To feel sad that DC miss out because I don’t do a lot of school pickups

I know what you mean. I recently changed jobs and DC now do 2 hours of ASC instead of 1. I feel out the loop because of it. Most DCs do an hour of ASC which is when most of the chit chat at the gate happens.

I think it is probably more unusual to rely on school gate relationships to provide the majority of your out of school socialising.

At our school the parents I am friends with are mostly people over known anyway through work, or as neighbours etc and some of the mums who socialise a lot together it is because their kids all attend the same football club, not because of school.

I actively avoid the school run as much as possible, and my child goes to wrap around a lot. Our school is not a calm sea of chatty parents making plans at the school gate - it's a chaotic melt down of bad parking, trailing jumpers and buggies with tantrum throwing toddlers. Most parents are trying to get on to work etc and no one wants to use it for a social.

If you want your child to do more things with school friends outside of school, then instigate it. Invite people round to yours or suggest a park play date on the class WhatsApp. Offer to do a group booking to the cinema or a panto etc.

My better advice would be to build your social life outside of the school acquaintances instead. Then you won't care.

But it’s no surprise that there are English people at the school gates … what do you expect?!?

Oh my goodness please do not beat yourself up about this. A good mix and remember why its like this because you are working to improve quality of life for all of you. Grandparents will love the privilege too. The majority of children are picked up by more than one person within the week. You are not preventing your children from making good relatio ships with their peers are you? Abld that's whst really matters isn't it?

To be honest, I don't think you're missing out on much...Some of this school gate friendship stuff can be toxic. I didn't do a lot of pick ups and drop offs as I am a single mum who works full time. I did make friends with a few of the mum's and we would sometimes see each other for our kids play dates and outside school. Things definitely change When they get older. When they left in Yr 6 and went to different schools I was dropped like a hot potato 😒 my daughter has her own friends and didn't want to bother with the old ones. I used to occasionally make plans but it was always me. When I stopped, literally none of those fake friends bothered with me again. One in particular I was quite close to, I used to have to listen to her moaning endlessly about her husband and her job when the kids were friends at school ...bumped into her recently in a supermarket and she had absolutely no self awareness about just ghosting me, even said 'oh we must get together '. No thanks

Don't worry OP.
My DC goes to after school clubs 3 days and the other 2 his grandmothers pick up one day each. He is Mr Popular - there always seems to be a party or football social to go to.
I've met a few of the other parents at those. Some are quite nice but don't class them as friends. And that hasn't held DC back.

Don’t beat yourself up about it too much. Your DC is a person who will chose their own friends. As they get older they won’t want forced friendships based on who you know, but to choose who they play with.

I felt guilt at the time too (similar situation to you) but now looking back on it I see that that had advantages in that they got to choose who they played with. I don’t think you say how old they are…. as they get older they will have opinions and it will be a lot easier for you to let them lead if you have not emeshed yourself in mum friendships which make it difficult to let your child choose.

Not everyone on MN is English, even if we are UK natives.

YANBU for feeling this way. I felt this way too for many years as a working parent. However I also agree with others that it's not always as simple as being there every day to socialise. Sometimes people know each other from other places and in the grand scheme of things the school run isnt (in my opinion) the top place to make adult friends anyway. I also think after school play dates are less common than you may think. It sounds like your DC have friends already which is really good. I would just do things like attend birthday parties if you can, get involved in any events and involve DC in other things like clubs to widen their circle.

I don't think it always correlates. DD1 started a new school during covid into middle year 1. We all wore masks and stood 5m apart at pick up so didn't get to know them very well at start. She does lots of after school clubs so i dont chat with her friends parents at pick up. We are good friends with several of her friends parents and socialise with then through chatting at parties, chance meetings at park and village events. DD2 I speak with lots of parents at pick up but don't socialise with any outside school.

You are all just a bunch of parents with children in same class. Sometimes you meet ones who you get in well with, sometimes you don't, and that's just luck.

Yes of course people can have group of friends. But if parents only organise play dates with the classmates who are kids of their friends, are too busy fir any other play date, even the birthdays are just with the kids of their friends (which not necessarily are the friends of the kids!) this is cliquey.
in my eldest daughter class there is a group of parents who go often out together also on holidays, two of the girls are very close friends of mine and she is invited to play dates, bdays etc, they are friendly with me and let me know about Halloween tours etc if we want to go along, they actually post things in the class chat (not everything of course!) , as they often organise with a good group of kids already so they just extend. A new girl joined in y3 and she got invited to all bdays, parents really made an efforts as they knew she was new.
my other daughter is in a class with a cliquey set of parents. It is a relatively large group (7 kids). Kids just have play dates, bdays, events with each others, no one else seems to be invited. My daughter says she is very close with a few of the girls, but any attempt to organise a play date as always been a too busy response or just meet in the park the first time and then never initiated back. It is clear they can’t be bothered to get their kids to socialise to anyone who is not on their list of friends… she made others so really I don’t care but this is an example of cliquey parents. If my daughter was new she would really really struggle to fit it or make friends.

People are allowed to be groups of friends. If this was a workplace or university it would just be a group of friends and not a clique. For some reason school mums have to become friends with every single person they see at the school gates.

This is the best and most honest response. you are a cliquey bunch and anyone coming to the school will really struggle to become your friend, you need to assess if they “gel”, that is are of your type/tribe, and I am sure you organise things among your kids and never ever would invite any new kid joining a class.
that’s what is probably happening to the OP kids, they ended up in one of these classes so no chance they would invite them for activities or play dates, they are all “too busy”.
the good thing is there is nothing to do with not doing pick ups, the bad thing is it will be very hard for her kid to fit it

This. Most women work now, I think it’s like 70 or 80 percent, the op won’t be in the minority.

Lots of other parents will be working too. Many kids are picked up by grandparents, childminders or go to after school clubs. It makes it all a little more difficult to form connections with other parents but it won't really tdamage your DC's social life. Just be friendly when you're there. Encourage your DC to have a wide circle of friends.

I seldom to never did pick ups, but I knew who her friends were and texted the mums to organise stuff, it never occurred to me I had to be their mate,

Maybe because we are in England 🤣

I was just to say; very unusual for most mums to be doing every pickup. Are you sure? Do you live somewhere very rural?

I suspect that not all the people picking up are actually mums.

I do everything possible to avoid as many school runs as I can and ensure those are so are quick. My children still get invited to loads of things.

People massively overthink this stuff: so many posts on here from people convinced theres a “clique” of school mums. It’s an illusion.

I did literally a handful of primary school pickups because my child was dropped off and collected by a childminder up until year five (before COVID). It never did any harm either to my child’s social life or mine: my DD made good friends at primary school some of whom she’s kept up with (now in year ten) and I still catch up with the mums.

Pickups aren’t particularly sociable: the majority of parents are rushing off and not hanging around and the majority of friendships made during this period are based on convenience. As your child makes friends the parents will contact you, its not necessary or desirable for you to live in each other’s pockets. Some parents may go on to become friends, most won’t. But you will drive yourself crazy worrying about something you can’t control if you fixate on this. In the end it makes no difference whatsoever.

My daughter never made any friends in the school gate , it is all English and Polish

Before Covid I only did 2/5 pickups and DH did none. I only started doing more because of WFH over covid.
Your school must be quite unusual if most of the mums pick up every day, in our school it’s a mixture of mums, dads, grandparents, and some going to after school club

I think it’s more likely because you’re new to the school. I’ve made a wonderful group of friends via the school run but that took a long time to establish. I already knew one from afar so we gravitated towards each other in reception then as our children formed friendships, others gradually joined. Now we are a tight knit group who do socialise together with and without our children. We would obviously be friendly and welcoming if anyone new came to the school but I don’t think they would immediately become part of our friendship group without some time and figuring out if we gel/have things in common.

I think you are overthinking the importance of the school run. Parents generally socialise with those they already know, from outside school, older siblings, living in the same area, it's very hard to infiltrate within the short time of waiting for your child to come out and make friendly chat that goes any further.
Most parents at my kids school are polite if you talk to them, but there are established groups too. If my child wants to invite a friend to something then the easiest way is to send a message to the parent. The children don't become cut off simply because parents aren't friends.

As a teacher, I picked up my DC on maybe 3 occasions in the whole of primary. They had to go to after school club 5 days a week, where they made friends with kids from other classes and year groups and mostly had a great time. We had the holidays together and always spoke about that was how we had balance.

It certainly meant that I knew very few of the other parents, and those I did know were through church.