and it would have worked it was a well thought out consultation teachers were behind it parents were behind it then they lost the election and poof it vanished along with funding for new schools we couldn't go back to three tier so we have over crowded primary schools with little to none play areas and secondary schools over two seperate sites quite a distance apart

Logistics arnt a Conservative speciality

SCHOOLS ARE NOT FOR CHILDCARE

My DC can be in school 7.30am - 6pm; I’m one of those awful people who deserves to pay 20% VAT and wear sackcloth and ashes…who chose a private school for the wrap around care so I could continue to further my career that I worked so hard to establish. Onsite wrap around care is near top of the list why I and my friends chose private school.

Yep came on to say this. And if you need childcare there are childminders, breakfast clubs and after school clubs. It's not the schools duty to work around your work schedule- so entitled.

Teachers would be working a 12 hour day? If you add setting up/marking etc plus what they take home. I think you may be missing that the education system needs an overhaul. It’s a one size fits all system which does not work for children with sen. Requiring 5/6 year olds to sit still at a table for hours is ridiculous in my opinion. Children's mental health issues are at all time high. Plus the amount of teachers leaving education….

How about reduce the working day to 9-3 without making pay pro rata 😂

Well that depends on who you vote for doesn’t it.

Could we’ll be your fault. 😂

Scandinavia have a government who charge more taxes; they also care about children and their mental well-being and research shows they have some of the happiest kids in the world.
We have none of those things, sadly!

Schools are to educate. Why is it the school’s responsibility? Why isn’t it your employer’s responsibility, for example? Why isn’t it yours? You say you didn’t have a child when you bought your house, but surely you thought ahead? Thinking ahead involves thinking about having children and the practicalities, along with increases in the mortgage rate.

More than that, to answer one of your early points: yes, fancy jobs that pay well don’t always offer flexible working. That’s part of parenthood - one or both parents choosing a job that works or going P/T which they wouldn’t have done if they didn’t have children.

What about nightworkers? Why not make schools into 24hr boarding houses so parents could do what they want while other people look after their children for shit money so the parents can work in a fancy office. Alphas and deltas, yes?

Ideally wrap around care should be in all schools. There are issues though. One is that, perhaps surprisingly, demand is not always as great as you’d imagine. Grandparents pick up, wfh parents pick up. This can reduce profits so I think it would have to be government funded, not for profit, and parents need to pay a reasonable hourly rate.
IMO, it should be in the school building, but not school run. Schools are absolutely swamped with safeguarding and social concerns these days. Childcare has to be separate.
The biggest issue is staffing. It’s much harder to get staff in all roles in schools these days. So it needs to be a decent hourly rate, again, I’d government fund it, not for profit, run at a loss if need be.
Afterschool childminders should have ofsted for safeguarding only, not assessing quality of education provision, so that more people might offer that.

I think schools are used for too much for social work already. It sometimes feels like education is no longer the main priority.

What about shift workers OP? Should schools be open 24/7 365 days a year?

I'm going to be blunt here...it is not the school's fault, nor is it their problem, that you can no longer afford your mortgage. That is entirely a family matter. You have lots of excuses but ultimately you have two choices. Either continue to struggle as you are, and accept that you actively chose this situation, no one forced you to be in it, or you sell up and move somewhere cheaper with wraparound care. Wraparound care, as you can see from the numerous working mothers that have responded to your thread, is plentiful. You live in an outlier. It's not the job of the school to fix your problems for you. You are a grown up, make some difficult decisions and actually work on solving your own problems.

In an ideal world, schools would have childcare on site. Ours does and it's great for working parents, but is run entirely by staff on minimum wage. The irony is, in more affluent areas this is less likely as the cost of housing is too much for someone on minimum wage to afford to live there and simply offering jobs won't fill vacancies. Raising wages would cost parents too much as schools cannot afford to absorb any costs. People need to recognise this when moving to more expensive parts of the country, that certain minimum wage services won't be as available as in other parts of the country.

As it was easy to just “use wraparound care” ffs! you know, not everywhere is London…

DS’s school has a very small minority of two full time working parents so they offer no clubs other than occasional specific activities up to 4 pm, and no childminders collect from there.

I had to find and hire a part time nanny - these roles are like golden dust as too few hours 🙄 - and pay her quite a lot. Have been tempted to go part time as in the end I work the extra hours for crumbles. 🙄

(The upside is that at least she is a native English speaker unlike me, with a lot more imagination than me and manages to get listened by DS and keep him away from screens…)

I had a fantastically flexible job working 3.5 days from home with allowances to do school pick up and drop off.
I was at this job during pregnancy and until my DD was 6 (so just about 2 years of schooling) at which point I was suddenly made redundant. This coincided with an unprecedented cost of living crisis meaning I had no choice but to take a full time job (for the same salary as my previous part time job) with much less flexibility.

Even with the best laid plans things change.

My school is from 8.30-4.30: the kids are DEAD for the last hour or so of the day. They’re completely exhausted by that point. We also have loads of events/clubs/extra interventions that run after school until 5.30 and you can absolutely tell the difference between the ones that want to be there because they like the activity and the ones who have to be there because of childcare reasons. The ones who have to be there are miserable and just want to go home.

Also the earlier the school opens and the later it closes, the earlier and later the cleaning and caretaking team need to be onsite. Just in case anyone had forgotten that these hardworking people are workers who need a balance and have families too.