Do families with an SAHP tradition think it's worth educating their DDs?

My mum worked. I'm a sahm to school age children.

If my dc wish to go to university then I'll do all I can to support them.

I'm a sahm because it suits our family set up. Not because I can't see any point in working or aspiring to be educated. Anyway you can have a brain in your noddle and not be in a paid job.

I hope very much that my dc will enjoy fulfilling careers and that being educated will not only help them achieve that but also give them the extra enrichment to their lives that education brings.

Me too zzzzz. But it's here. Curriculuum for Excellence in Scotland is built round 'employability' skills (obvs it doesn't say that on the website, but, you know, with my broad arts-based education of the old-fashioned kind I learned critical reasoning ).

DS7 - 7! had to do a presentation last week and they suggested the children used powerpoint. It's all very David Brent.

No-one knows how their life is going to turn out. When I was 20 I certainly didn't envisage I'd be down-grading my career (in terms of money) when I was 40. But then I didn't envisage having a child at all when I was 20, let alone one with SN.

So no, I don't think it was pointless going through Uni. And if I had a girl I would give her exactly the same educational opportunities as a boy and expect her to use that education to make her own choices about what's important to her as she goes through life. That's what education is for, isn't it? To help you understand that there's a big old world out there and to figure out what your place in it is.

No it's not saying that at all - it's saying I CHOSE to be sahm at the moment but I also have the option to be a WOHM should I need to or indeed want to.

Education meant I had choices.

Bea - sorry - I realised as I was writing it that I was making a lot of assumptions about you that weren't necessarily the case but was asking in a more general sense. Interesting that you are doing further training, which of course wouldn't be an option without your original qualifications. However I do think that anyone relying on qualifications and even experience from more than maybe 5 years ago to allow them to easily get a job at a level to allow them to support a family from the off is on shaky ground. I'm sure there are exceptions relating to demand, nursing and health visiting spring to mind. But my qualifications would lead to a low paid job without experience, and "old" experience would not get very far as things are constantly changing.

However on the wider point I have no doubt there are families out there who don't bother sending their daughters to university, or if they do it's so they can snag a future doctor bleurhh. However, education is more than trainjng for work and at least these women are going to university. at which point, presumably these bright educated young people can decide whether to fall in line or use their education for a career of their own. They do have the choice, however dodgy the original motivations. Families who educate their sons over their daughters are in a different league.

The Neanderthal doesn't voice the beliefs of current SAHPs any more than a SAHM tradition means vehement opposition to childcare.

It was a well renumerated career that allowed me to stop working when I had children and the education that made this an option helped when I retrained too. Now I have two potential careers I could follow and am employable in either. I would worry a bit for a daughter who didn't have this independence although I would view all my children's education as important.

Am not overly surprised to hear their are some bizarre views out there though. Actually an old neighbour was the same but agreeably his son dropped out choosing an alternative life style whilst the daughter excelled more traditionally.

I was a SAHM. Worked for ten years previously and it was largely that work which enabled us to have enough financial security so that I could stay home. I now work part-time and have all afternoons and holidays with my children. When they are a bit older (12 - 15), I intend to retrain and enter the workplace more earnestly - am making gentle steps toward this now.

While being at home they have had me around to help with homework, friendship, clubs, etc. I have also put hours and hours of unpaid labour into their schools - often in the classroom, where many of my workplace and university skills have been used.

But most SAHPs will work for 5-10 years before even getting married, let alone having kids (average age of marriage is 29 for women 31 for men, I think) which is the time in your work life when education matters most (vs experience)

I am really shocked that your friend has said this out loud. Way to give a bad message to his DD. I assume the corollary is he expects his DS to have a SAHW.

SPB - thanks for that!

Seriously though, I'd like to think so - I do have experience from the short time between graduating and having ds but tbh my plan is to retrain with a postgrad which I couldn't do if I didn't have a degree in the first place. My degree is a MA Hons and once dd starts nursery (15 free hours) I will be getting some voluntary experience in a relevant field for a couple of years until she starts school.

But not every sahm is opposed to mothers using childcare or being in paid employment.

I think your question is to the very small number of women who see being a sahm as a calling, a sort of moral imperative. They are as rare in my life as the cliche feminist who hates men.

Most sahms I know, including me, see being at home as a pragmatic choice created by specific circumstances. That sometimes include a particular emotional response to motherhood.

I was an associate Director in a major city firm running a department of thirty staff in three locations for over 16 years before I became a sahm. Why would I want my daughter not to have a career ? She is 10 and already talks about her future life and it is just like her brothers was - going to uni, studying art and doing sport and then a career. As long as the Oscars feature along with an Olympic gold medal she wants to fit something great in. At the moment being an English teacher or writing books.

I also encourage my DD to see education as having a value beyond employment - a priviledge (and hopefully a joy) in its own right.

Oh and incidentally I went to a state school that was the bottom of the league tables, I still went to one of the best universities in the country and one of the leading departments for my subject in the world.

" were anything to happen and dh be unable to support us I could go and get a job / career because I have good qualifications"

Really though? After a decade or so out of the workplace and with little/no experience (am talking in general rather than you specifically) can you just walk into a family supporting career on the basis of old qualifications?

That father is being stupid and short-sighted. These days we don't educate people for a single career for life. The value of education in my opinion is in learning to learn. Once you have the skills to learn you can continually learn, take on cpd, re-learn, re-train, change career... if anything, the ability to re-train and learn new skills confidently is MORE important for anyobdy who will for any reason take some time out of the workplace.

Well I would hope that is a minority view! I certainly don't know anyone who feels like that thankfully.

I'm a SAHM and I would certainly place any DDs education on a level with DSs - gender wouldn't come into it for DH or I.

I am degree educated, had a great job before DCs and I would hope to go back to work when I feel the time is right for my family. Being a SAHM is a period of my life, it doesn't change who I was or will be in the future or define me.

Also, most SAHM's aren't at home forever. I will almost certainly go back to work at some point.

I am a SAHM. My daughters may not make the same choice, but more importantly, even if they did, an education is still vital - it opens up new horizons and ways of thinking, and benefits the mother and the whole family. The idea that raising children is unskilled work is IMO pretty damaging for society as a whole. That goes for childcare too - it would be better if very young children were cared for by educated people.

I'm more worried that you think his daughters will be less "educated" if they go to a state school - education is NOT just about schooling...

How will their girls find rich husbands if not by going to university?