AIBU to be baffled a mum had no idea the school fayre was happening?

[xAwaywiththefairiesx]

Today my daughter's primary school had a spring fayre after school on the school field. Ice cream van, face-painting, various stalls with games, the usual. All arranged by the PTA to raise money for the school.
There was a mufti day today, and the children were asked to bring a donation to the school as an exchange for the mufti, something like cakes to sell or a teddy for the tombola or a bottle of wine as a prize or something.
One mum wanders onto the field after school, with both of her kids in mufti, looking around bewildered saying "What's this? Is this a new thing they're doing? Will it be every week?"

And this is so weird to me because the spring fayre has been organised for months. We have lots of emails asking for donations, several more asking for volunteers, we've had at least three leaflets home about it, and she obviously got the memo about mufti, the whole point in which was for the school fayre!

My phone own child has been banging on about it for three weeks.

How can she get so unaware? I'm not judging, honestly, I'm just baffled how it got past her.

Is it just me? Could you miss something like this after all that communication?

This has been explained. So. Many. Times. On this 35 page thread.

The OP has explained many times, and others have agreed with her that they have had the same experience, that it's the only word she's ever know for non uniform day and she wasn't aware it wasn't a universal English word.

There's already been massive tangents about this, lasting several page. Pleeeease don't start another.

No, please, by all means, start another tangent. The more comments there are, the quicker this bloody thread ends!! 😄

Always non uniform day for me and my DCs too. My juvenile sense of humour could not cope with ‘Mufti day’ I could not say this with a straight face. 😂

If it was such a commonly used phrase then there wouldn’t be so many comments asking what it meant! 🤷‍♀️😂

OK. But I didn't know that until seeing those comments 🤦

As someone who worked in a school office for 20 years this doesn't surprise me in the least!

Do you only ever read the first search result on Google? Or didn’t think “mufti day” might be a useful search input? 😂
It does refer to the Islamic scholars’ uniform as colonial British army staff would apparently wear something that looked similar to this in India on non-uniform days back in those times.
On a thread about being baffled, it made me laugh that you’d go to the trouble of looking something up and didn’t actually read the search results. The Wikipedia definition is 3rd in my list and explains the link quite clearly.

I don’t think everyone should necessarily have heard of it btw, things have different names all over the place and depends on the school. But to look it up and then not read the answer (let alone all the responses on this thread) to fuel your own “see, I’m right” is a bit odd!

School governer here and a grandmother.

I have always called it mufti day. Everyone in my school calls it mufti day. My children's school called it mufti day in the 1990s, in another part of the country. My own school in yet another part of the country in the late 60s and early 70s also called it mufti day.
Every school in our town calls it mufti day.
It's even been said by people from Australia and New Zealand that they call it mufti day.
I am 62 years old. Like the OP, I had no idea anyone calls it anything different until a few other people on the board of governments said they had never heard the word. That was four years ago.

I am not saying it is universal. But I can completely understand why the OP assumed it was. Why would she not?

Haha I’m that mum 🙈😂

We get that many emails etc, I’ll be honest I don’t read them, occasionally scan them sometimes not even that. I would prob be more inclined to read them if I wasn’t sent so many.

This Mum does sound a bit clueless - but in all honesty, I think schools do often imagine parents are more invested in keeping up with news and events than the majority actually are. I taught for a long time and because there’s a few parents who have the headspace and inclination to scrutinise every communication in the finest detail, it’s easy to assume all the parents are similar and have what’s going on at their child’s school front and centre in their minds all day.

Now I’m out of teaching I have very light engagement with my DCs primary school. I’m the one relying on the parents WhatsApp for info the day before!

If communication is the same as our primary, I find it odd. We get lists of dates, facebook posts, the school app and then usually a reminder of what the event is a few days before. If it was our school fayre, you would have had to miss it in newsletters, multiple emails and social media posts. Not to mention the build up to it over several weeks with donations etc.

There is a chance she could be really busy and just skimmed through school messages and missed that part. I check school apps/emails every day (probably takes less than a minute for 2 kids/2 schools) and put anything straight in the phone calendar. As a pain as emails/messages sometimes are, better than the screwed up letter in the bag we had in the 90’s!

How do you keep on top of school trips/payments/non-uniform days etc without reading them?

Not judging just its not optional to read them with both our schools as all info is sent that way i.e no letter about anything ever.

Do you have a “men’s shed” type group in your local area?

I don’t know what else they might be called but it’s a group of (usually older) men who do woodwork projects for the community free of charge. Sometimes you need to pay for the wood but often they have donated wood they can use too.

We had some lovely things made for our garden area and playground.

We also got a young local artist to paint a mural in the school library. It was beautiful and it helped them with their portfolio too.

I don’t think some parents realise how vital the PTA money is - quite aside from some of the “nice” stuff we also bought iPads for our Y6 class and restocked the library. Schools really are woefully underfunded - teachers buy lots of things for their classes out of their own pocket.

On a separate note, I lost your earlier reply re your friend but if you’re doing it properly, being a school governor is a LOT more than just turning up for occasional meetings.

I think you have hit the nail on the head here. I do feel schools seem to think we are more invested than we actually are. Or seem to think we are shit parents if we send little Lola in uniform on non uniform day because we simply “forgot”. We can be great parents who are simply just shit at remembering every single event that happens at school, because maybe we aren’t that invested to start off with or maybe more important things in life got in the way. But at the op has made it clear by starting this thread that parents do get judged.

Yes, we do! My mum's partner goes to the men's shed, he loves it.
We did approach them to make us some planters but they had too many projects on.
I have the most beautiful hand carved bird house up that's was made by someone at our men's shed, it's stunning. Mum bought it from them for my birthday ♥️

People definitely don't realise what we do. They think its all just putting on events. They don't realise the events are just the fundraising for the stuff we actually do.

I’m sure you are able to explain how important you all are - perhaps they don’t know what everyone does.

Why do you have to be so nasty and condescending?

Just ignore the bullies love x

I get so many emails from the PTA, that usually come in when I'm at work, that I generally don't bother opening them. My kids might or might not mention some event coming up, and that determines whether I know about it or not.

I’m genuinely surprised at all the posts asking what ‘mufti’ means. It’s not a new word ‘mufti day’ has always meant non uniform day. I schooled abroad and everyone knew the term. How do so many people here not recognise it?

Maybe she has more important things to think about

Aw a hand carved bird house? what a cute birthday present <3

Love our local men's shed, my dad goes. I didn't realise it was a widespread thing. Ours is called "men in sheds"

I know the term, but I think only from TV years ago. Maybe the Aussie soaps? I don't think I've ever heard it used in real life. Are you in the UK? It must be regional.

If you want to interpret that as condescending then fine.

But you have been incredibly condescending about this woman, about being ‘baffled’ about the woman’s inability to remember the fayre and saying things like she looked like she had come from outer space. You clearly meant you were looking for an in to complain (which is fine - like I said before, own it).

Are you truly ‘baffled’? If so, people have kindly suggested why she may have forgotten. So they should clear that up.

But you appear to have taken offence that people have legitimate reasons for not prioritising it because you have put a lot of effort in.

Because we simply don’t use the term in a lot of parts of the UK. It sounds like it’s a term used regionally in certain parts of the UK but not nationwide, a bit like a slang word. I’ve always known it as “non uniform day” and that’s what schools have always referred to it as where I live. If someone said to me “we are having a Mufti day” I’d look at them gone out. Never even heard of “mufti” until yesterday.