How quickly can you get your dc from school?

[elliejjtiny]

Normally we are 5-10 minutes away from primary school in the car and 10-15 minutes away from secondary school depending on the traffic. Today we got a phone call from the secondary school saying after school activity has finished 30 minutes early because the teacher had an emergency. Can we please come and get dc3 and dc4 straight away. Dh unfortunately can't because he is picking up dc from college, he will be there in 30 minutes. I have a SEN child at home and can't drive. So I could come but dh would be quicker. Pil are 2nd contact but they live 30 minutes away. School were not impressed with us but I don't know what else I could have done. I don't have any friends who could pick them up and look after them at that short notice.

I feel so bad for abandoning them but I can't think of anything else I could have done. All the dc go to the nearest schools/college.

How old are the DC? Do they have any sn? Don't secondary schools usually just let the kids leave?

How old are they

Could the child at college not make their own way back whilst your partner picked up the younger children?

Yeah agree, how old are they? I think 30 mins is an acceptable amount of time at short notice

But even if it was more, that's not the parents fault if school has closed early, people work etc

So weird of the school for being funny about it

I wouldnt take it too personal, id put it down to the emergency being so stressful or traumatic such as an accident or death which meant staff were frenzied about quickness to get to where they need to be, and the other staff will be mirroring this out of concern i suspect

It's been a long while now but work was 20-30 minutes away from school for both DH and I

Same as you, usually I'd be 10-15 mins away. 5 if I ran!

But I don't stay at home all day, if I'm in the office I'll be at least an hour away. Or me and do decided to go for a date day one day when the kids were in school and it did cross my mind if school were to call we'd be a couple of hours at least. I have friends who could pick them up e.g school closure, but not for illness.

My child's secondary school cancels activities etc due to weather or teacher illness and we'd usually just get an email telling us of the cancellation. Nobody would ask us to come and collect child - up to us to talk to child on their phone and work out how they are getting home if they've missed the school bus. School library is open until 6pm if they've missed need somewhere warm to wait.

To answer the question, it depends. I sometimes fly overseas for the day on business or to london on the train and can't be home for hours 😂

I've had this problem but I was at work and couldn't get back out from central London in less than 45 minutes. The school staff were extremely disapproving and kept asking if I couldn't get a neighbour to pick my son up. Despite the fact that he wasn't well they would have been completely happy to hand him over to any random neighbour if they could get him off their hands quicker, and this is during the normal school day.

They gave me concerned sad faces when I arrived. Dickheads.

Secondary school? I'd not even leave work for that. Time it would is irrelevant. I'd ask them just to wait in a communal area until I'd finished or make their own way home!

Secondary school kids should be old enough to sort themselves out unless they have SN

Dickheads...

That's lovely.
I have cleaned vomit and poo from children whose parents weren't able to get there .I have had children sobbing with sore throats, headaches etc
I have no problem with that and understand life is busy and people work away or have caring responsibilities of other children or elderly parents.

Knowing I was being called a dickhead would seriously piss me off.

We live 5 mins from school. I'm usually working a 45 min drive away and my husband is a 1.5 hour commute away via train. Grandparent/Aunt are both 1 hour away. I'm not allowed my phone in most schools I go into, so there would be a lengthy wait if we were ever called into school. Thankfully that hasn't happened to date!

I think 30 mins is fine OP!

I'm a 7 minute walk from the kids primary and a 30 minute walk from secondary (obviously I'd get in a cab if I needed to be at the secondary school in an emergency - was a this not an option for you?)

Of course this depends on if I'm home but as I WFH I usually am.

I spent a couple of years working at my DC school. Even then it would have taken me probably half an hour to arrange cover to be able to leave with my own DC.

The dickhead comment is because it was impossible for the OP to be there any sooner. And it wasn't aimed at you.

Unlike in the 1970s most women work, and while recently more people WFH it is still common for parents to work over 30 minutes away from their kids school. Added to the fact loads of schools aren't 5 minutes from stations.

I'm surprised secondary school ages kids are usually picked up?

Depends where I am.

Wfh - 5 mins
In my usual office - 20 mins
In London - 90 mins
If DH is at his office, it's 45 mins for him.

I think op must mean primary school if it's dc3 and dc4. Unless she has at least 5 kids?

One 6 mins and one 45 mins BUT like you I have to juggle other caring commitments so might be longer.

To answer your question, we are lucky, we live less than 10min drive from both school and nursery and dh works from home on my working days.

I think that not being able to drive is what makes your situation difficult op

30 mins is fine, they can’t just expect parents to be there immediately regardless of the situation, people work in different locations or may be out of the house doing things and would have timed it for the original pick up time. I’ve had to make my baby wait in nursery to be picked up for an hour and a half when he was ill and they’d called because I was working in London and DH was away, there was nothing else I could do I can’t magically fly home quicker. It is what it is and they just have to keep DCs u til you’re able to pick up.

That's really odd for a secondary school.

Ours would email or text parents to let them know the pupils were being released 30mins early, but then leave it up to families to sort out arrangements for going home.

And the library is normally open, so if a pupil needed collecting, they could always wait there. And unless you're really, really rural, surely there's a coffee shop or some other business that's open where they could wait safely?

Primary school - dropped DC (age 7) off at schools breakfast club in gentle snow that was not predicted to last.

Headed off to work an hour away (driving - no such thing as blue tooth back then!). Got to work to find various missed calls from school - they had decided to close before even opening - probably about 5 minutes after I had dropped off.

They were incredibly cross that I hadn't answered phone but in those days there was no ability to answer whilst driving (still don't like to TBH).

DH was second contact - also driving. They had to wait another hour for me to get back. Complete waste of time as snow did not persist and school could have happily opened.

So to answer the question - it took me 2 hours to pick them up.