If you work, but also take your kids to school and pick them up, what do you do?

[mintich]

I'm considering a career change for when my kids go to school, that will allow me to drop off and pick them up.
If you are able to do this, what job do you do??

Local government IT project role, 30 hours per week, 9.10am-3.10pm. Works well because school is only 5 mins away. Very flexible with my hours, work a different pattern during school hols. Great annual leave entitlement and can work from home a day or two a week if I want to. Only downside is that my role is very demanding, and apart from my 5 min walk to school and back I get zero time to myself. I don't take a lunch break so I can fit in my hours. By the time half term comes I am usually on my knees! But also thankful for the flexibility and appreciate that the school/work balance can be terribly hard for some parents.

Lunchtime supervisor 11.50 - 1.10.

The rest of the time the kids are at school I earn money doing website usability testing and other freelance stuff from home. It can be pretty lucrative depending on the projects.

I work in the finance sector (8am-4.15pm but flexible so can finish work early or WFH etc). Tend to do most drop offs & pick ups, as fortunately my DC's school is a few minutes away from my office and I have to walk through the school grounds to get to my office.

Admin in a uni, work 10-2.30 but find it really stressy always having to be somewhere on time

I'm an academic. I use after school club a few times a week but pick up every day x

Local government on a flexible working contract. I do about an hour in the evenings after bedtime to catch up

I'm a teacher at the school my children attend. I bring them in with me and then collect them from the on site after school club.

When my DC where at primary I worked school hours (inc. holidays) as a translator for an internet based company to do drpo off/ pick up.

I was lucky, because they struggled to find someone with a certain expertise... so I just asked for hours to suit me & work around family life. The office was also 10 minutes from home with the kids school half way....

Local government
I pick up every day
I drop off at breakfast club at 8.15 mon to Thurs. but if I lived closer to work I could drop off at normal time

TA at a school 5 minutes away from DD's school.Shit pay but minimum childcare. I drop off at 8 am breakfast club and pick up at 3:15.

DH works in IT at a university which allows him the flexibility to pick up/ drop off as needed around my job. There are core hours (I think 10-4), but he has an agreement that he can leave at 3 some days as long as the hours are made up. We do use breakfast club when he has early meetings and we have 2 days a week after-school club because he can't leave at 3 everyday. My job means I leave the house at 6.30am and return usually after 9.30pm, but because it includes weekends and night shifts there are usually only 2 school days each week that I can't drop off or pick up (I don't get home early enough from a night shift to take to school but do pick them up in the afternoon)

TA at my children's school 5 days a week.

The money is pretty rubbish, but I've spent the last 5 years working ridiculous hours with DH. The holidays are nice.

Both myself and DH share this. He's a chief executive (third sector) and I'm a senior clinician in NHS. Our advantage is that in the morning we can drop (school gates open at 8.40) and cycle to work for 9.00 am. I work 30 hours over a week and DH can week from home on his two pick up days (he often makes cams to USA late so it all events out).
We are valued employees I guess and so have negotiated what works for us

I work for HMRC. Flexi time working meant I could drive one to nursery, and walk the other one to school. When they were both at school, I switched to term time working.

You could also explore different options. If you live with their father, could one of you do drop offs and the other do pick ups, and both adjust your working hours accordingly so one starts early and the other finishes later?

Use of breakfast and/or after school club to extend the hours that you work to give you more choices? As someone else has said, length of commute is a big factor, work and school need to be very close to each other, probably 15 mins or under, otherwise, your working day will be very short, unless you find an employer who agrees to let you work at home in the evenings to make up the hours.

Jobs in schools like TA might be a good choice with the added advantage that you get all the school holidays off, so school holiday childcare is covered, but competition is very high, as the holy grail job for many parents.

I have an annualised hours contract in a school and work the hours I choose term time only. It's a dream job for a parent which is why I'm still there after several years, feeling a bit bored of the work!

School secretary in a prep school. I don’t start until 9.30, finish at 5.30. Dds are I ASC until 6. Dh normally picks up, but if he’s working away, has meetings that overrun or is not local, I will pick them up from ASC.

I'm an educational psychologist. I work one long day and 3 school days each week. I now worked for myself, but chose four school days when I worked for a Local Authority.

Agree with the previous comment about a short commute helping. I have a short walk from home to school, then from school to work. Means I can fit my hours into three short days and two long days - I would struggle if I had a longer commute.

Those who have Flexi time : did you work for the same company before you had children or did you start a new job on those terms?

I work in children's community nursing as a health care assistant and work 3 days over 4 which means pretty much school hours - 2 mornings I drop at a child minders at 815 the rest of the time I do all school runs .
It's good financially but does mean at times a mad dash to and from work and have to clock watch to leave on time which can feel a bit slack at times. Also it means you are always either at work or with kids and can be tiring- I used to do 5 days 10-3 term time only and that was exhausting I much prefer doing 4 short days all year round as my day off really is a sanity saver for me, the time after school we are all a bit knackered and I do sometimes think the kids would probably be better off at an after school club or similar rather than sat glued to screens while I dash about sorting dinner and so on .

I'm a teacher so don't manage to pick up as my school is half an hour away, but I do leave 'on the bell' one day a week so DD is not in after-school club for so long.

My DH is a civil servant on Flexi time, so he manages to drop off every day and pick up 2 days a week. He can work from home, so if he still has work to do then he can log back on once he's picked her up.

My DCs are now adults, but when they were young I worked as an accountant for the NHS. I worked Mon - Wed (09.45 to 14.45), Thurs (09.45 to 12.45) and off on Fri. So, 18 hpw.
I’d previously worked FT and negotiated those hours when I returned to work after maternity leave.
It worked perfectly for me (and the NHS I hope). But I did have an 11mile drive on the motorway to get to and from work and I often panicked if there were any traffic hold ups on my way to pick them up after school.

I work 3 days over 4 and set my own hours. I wanted to do drop off and pick up but now I think it's not that big a deal. They have always gone to a childminder/ after school club one day a week. They do their homework there and then I collect them. When I collect them, they do the same- snack then homework while I work.

I work full time from home. I drop DS every morning. He either walks home alone (he's yr6), goes to the child minder, an after school club or I collect him.

I am an editor for a scientific journal.