working parents - how do you get to all the daytime school meetings/assemblies etc?

[chuffinell]

my dd is 4 and in reception class, but she has been at the school a year already, (was in nursery last year)its a lovely school ,very caring and nurturing and i love it

the only problem is they keep scheduling everything at times we are unable to attend - yesterday i was handed a letter inviting parents in at 2.45 this thursday to discuss reading methods and how to help your child. i desparately want to go, its so important but i cant just take time off willy nilly

i have already missed a 915 mass, and i have a list of other 9.15 assemblies, school plays, harvest celebrations, and they always finish term an hour earlier on the last friday of term

i desparately try, as does DH to attend as many school events as possible, but we cant do everything, and we both need to work, i really dont want DD looking round to find neither of us could make it into school, its so important to her

DH takes her into school so i can start work at 830 and make up enough hours to pick her up at 320. he has to work later to make up for his later starts

i wd be interested to hear how other working parents manage to attend all these events?

[notevenamousie]

I can't imagine how a PP's experience of lone parents is true - it's TWICE as hard as you have one salary and have to make ALL the stuff.
OP - I think being a working mum is just a lifetime of feeling torn. I have found others where I work - though they all seem to have partners/ husbands, but I think it is still very hard on mums in particular. I think your dc WILL respect that you went out to work and pay for their home and standards of living, it's just that they don't get it now, whereas they do get that some children's parents get to come to harvest festical and theirs don't. In the longer term, you are doing the right and best thing.

[MollieO]

I think it is particularly hard when they are young. Ds is 5. He knows I have to work full time but he still gets upset if I can't make it to school functions. Of course I know I am a good role model for him but I doubt he will appreciate that until he is older and there are a lot of years to get through between now and then.

HSMM my ds went to lots of school functions when he was with a CM - school assemblies, parents evening, school concerts etc. She didn't mind taking him and he enjoyed going! As far as she was concerned it was as if ds was her daughter's sibling.

Certainly when I was young parents' evenings were always in the evening so I'm not sure why they are now scheduled for straight after school.

[MintyCane]

chuffinell oh no did he refuse to marry you because of the mess ?

[Elk]

I don't know if this will help anybody, but I am a SAHM and a quite a few of my friends work. As we have children at the same school I often volunteer to be a child's 'honourary mummy' so that if their real mum or dad can't make it as they are working then the child knows they have someone there looking out for them. I have done this at events like the Barnado's toddle, nursery day out, Macmillan's Coffee morning, Christmas Fayre etc. Obviously this only works with children who already know me and we ask them in advance if they like the idea.

[titchy]

Oh, another thing I've remembered - you can always do the 'turn-up at the beginning - quick wave then disappear' bit! That works too. Obviously you don't tell your dc that you disappeared two minutes into the event

[chuffinell]

thanks for all the support, it is like being constantly torn, notevenamousie

titch i did the opposite at the last afternoon assembly - got stuck in traffic and arrived just as the Head teacher was telling the kids what a wonderful performance they had given, i was almost in tears. DD just laughed, luckily DH had managed to get to that one - and on time!

elk will you be MY honorary Mummy? i feel like i need a bit of looking after and a cuddle ha ha

[chuffinell]

minty- no he had refused us already by then! we are both previously divorced Catholics (lowest of the low!) he did baptise DD thou

[Elk]

The 'honourary mummy' thing started quite by accident one day. Now at events my children storm off saying 'not fair I want an honourary mummy'.

I often feel like I need one as well as my mum lives a long way away and I normally only see her once a year and there are some times when you just need your mum no matter how old you are.

[SamMitchell]

Try to juggle it between me and DH. Miss some things.

[cea]

Speak to work as well..if there is no formal procedure for buying extra holiday ( or it isn't financially viable) can you do unofficial flexitime ie get in a bit earlier a couple of days to build up time to then make the most important of the school events. At my work we encourage people to do this. We also encourage people to take work home and finish it off after Children are in bed if they need to attend a parents evening or similar. Most employers know they need to keep good staff happy, tho of course it does depend what sort of work you do.

[jelliebelly]

Juggle, juggle, juggle is the only answer although some schools are much worse than others for some reason from what I can gather. If there are other like minded parents though it might be worth lobbying the head - enough pestering and they might start to take notice.

[MollieO]

cea can I come at work at your company? In my office I am surrounded by colleagues who all have SAHW so no flexibility offered to me at all.

[Builde]

I am sure that this doesn't help in the slightest but when my dd started school I felt a bit overwhelmed by the number of meetings etc. that we were invited to.

e.g. reading meetings, slide-shows of the first few weeks, school photos.

Now, I did attend most of them because I am self-employed but I also now realise that:

1. there are an awful lot at the beginning of the year but they get less frequent as time goes on and the children get older.
   
   
2. children spend 7 years at primary school and very few parents will go to everything that they are invited to.
   
   3)you will start to know what is important and what isn't. So, going to assembly is probably not a big deal, but the reception year nativity play is.
   
   So, don't feel bad about the ones you miss...there will be many others.
   
   Also, suggest that some of these things happen in the evenings. Our school often runs two lots of meetings; one during school time and one during the evening.

[spiderlight]

'Or find someone to go and show an enthusiastic face such as GPs.'

You wouldn't believe how long it took me to work out that this was referring to grandparents and not to asking the family doctor to go to their school play instead of you

[nymphadora]

I have only ever done Xmas ones because when I was working in a school I couldn't take time off. The head used to let us do that as long as they didn't overlap too much or clash with our schools. Unfortunatly 2 years in a row dd2s clashed with me interpreting so noone couldcover.

Now my issue is getting enough notice cos work is flexible but I can't go at one weeks notice

[WriggleJiggle]

It's not at all unreasonable to ask the school to timetable some things in the evenings or first thing in the morning (8am). They have to accept that working parents are often not able to attend events during the day, and in order to get parental support (for things like reading techniques) they must make their metings accessible.

Sorry, I get particularly annoyed by this happening, and I work from time to time in educational settings.

If you can find a couple of other parents who feel the same you should all speak to the head about it individually. If you don't mention it to the Head, they aren't going to change things.

[Acinonyx]

Dd is in reception and all parent-teacher meetings are after 7 pm, thank goodness. It can be done - surely there must be many other parents in this position - could you talk to the school?

Dd is begging me (a card carrying atheist) to go to the harvest service at church on Friday morning - when I had planned a work-related trip to town. Don't think I'll be doing any assemblies though.

[mollymawk]

(LOL at spiderlight and the family doctor...0

I suggest asking the school to (a) try their best to schedule things at times that might be slightly feasible for working parents and (b) give you a sensible amount of notice (2 days FHS).

If enough people ask (or one person asks enough times...) they might take some notice.

[Clary]

It's really hard isn't it.

I start very early so as to leave at 3pm and do pick up most days. (school finishes 3.25pm)

So if there's sthg at 3pm or even 2.45pm I will go in for an hour over the weekend for example or make the time up by working at home in the evening.

But I'm lucky in that I can do that and my work is flexible. For many people of course this is impossible.

I do think it's worth lobbying for some meetings to be held at 6/7pm for working parents. But of course for assemblies etc that's impossible.

What gets me is things stage at 11am - that's a really tricky time! My DC know that I or DH will be there if we possibly can (prob 3/4 of the time) but if we can't, well, we were working to earn money to pay for (insert vital item in DCs' life here).

[nymphadora]

I can't understand why schools can't give a terms worth of dates in advance (& I worked in a school for years and dp is a head!) there is no reason for not setting Xmas plays in September or October

[Hulababy]

I work PT s can make all afternoon events now.

Previously I worked 2-3 days a week, and had some flexibility in being able to swap days to be able to go to school events.

If something is in a morning, it is now very difficult for me to go. On more special occasions I can sometimes swap to an afternoon (but I work in a school and not always possible).

Otherwise DH has to rearrange clients or whatever to go. He doesn't mind the ones first thing in the morning too much as he just goes to work afterwards, and is good and tries to get to bigger events like school plays and the annual speech day, and things where DD has a proper part. DDH will be staying a bit later on Friday for the charity coffee morning, as I can't make it.

[Hulababy]

nymphadora - we do get notice. We get a letter home at the end of each term to tell us important dates for the next term - so summer, Christmas and Easter. Normally comes nicely with the school fee invoice - kind of a softener, lol

[nymphadora]

I never have but dp says he does a terms notice now obviously cos I ranted about it

[fridayschild]

Every year I make a point of saying to the new teacher that DH and I are keen to come and support DS but as we both work FT it really helps if we are given about a week's prior notice. DS has trained himself to tell teachers off if they do not give mummy a week's notice as she needs to check her diary to see if she is available - a supply teacher was slightly taken aback by this last term.

Some teachers are more organised than others, if that helps. DS2's teacher this year will just not give enough notice at all, as I know from experience. The Y1 teacher last year is great.

And don't fall for the line that everyone else's mummy goes. They don't. Work out who the other mums are who won't be there, and use their names in your defence!

[dogonpoints]

Between dh and I, we have taken bits of annual leave to cover it, or we make up time later. Some things we have just missed.

The school should send out info on any meeting that some parents cannot attend.