To feel increasingly resentful of the growing divide between those who are able to home school and those who can't

[thepeopleversuswork]

To preface this with the observation that I'm very lucky to be able to work from home in safety and I haven't lost sight of that.

But I am working about 10 hours a day in order to be able to hold onto my job. I'm a lone parent and have no support from anyone. My company expects me to be literally always on and takes no account whatsoever of the fact that I am supposed to be home schooling.

I'm constantly bombarded with people who are either on furlough or not working talking about the "pressures" of home schooling and how difficult it is to fit it in when they have whole days free and are agonising over difficult maths problems etc. Or people posting endless pictures on social media of the cool, creative things their kids have done.

I'm really lucky if I get to spend half an hour with my DD setting tasks for her and very rarely get to do any supervision, let alone teaching, as I'm holed up in the next room.

I've mentioned this to various friends and they will raise an eyebrow and say "but surely your work must understand?". No, they don't understand. It makes me feel so shit.

I get that furlough is not ideal and that we're all in various ways struggling so there's no point feeling resentful of other people for their circumstances.

But I'm increasingly concerned about how the government and schools plan to handle this if physical schooling becomes more difficult over a longer period.

A real divide is going to grow between those who are able to support their children in the home and those who aren't. I can accept my daughter's schooling taking a back seat for a few months or weeks. But what happens if she ends up losing half an academic year to this, while the children of SAHMs or those on furlough get lavished with one to one attention at home?

Does anyone else worry about the impact on our children of those who are physically unable to provide this support?

Fab advice. If you have a partner op . 🤣

I totally hear you, op. Full time working single parent here. You can’t work (especially being on video calls all day) and parent, let alone actually teach. School have given us the bare minimum. People in two parent families where at least one parent doesn’t work, post smug stuff on FB doing all sorts of exciting activities- it grinds my gears, but then I think to myself well at least I don’t have to be married to their lump of a husband😂

Devlesko no I don't have a partner (not one who lives with me anyway). That's the whole point.

@Phineyj a retired person might do what?

@MadameGazelleIsMyHomegirl 🤣 I’ve had those same thought. I’ve always loved being single (well you know what I mean) but now, I’m thinking thank fuck.

Which of course will also be a contributing factor to the divide. Many have fled because of DV. Those children are now between schools and more to follow.

y agree - has been awful.

My kids are doing crafts/playground play/films at school and having to try to catch up on set work on the weekend as I'm working much of the time. They hate me for it as there is a lot set.

I've chalked it up as one of those things other than the one in Y5 who has 11+in Sept. Her chances are going to be destroyed, particularly if comments on other threads that keyworker kids will be kept in their cross age range bubbles that than being readmitted to their class bubble where they might get a sniff of learning. all her peers are at home banging through the bond books.

I've had to switch out of all the class wattsapp groups and email threads as they were driving me mad.

School are very upset with me requesting that at least the y5 one gets a quiet space to do the set work and have interpreted it as me being highly unreasonable on the one hand then repeatedly giving me copies of the passwords for Google classrooms and asking why they haven't turned it all in on the other. You can't win

aintnothinbutagstring I work from home in the evenings. In the day I go to work in the care home and have to send my son to school when I'd prefer not to risk it. I didn't say all people home educating were in that situation either I was just saying to OP that some are which is probably why they don't understand the pressures of a single parent juggling everything with or without the pandemic.

Fast moving thread! I suggested finding a student to do an hour with the DD online once a day to check on learning. Then I thought a retired person would also be possible. Sadly while a lot of people like the OP are working their butts off, there are many others who are stuck at home bored.

Yanbu. Lone parent only working three days a week.
House has gone to shit (mondays dishwasher load still waiting to be emptied) and my 11yr old is doing about 5 mins of school a day. Teen is managing a reasonable day.
Can't work early or late as one is an early riser and the other is prone to late meltdowns.
Totally winging it and crossing my fingers I can get out the other side. Just glad I can still pay my mortgage and I'm saving on holiday clubs.

The government needs to address this, it's such a huge issue. People who need to work and parent simultaneously should be protected from being overworked and not penalised for looking after their children - it's simply not fair that you should start at 6.30 am and still be available at 5.30 when there are children to look after. I honestly don't know how you manage, even with two SAH parents here not working we still find it a challenge to keep on top of the house, kids, schooling etc etc. It must be hugely stressful.

If anybody is on their local
"Next Door" group, there are usually lots of students or retired people offering on line tuition.

So why can't you pair up with colleagues and tag-team on accounts to provide longer hours of cover? Sorry if I'm really missing something, but if the issue is that clients will fire your company if they aren't getting the turnaround expected on requests, then there must be provision within normal working practices and condiitons to cover off those requests during annual leave/sickness/parental/bereavement leave. If it is so critical to the survival of your company that clients must never, ever wait, then someone up the line must have made it their business to work out how, given that staff are human and not robots that never fall sick or go on leave, that client expectation can be met. Has no-one ever proposed this within your business as normal risk management?

YANBU, I am not on my own, I have a DH but he is in his makeshift office on conference calls, client meetings etc most of the day so he is not a huge amount of help. Like you he can't just ignore clients and things feel very insecure as others in his company have been furloughed and there's a huge likelihood of redundancy hanging over everyone.

I work part time - 30 hrs in theory and my work is largely computer based but due to the kind of work I do, I cannot complete it in 30hrs, certainly not the 30 WFH with children to teach hours! I have two children one who is 13 and a DD who is 8. My DD struggles with maths and so it takes quite a bit of time to explain concepts, she certainly is not able to go away and complete the tasks set by school. However, like a PP I do bribe my 13 year old to help as he is calm and logical and explains things well. The downside is I find them both distracted by something else like the guinea pigs etc. I don't blame them as they are both young.

I don't think we are in a competition but I don't see how you could argue that there is no advantage in being a parent who doesn't have to work in this scenario. I think what the OP is asking is what is going to be done to balance this out on the children's return.

it's simply not fair that you should start at 6.30 am and still be available at 5.30 when there are children to look after.

The problem is that we’re so used to putting the needs of business first, that we hardly notice it.

And even now, when all the supports for these ways of working are gone, you’ve people on here, clambering for parents to deliver their hours or face redundancies/salary reduction.

We need to think much harder about people’s wider commitments and what’s good for society as a whole.

The way we’re going we’ll be forcing parents out of the workforce (and they’ll be mostly women, let’s face it) and plunging more and more children into poverty. What a wonderful outcome.

YADNBU. For me, this is one of many strong arguments as to why children must go back to school. The variation in how kids are homeschooled is huge with those already vulnerable suffering the most.

We need to think much harder about people’s wider commitments and what’s good for society as a whole.

in the middle of a recession that is just starting? good luck with that..

start by telling that to the parents screaming and abusing "lazy teachers" on here - to many teacher bashing thread to chose from. The majority of these posters is not really concerned about the greater good, are they...

BorsetShireBlueBalls in theory there is cover. There are multiple client teams with at least one person on them. In practice, its very hard to ask a junior team member who is earning half your salary and is spread ridiculously thin and has been working since 6am to pick something up at very short notice. Its a case of "take one of the team" or it will be commented upon.

Has no-one ever proposed this within your business as normal risk management?

I’m not the OP, but I feel quite sure this is normal practice. However, it’s will be put in place to cover people for a few days/a week at a time, not months and months.

In my industry, we organise our projects around our holidays, so it’s kind of up to us to keep this to a minimum. You wouldn’t last long if you took a lot of sick days either.

Many workers without children are getting more intransigent about not taking on extra at this time to cover people like the OP.

It’s very difficult and there aren’t any easy answers frankly.

You are not alone! Although my employer is great I still have to work and attend virtual meetings so I just can't keep on top of the kids and how much work they are doing - some days I can help depending on how busy I am but others I physically can't and I do feel guilty.

My two are old enough to get on, my yr7 child is finding it easier than my yr6 child but that could be due to ability and how work is set.

Yanbu op. And I know it's not ideal or the point but could you do a bit of school stuff on the weekend even if it's just a few hours?

The majority of these posters is not really concerned about the greater good, are they

Well I think some of them are desperate for schools to get back in some form so they can do their own jobs and have their children educated.

If you can afford £29.99 a week you can afford an online tutoring company who are running classes - 2 hours a day covering Maths, English,Science,and Art taught over Zoom. My DD8 is in a class of 12 and it’s been a lifesaver

Laurie is right. The business model is more or less designed to be run on skeleton teams. There’s also an expectation that senior people have “ownership” of projects and don’t delegate difficult stuff to juniors.

Clients also deliberately capitalise on our insecurity about their business to drive more productivity. And they don’t give a flying fuck about EU working time directives or childcare considerations.

Capitalism at its best...

Divebar good shout

It’s why I walked away from my old City corporate job the climate is brutal you stay there until the job was done and if that meant all night so be it. The client was king to be fair it’s not actually the employers fault.

If they don’t offer that service others would. I don’t know the answer but agree capitalism is brutal for families and a true nightmare in this situation for single parents. Those suggesting the op talks to her employers are hopelessly naive or public sector workers.