A very dull thread about dropping off times!

[Tanzie]

DD2 has just started pre-school and I am not allowed to drop her before 0850. I can drop DD1 at her class in same school at 0830, and then have to hang about for 20 mins to drop DD2. I work and if I leave the school at about 0840-0845, I can be in work for about 0905, but if I leave it just that bit later, I don't get in until around 0920-0930. I often have meetings at this time, so it's cutting it a bit fine.

Anyway (to get to the point!), my main gripe is that there are 3 children in DD's class who are teachers' offspring, and they are allowed to drop their children there for 0830, which seems unfair to me. Should I take this up either with headmistress or with the school governors? It is both their inflexibility on this point, and the one rule for one, one rule for someone else that gets me.

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You work a 10 hour day? Luxury. My day starts at 6:30am and finishes at 8pm. Go figure.

BTW, I'm not offended. Everyone has different lives.

at Twiglett though.

SD, Tanzie doesn't 'just' work a 10-hour day, she is paid for 10 hours and then 'mum' for several hours more. Stop having a go, for heaven's sake!

OK Soupy, you're obviously up for a row about "who does most, stay at home Mums or working Mums." Fine. I was talking about the time I spend in the office. I get up at 0600 to get the kids ready for school, make packed lunch etc, clear up the cat's sh*t (she is 19 and doesn't seem to know where her box is any more). I get home at around, oooh, 1930? Just time to do bath and bed. Then I cook dinner and a couple of nights a week, I cook and freeze meals for the children so that they can have "proper food." I'd therefore estimate that my "working day" ends at around 2200. I'm crap at maths, but counting all that in, I'd say I was looking at around 16 hours?

You're not offended?? I am glad, because I certainly am offended, upset and angry by some of the flack I've got from you and others on this thread. I have apologised. YOU have reduced me to tears. I hope you're happy now and have achieved what you set out to do.

I am sorry that this thread has become so controversial, I originally only wanted some advice on a (fairly dull, as I saw it) issue which was affecting me. I thought that was what Mumsnet was for.

As I said, I work (salaried job) from necessity, not choice.

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I have been a SAHM (5 years) and I am now a teacher, so this is an interesting thread for me. Both going out to work and being a SAHM have their own stresses and strains and different advantages. I fully remember the stresses of being with two small children day in, day out! One of the advantages of being a SAHM is that you don't get the same stress at drop off time.

I drop mine at a pre school creche at 8 so that I can then dash across town to a briefing at 8.30. I usually get there with 5 minutes to spare, so it is a close run thing. Yes, I'd like to drop them 5 minutes early, so that I could set up more things before school starts, but I know thatI can't and that the people running the creche have to do their own set up.

However I also think that just as the choice to stay at home with your kids has different advantages to going out to work (an vica verca), then choices of jobs have different disadvantages and perks as well. If parnts are taking their kids into the class that they teach in, I do think that may be a mini perk of the job? Other jobs have other perks, for example when I worked for Boots I got a discount card to use in all their shop, was that 'unfair'? And TBH as a teacher I don't get paid enough to hire a nanny, is that 'unfair'? Other people work harder than I do, for less money, that is unfair, but it is everywhere in life. Do you realy begrudge them a perk?

They probably spend a fair bit of their own cash on things for the school (I know that my kids teachers do). I've just spent £48 on a book that the department needs but can't afford, so it all evens out in the end I think.

Tanzie, I'm sorry you've been upset by this thread. But I'm so fed up at the little digs that working mums have at SAHMs and vice versa on this site. Fgs, we should all be supporting each other and respecting what everyone chooses to do. Both roles have their good and bad points - it should never come down to whose "job" is harder, surely?

Btw, I sympathise completely with your problem and really hope you manage to find a workable solution. Could one of the chatting coffeeholics mind your daughter for 10 mins or so??

Hey, you said this was going to be a very dull thread. Gross misrepresentation

I don't know why you think I'm up for a row, Tanzie, given that you started flinging around cr*p about SAHMs spending all day gossipping at coffee mornings, not having time constraints on their day and then how neither you nor your nanny should have to work a 10 hour day. I'm not up for a row and I certainly did not set out to reduce you to tears. I'm sorry you feel that way and I'm sorry you were upset by anything I said.

I'm just p*ssed off with the assumption that I and SAHMs in general are "non working mothers" who tart about gossipping, drinking coffee and eating cake all day. I certainly don't I work damn hard doing the stuff your nanny does - do you think she sits around all day drinking coffee and gossipping or do you think she works hard? This is not a sly dig at the fact that I'm doing stuff and you have a nanny who does it instead, it's just a comparison. I'm curious how you might think that she works but a SAHM "does lunch".

As for being fed up with the flak you've got on this thread, I'm fed up with the flak SAHMs get on this thread, other threads and life in general. Mothers working outside the home (MWOTHs) get different flak. We can't win whether we have children and stay at home, have children and work, don't have children or whatever.

I work from home (atm) and have been known to chatter at the school gate for 10 mins(don't do coffee though) - it does appear to be the case that the mums who go out to work don't tend to participate in this activity as they have differnt time constraints. I am viewed as a SAHM and consequently everyone does think that I have all day to do as I please. That said on my days off I am busier and run around more than on my working days and tend to chat less!!! I don;'t think Tanzie is looking for a fight as her original post was about preferential treatment of TKs (teachers kids) which would help make her day go more smoothly if it were extended to everyone.

very pertinent article about trying to balance being a mother with working full time part time etc in today's FT
see here (although can only be accessed today i think)
mummy in the middle

SD: Read my posts please. I am reporting what I see re the SAHMs I know. I know they are not representative, but they do have coffee mornings, play tennis, go to aerobics classes etc etc. They all have cleaners and "ironing fairies", so no, they are not doing what my nanny and you (and I) have to do. That's why I think my nanny (and you, and I) work hard, but the SAHMs I see don't seem to have that much to do on the work front. This is my experience and it is clearly different from yours and millions of others. But that's how it is here.

And before anyone else starts, no, my nanny doesn't do the ironing and she only does cleaning related to the children.

If you go to see the Deputy tomorrow, Tanzie, please ask yourself this: do those three teachers' children in the pre-school section belong to teachers whose classrooms are open from 8:30? If so, where could their children be if not in the pre-school section? They couldn't be in the classroom with the older pupils. Maybe a concession has been made to them so that they can open their own classrooms early.

Also, consider the potential consequences of your complaint. Every teacher that I know, and me included, spends many hours per week over and above our contracted time, and pays for huge amounts of resources out of their own pocket. The parents of these three children presumably do the same, voluntarily, for the benefit of your children, trying to patch up the massive holes in the state system's bedget and provide the best education they possibly can. Schools survive only because of the goodwill of all the staff - Heads, teachers, Teaching Assistants etc. How far are you prepared to go? Are you prepared to risk the possibility that the teachers concerned will think 'sod it' and avoid the risk of offending you with these 'double standards' and not come in to school until their contracted time starts? Who would that benefit? If my Head said to me that I couldn't have my daughter in school with me before 8:45 (when our school opens) then I would just stay at home until I was contractually required to be there.

My final point is that if the Deputy has young children, she might not feel much sympathy when she knows the details of your complaint. Not many people are fortunate enough to have the flexibility of their start times that you seem to have. I, for example, was never once able to take or collect my daughter or my son from playgroup or from infant school because I was always at my own school. Your Deputy Head may well be in the same position.

Going back to the original post, I would say that it can't hurt to have a word with the pre-school teacher to ask if you could drop dd off a little earlier on certain days when you have meetings to get to. They may be willing to make an exception for you too. IME the staggered openings of school and pre-school is to help those parents who may have children at more than one school. For various reasons parents don't always send their child to the pre-school that is attached to the school that they want their child to attend when they reach school age IYSWIM.

Refusal to take children earlier may well be (as someone said earlier) due to insurance purposes. Possibly the teachers who drop their children off earlier have made some formal agreement that the pre-school isn't responsible for accidents before 8.50am. The pre-school teacher may be able to explain the reasons why the rules are different for children of teachers. If you don't agree with the reason(s) given then you may wish to take it further.

Agree 100% with you, NDT. Ive spent the morning perparing resources, because the school doesn't have them. I'm in secondary and I know that it is even worse in Primary. I've used my OHP, my printer cartridges and my paper. I've also just forked out £48 on a teat book and CD resource to use with the sixth form because , if you can believe this, we can't afford books for the 16 kids in the Upper sixth! I'm lucky regarding my child care, I can jsut about get to briefing.

However if I were those teachers I'd be temped to think , 'Sod it' and play to the rules. And that wouldn't help anyones kids.

hmb! I'd heard things were bad but didn't realise it was so cr@p!

I'm not kidding! How crap is that? Last year I taught for half the year before we managed to get 5, yes 5 books for the upper sixth! This year we have changed the examination board (for some compelling reasons) and the old books don't cover everything.
TBH I've been s myself that I haven't covered things in enough detail, so the book is a great help for me, but even so.....

The alternative is to try to change your work arrangements so that your meetings don't start until 9.45am at the earliest. If you feel that the school should change their working practices to suit your time constraints, it's surely not to much to expect it of your own employers first?

I will ask if there is any chance that DD2 could be taken earlier on the two days when I have early meetings. I am not approaching this from a complaining standpoint. If the answer is "No", I will ask why not. As I have said before, I agree it may be an insurance issue, and the parents on the premises are covered by this, in which case, presumably, end of story.

NDT - this school is neither state nor UK system. Don't know if that makes a difference at all.

Where are you Tanzie?

I know it has been mentioned before but why not ask the PTA or head teacher about starting a breakfast club. It is run by a lady not a teacher.

The children are dropped off from 7.30am and can have breakfast and a play before going to their classes.

The parents pay for the club when their children are there.

There is a very successful one at DS school there is also one after school.

I have never used it as I work as a childminder each day. I don't know how much it is but it would mean that you could leave your child these extra 10-15mins so you could get to work.

All my family have been or are teachers now and teachers do indeed need the time before the children arrive into the classroom. I think most people see them just working 8.30 - 4.00 and think it is an easy life. Well it isn't....

I do understand the difficulties of being a working mum. (I am one) and my life would be much easier if I could ask my kids' school to be flexible about start times BUT I had to leap in here to support NDT. As an ex primary teacher myself I know exactly how demanding a job it is and I think if you haven't done the job it is difficult to imagine just how vital those last few minutes are before class starts. If children are allowed in 10 minutes before official lesson times that means the teacher will be unable to leave the room, go to the photocopier, collect the last bits of forgotten stock, liaise about playground duty when a colleague is sick etc etc etc. Yes, the teachers' kids are an exception because on paper they are being looked after by their parents even if in a different room. If you leave your child the school is in loco parentis and if the child got hurt while the teacher was out of the room it would be the school's fault. Your children may be no trouble at all but you can be sure that if you start doing it other parents will demand the right to leave their kids early too. Think about it - how would you feel if someone added 10 minutes to your working day without asking?

And then other people, who at present can't use the school to 'mind' the kids would want it to be just 10 minutes earlier, and so on and so on.

In essence these teachers are in charge of their own children. Are you realy saying that they should drop their kids off at a childminder for 10 minutes so that they can then come into school, in their own, unpaid, time, to set up activities for your children to enjoy? Do you think that would be 'fair'?

Sorry but if I was asked to do that I would be strongly tempted to tell the school to stuff it and dash in at the last minute.