I’m on a FB group that includes over 10,000 educators in my state. As you can imagine, it’s been very active over the past few months with people posting speculations about what school will look like when it opens. Last night, I ran across this comment regarding schools having to bend over backwards and change everything about schedules and learning in the wake of COVID-19:
“Why do schools have to be the ones doing all the adjusting? How about other businesses adjust for schools?”
Something struck me during all of this in my situation. So here I am working from home and homeschooling 2 kids and keeping a 4 year old busy, and after almost 3 months I ask my husband to take a day off work so I can go into my schools (no children allowed, appointment must be made between the hours of 9-4) to close up my office for the year and move out of one of them, and he gives me pushback, stating, “well we are really busy at work.”
Ok. So he’s been essential and he works for the federal government in facilities management. Very few women in these positions. Are they busy? Yeah.
But OMG? Can these fucking men give a little? Their day to day has not changed. Not in the least. Well their commutes have been shorter bc if less traffic. Are you kidding me? I went off on him and told him he and his male buddies need to take one for the team because the women of the working world have sacrificed OUR ASSES off.
*i do realize that I’m being sexist and over generalist here, and this was more of a husband issue than anything else. It pissed me right off.
ETA not sure if this even comes close to your question and I’m not sure how businesses would accommodate schools but in situation, I needed a non-homeschooling parent and his workplace to understand that the world outside of their job has flipped upside down and they needed to give a little. Just a little. Consider it, 1/64th of a give. (1 workday of 64 workdays of this.)
Yes, I do think a lot of businesses need to shift to accommodate the insanity that is our world right now. I know my company has been really understanding, within reason, to people needing to log off mid-day and log back on to work at night or early in the morning to work around kid and school schedules. I don't think many places have been as flexible, at least from what I've heard from friends locally. I have one friend who was required to go back to the office because HR said it wasn't fair for her to work from home while others were in the office, even though she reports to the CFO and had his permission to keep working from home due to childcare issues. So she was left scrambling to find a daycare that's open for her son because of an arbitrary "rule" from HR. Her job could be done 100% remotely - she's an accountant.
And campermom, YES to all that. Another friend of mine has been home schooling and watching her two kids all day, then goes into work for an overnight shift because her husband is a facilities/maintenance person who is considered essential. So literally nothing about his life has changed at all and she is left burnt out and exhausted trying to pull double duty. We're also dealing with some men at my company who want us to reopen the office because they're sick of being home with their kids. They have SAH wives and want to "get away" from the chaos at home, so think we should revamp everything and reopen to accommodate them. I just want to say "Suck it up buttercup!"
Here’s another example, now that I think of it. So during this summertime period I am very lucky to have off and can stay home with my kids. That’s a much better position to be in than most, and I realize that.
My dilemma is that we have or will have 3 different orthopedic appointments for a broken arm, 2 well child appointments (different times), one Rescheduled dentist appt to replace a sealant that had popped off prior to COVID. I need to go to my GYN to have my Mirena removed and replaced. I scheduled that for the first week back to work, before work. I’m honestly skipping other regular dentist cleanings and doing virtual appointments for many other things.
None of these appointments are allowed to have any kids other than the patient. Our day camps shut down. We no longer have daycare, so I need my spouse to take off to care for our other kids.
His workplace needs to understand that he is going to need to use sick time for this kind of thing, bc I can’t just send them to Grammoms. He’s resistant bc he is taking 10 days of vacation this summer (2 separate weeks). I’m not sure if I’m being gaslighted again or if other moms are just...what are you guys doing for this stuff?
For yesterday’s brace replacement on my sons arm, my 72 year old parents met me at the doctors office parking lot, stayed with my other two kids at a picnic table outside of the orthopedic office and they all wore masks.
campermom, I think a large part of it is your DH just being stubborn and unreasonable. My ExH is the same way about that kind of stuff. His job is always The Most Important Job Of All and he's difficult to work with when it comes to scheduling appointments for the kids. If it comes down to it, I'd just call the doctor's offices in advance and say "Listen, I'm home with the kids by myself. I have to bring the other children with me, I have no options right now." and see what they say. That's what I've done and what a friend of mine has done and places have been relatively understanding.
campermom- if he’s a federal employee, he’s allowed to use sick time for kids dr appointments. It’s a different pot than his vacation pot. So yes, you’re being gaslighted. He just doesn’t want to watch the kids.
I’m not sure how businesses could adjust to schools since schools don’t have plans. From my POV, so far businesses have done all the adjusting. Schools just shut down and went to virtual stuff. I don’t recall any of us getting any input into what virtual learning looked like last semester. My company, which is old, stodgy, conservative and overwhelmingly male, has said that they will make allowances for people who need to work from home because of lack of childcare or schools. We are an essential business. So essential in fact that we get priority for Covid testing. And even we are saying we will flex to deal with what schools decide in the fall. Frankly, we never flex for anything. I was pleasantly in shock.
I was just going to say the same thing as mommyatty - businesses have done tons of adjusting and I don’t see that schools have done any yet. There seems to be a real lack of creative solutions from my standpoint. And when I say ‘schools’ I don’t mean teachers - I realize teachers had to adjust to distance learning. But the structure of schools needs to adjust. If we can reopen nearly every other part of society and not manage to do it for schools, which are so much more important - more creativity (and money) is needed.
campermom - I agree that your DH is being stubborn and unreasonable. He has shown almost no flexibility through this whole thing, from what you’ve shared.
I will say this... DH works in a male-dominated industry. Before he started his own company, we would stagger our work start and end times. He left the house before 6am, left work at 4 to relieve the nanny by 5. I left at 745, commuted at least an hour, skipped lunch, and tried to leave by 5-530 to get home by 615-630. Then I’d finish up when the kids went to bed. But no one at his office understood why he was leaving. What do you mean you have to take care of your kids? Where’s your wife? But, I mean, you’re X Level here - doesn’t she understand? She can’t have a job as demanding as yours... and on and on. He had those conversations frequently, stood up for me, and I STILL needed to strong-arm him into taking someone to the dentist.
So, maybe for some guys it’s part stubborn, part work environment, part clueless?
mae0111 I think that’s a fair point. My DH seems to think women run everything/shared kid involvement is the norm because I have a demanding career in a diverse firm and his firm is mostly run by women, which is super rare in the investment industry. Also women are the breadwinners in many of our friends’ and in SIL’s marriage. I have to explain to him that it’s not like this everywhere/for everyone.
Post by librarychica on Jul 2, 2020 9:53:41 GMT -5
My not-known-for-flexibility employer in a mostly male industry has sent hundreds of thousands of people home, spending who knows how much money doing so since we weren’t totally set up for it, implemented a very flexible schedule for those that can be home and those who are on site, coached every level of management on how to best accommodate employees who need additional accommodations and literally said “you cannot expect normalcy until schools are fully in session” and that we should give parents “maximum flexibility” and assisted with childcare in some locations. They appear to be doing everything but the hokey pokey to accommodate both school closures and the ever-changing work rules. We are an essential industry and so they don’t really have to, and yet they have.
Our schools (and local government for that matter) has sent lots of memos. Granted, I know public schools lack resources and it is certainly not the teachers fault, and that not all businesses have reacted this way, but to say that businesses haven’t accommodated at all is a bit of a trip.
Post by librarychica on Jul 2, 2020 10:04:13 GMT -5
Also my husband has pulled his share of childcare for years. I may still bear the mental load, but he shows up when needed and does his damndest. He took flack for it when DD1 was born (what do you mean you’re not available to drive across town at 7:30AM with no notice because your wife has left for work already? Why don’t you get her in line?) and he complained about it to me a lot and then found a new job. Now not everyone can just up and change jobs but if you are one of two professionals in a family and yet are SO KEY to your employer that that you cannot support your spouse, well, I wonder how much you want to.
FWIW, the men who work for and with me and have kids appear to be taking advantage of the flexibility offered as well and we have all had so many children wandering in and out of calls. Everyone is struggling, everyone is hustling.
sdlaura, That article really resonated with me too. Even if individual companies are trying their best, our society is just not set up for the level of flexibility and support that working families require right now. I have a job where I can work from home indefinitely if required. There are many more families with two working parents who do not have that luxury because they're working in essential jobs, retail, restaurants, etc. We've decided we need to reopen the country without any supports or plans in place for families. It's something I really struggle with, because of my very obvious privilege in this mess, even as a single working mom. This quote killed me:
"Allowing workplaces to reopen while schools, camps and day cares remain closed tells a generation of working parents that it’s fine if they lose their jobs, insurance and livelihoods in the process."
I'm going to... 100% disagree with the statement that schools are the only ones bending over backwards. EVERY aspect of society is having to bend over backwards. Schools are going to have to change too.
Some companies are more accomodating than others, but the accomodation can't come solely from the businesses and parents.
Post by traveltheworld on Jul 2, 2020 11:49:08 GMT -5
I agree with librarychica, my company (with hundreds of employees across multiple offices) has bent over backwards for its employees. Everyone is allowed to WFH, laptops/printers/monitors got shipped out to people who didn't have it; extra tech support were hired, and there have been constant reminders to work whatever hours work for you and your childcare arrangements. Additional mental health support has also been set up. Our HR even went as far as putting together lists of education websites/resources/packets according to age group to help employees "homeschool" their children. In terms of re-entry plan, up to 15% of our employees can go back on a voluntary basis starting August 1; up to 25% can go back starting September 1; but no one is being pressured to go back; especially those with kids. And we are in insitutional investment firm with a 80%+ male management.
Meanwhile, our school has put a few assignments on-line. I know there are teachers who have worked very hard during this time. We had a few in our school. But for the most part, I felt it was very much an individual decision and there was no accountability nor much direction from the administration. While we were all expectedd to meet our normal workload, I felt that the teachers (for the most part) were not.
I disagree with that statement too. Every job and business looks different. Bars and restaurants have gone out of business forever. Millions have lost their jobs. Broadway is not open, the airline industry, hotels and tourism are pretty much dead.
My organization closed down 6 days before the executive order. It came on us like a freight train. We had straight up Black Friday style hoarders on the last day. I had to strong arm the board to close since I no longer had staffing. I cried the day we closed.
Then we spent weeks and weeks and weeks of meetings, research, planning to reopen, purchasing PPE and cleaning supplies, redesigning our entire workspace to allow for social distancing.
We opened last week. The only way we can be open is that EVERYONE wears masks, so now we have to sit by the door and demand mask usage or hand out masks and count the number of people that come into the building. We had tables and tables and tables of quarantined books, we had boxes and boxes of deliveries since delivery was stopped, our meeting rooms that we can no longer use is full of furniture we had to pull out of common areas.
So no don’t tell me that schools are the ONLY ones adjusting.
And schedule wise we’ve done about 5 different schedules.
Also my husband has pulled his share of childcare for years. I may still bear the mental load, but he shows up when needed and does his damndest. He took flack for it when DD1 was born (what do you mean you’re not available to drive across town at 7:30AM with no notice because your wife has left for work already? Why don’t you get her in line?) and he complained about it to me a lot and then found a new job. Now not everyone can just up and change jobs but if you are one of two professionals in a family and yet are SO KEY to your employer that that you cannot support your spouse, well, I wonder how much you want to.
FWIW, the men who work for and with me and have kids appear to be taking advantage of the flexibility offered as well and we have all had so many children wandering in and out of calls. Everyone is struggling, everyone is hustling.
I agree with this as well. Most of the men I work with/for are dedicated fathers who all contribute, if not equally, then at least to the best of their abilities. My GC for example, has taken over most of the childcare responsibilities during this time since his wife is a doctor and has to be in the hospital. He works weird hours as a result and as much as we complain about having to accomodate that schedule by having group calls at 9:30 p.m., we all do it so that we can all make it through together.
Post by supertrooper1 on Jul 2, 2020 12:42:16 GMT -5
My agency is known for being inflexible when it comes to employee accommodations but they have bent over backwards for everyone. Part of it is my division having the ability to be more flexible than my last division. My workgroup of about 50 people was already WFH 4/5 days per week, so we switched to 100% WFH and may stay this way. They have sent out emails and had WebEx meetings to discuss flexibility and to talk to your supervisor if you need to take leave to manage childcare and homeschooling, or just to adjust your hours. They have made it more difficult to go into the office to encourage people to stay home and have reiterated that there is no rush for anyone to go back into the office.
I feel very lucky right now to have such an accommodating job where I can work from home and still manage homeschooling and childcare.
In reguards to schedule we required 25-50% hours during the shut down. I worked more because of all the planning.
DH’s job I think it would be a more formal leave of absence, but he told me tons of people were in leave. He didn’t take time off because of my job’s flexibility but he could have. He was the one that hired the babysitter.
campermom , I also want to say this in the nicest way possible.. YH's response is not just some general man response. I think you're giving him a lot of leeway and the ability for him to blame it on some notion that it's "because he's a man and thinks his job is more important."
YH is making you shoulder the burden alone because he's an ass. (okay, that last part wasn't the nicest way possible.. but.. ya know.)
Something struck me during all of this in my situation. So here I am working from home and homeschooling 2 kids and keeping a 4 year old busy, and after almost 3 months I ask my husband to take a day off work so I can go into my schools (no children allowed, appointment must be made between the hours of 9-4) to close up my office for the year and move out of one of them, and he gives me pushback, stating, “well we are really busy at work.”
Ok. So he’s been essential and he works for the federal government in facilities management. Very few women in these positions. Are they busy? Yeah.
But OMG? Can these fucking men give a little? Their day to day has not changed. Not in the least. Well their commutes have been shorter bc if less traffic. Are you kidding me? I went off on him and told him he and his male buddies need to take one for the team because the women of the working world have sacrificed OUR ASSES off.
*i do realize that I’m being sexist and over generalist here, and this was more of a husband issue than anything else. It pissed me right off.
ETA not sure if this even comes close to your question and I’m not sure how businesses would accommodate schools but in situation, I needed a non-homeschooling parent and his workplace to understand that the world outside of their job has flipped upside down and they needed to give a little. Just a little. Consider it, 1/64th of a give. (1 workday of 64 workdays of this.)
Here’s something that has blown my mind during this. My husband is a big firm lawyer and I am a teacher. Generally, I have done most of the child care since “his job is less flexible” (meaning I can take off since my school is pretty accommodating - my day to day schedule is not flexible at all).
Since COVID, he’s been working from home and it turns out his job is more flexible than we thought. To the point that he has said numerous times that if we go hybrid and I teach every day but kids only go 2-3, we’re “fine” because he can stay home with them. It’s pretty clear that many jobs that are traditionally male dominated have been considered not family friendly but might be after all.
"Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies-"God damn it, you've got to be kind.”
I was just going to say the same thing as mommyatty - businesses have done tons of adjusting and I don’t see that schools have done any yet. There seems to be a real lack of creative solutions from my standpoint. And when I say ‘schools’ I don’t mean teachers - I realize teachers had to adjust to distance learning. But the structure of schools needs to adjust. If we can reopen nearly every other part of society and not manage to do it for schools, which are so much more important - more creativity (and money) is needed.
It’s money. Schools have proposed a million options (including smaller classes, which we know is better for kids and have been pushing for for years) and people won’t pony up the money for more space and more teachers. It’s that simple.
I’m floored that some of you STILL think schools aren’t adjusting. We fucking flipped the whole damn thing on 2 days notice. Was it perfect? Of course not! Two days notice...totally different job than the one we are trained for and have been doing. With no government leadership and no money. Jesus. What’s your plan for schools? No matter what, someone is dumping on them, so what’s the solution?
"Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of, babies-"God damn it, you've got to be kind.”
erbear , in our case.. they did not "flip the damn thing" in 2 days notice. The district restricted our teachers from teaching, providing materials, or even suggestions for what students should work on for WEEKS. When they finally did "flip the damn thing" we got about 40 total of minutes of prerecorded videos a week, links to 298374 different things, and told that nothing is graded or needed to be submitted for the remainder of the year. Our teachers tried. And I don't fault our teachers, but I do fault our district.
This may be different from what you did at your private school that likely has fewer students, more flexibility and more budget, but our experience in public school in our location? That's what we got. And yes, we are angry and frustrated about it.
ETA: This probably comes off bitchier than intended. But our district REALLY dropped the ball on distance learning. They're also not really trying for fall either. Their goal is to be in person and they've said any distance learning program is not feasible for our district. They haven't explained at all what their plan is if the county shuts down schools again. Soooooooo it's hope for the best and plan for the best. That's NOT flexibility. That's not being accommodating.
DH works for a small garage door place (3 people) they haven't shut down and no WFH or short days. COVID hasn't changed a thing for my DH and his boss and DH both think it is just a bunch of nonsense. DH's boss has demanded DH to come to work when he has had the flu with 104 temp because there isn't anyone to cover when DH isn't there so I wasn't surprised with how they are dealing with COVID. What has pissed me off is that during all of this the boss's 13 year old son has been doing ride-a-longs with DH once a week to give his wife a break. DH sees nothing wrong being a babysitter for a 13 year old boy but picking up his daughter up from practice is like chopping an arm off.
My take is most small business less than 15 employees haven't been able to accommodate employees because they just don't have the capital to do it or it just isn't possible to work different shifts/hours/days or they just need to be in person to do the job. I did notice that jobs I wouldn't have expected to switch to WFH (city, county, state workers) have and most of them it looks to be indefinitely here.
When I did my survey for the district I emphasized the district needing to pay attention to dual working parent households with no outside support who can't WFH. I know so many teachers with young kids who struggled with distance learning themselves because they couldn't give their own kids time let alone their classes.
Post by traveltheworld on Jul 2, 2020 15:54:12 GMT -5
I just feel like our public school could have done so much better. DD's private Montessori preschool managed to pull together lesson plans, did 3x/week Zoom classes, and sent helpful videos and instructions. We got a decent amount of materials/interactions. She also got to talk to her teachers live a few times a week. DS's public school class - nothing other than a few on-line assignments and a weekly Zoom call with all the kids. No feedback on assignments, no individual (or even small group) interactions, nothing. On the other hand, there was 1 Grade 2 teacher (out of 4) who really stepped up and did quite a bit with the kids. Unforutnately, he's the one who got let go because he's new and there are budget cuts. I can't even get into how upset we all are about that.
If we have to do on-line, I just hope that it's more standarized across the board and that there will be a minimum standard that all teachers would have to adhere by so that at least we'll know that kids/families are not being left behind.
erbear I’m not sure why that’s directed at me when I said that teachers did adapt and more money was needed...
It hasn’t been been part of my job for the past 4 months to figure out how to open schools like it has been for policy makers, but in terms of what I would do - for elementary you could open under the AAP guidelines with your only additional monetary outlays being for PPE for staff and a couple of additional custodians to clean more often. Things like staggered start and end times, temp checks, no parents on campus, no buses, kids eat in their classrooms and no field trips won’t cost much money.
I haven’t thought as much about middle and high school since my kids aren’t there yet - but there you probably do the hybrid model so no one is closer than 6 feet. No sports, PE is changed to individual activities, hallways are one way. Either you rearrange schedules so kids stay in the same cohort more often, or more time is given between classes so that everyone can stay apart in hallways and file into classrooms in a distanced manner. You would need money for a larger cleaning staff or different cleaning machines like are now being used in gyms and other businesses to sanitize classrooms between groups, but this is easier if only half the kids are on campus daily.
I’m not pretending that these policy and procedure changes would be easy or that there wouldn’t be downsides. But at least for elementary, a subpar experience for teachers and kids is still superior to kids being home staring at a screen in a best case scenario and starving and/or abused in a worst case scenario.
Re: certain jobs being more flexible - my fave working mom author Laura Vanderkam has written about how women have often gone into teaching and nursing and other supposedly family friends jobs but that as a doctor or lawyer you’re more likely to have more options to go part time, leave midday to attend some school event, etc. My teacher or nurse friends can often barely get away to use the bathroom. I have definitely found my male-dominated-industry investment job to be more family friendly than many supposedly family friendly jobs.
Post by supertrooper1 on Jul 2, 2020 16:10:31 GMT -5
I don't think my school district could have done anything differently. It wasn't a money issue or having to flip the switch in 2 days...because they didn't. This was a no-win situation for all. The schools tried to accommodate teachers and parents, knowing that the majority of parents were still working. They also realized that students wouldn't be as engaged at home as they were in school. My state made everything optional and my school took advantage of that which is probably a good thing after looking back at the end of the year. Online learning started a month after school was cancelled and very few students in DS's class participated with anything online. The first week was a test for the schools and teachers, where they provided a bunch of links and organized video chats. But there was no point in doing more when families weren't participating; whether that was because of the inability due to resources or the lack of caring. Kids and parents that wanted more were given more by the teachers.
Our superintendent has sent out survey after survey for what parents want and has tried to be as accommodating as possible within the state and county guidelines. I think the school leadership and teachers have done the best they could with what they were given. I also place some blame on parents that didn't even try. Everyone on this board cares about their kids' education unlike what I saw from my community.
campermom , I also want to say this in the nicest way possible.. YH's response is not just some general man response. I think you're giving him a lot of leeway and the ability for him to blame it on some notion that it's "because he's a man and thinks his job is more important."
YH is making you shoulder the burden alone because he's an ass. (okay, that last part wasn't the nicest way possible.. but.. ya know.)
Oh I know he is. These are the answers he gives me is, “I have no options. I can’t take off” Well he has the days. I don’t really care if they are short staffed and I have told him that. That’s his supervisors problem, and those above him-for not staffing appropriately.
I deserve more. Coming here gives me much more perspective. You all are really patient and kind to me and I appreciate that. It’s astonishing to see partners working together as teams on here to problem solve this together. I want that.
erbear- I think my kids’ private school did an amazing job with distance learning. They also took about 4 weeks to do it. The week things started going haywire was the week before our Spring Break. Then Spring Break. Then they extended Spring Break 2 more weeks. For comparison, we were told Monday at 5:25 pm not to come in Tuesday morning and to start working from home.
The original question was “why don’t businesses have to adjust instead of schools”. The question was not “have schools had to adapt.” Yes, they’ve had to adapt. And none have adapted with businesses in mind. Which is fine. They are two separate entities. But the premise, that schools were bending over backward for BUSINESSES? But businesses weren’t bending over backward for schools? That’s crap.
What the hell are businesses supposed to do to adjust for schools? Most are already doing what they can by providing flexibility. But some jobs can’t be done from home. No one can drive a truck or train or plane from their couch. Your grocery store clerk can’t check you out remotely. The people stocking toilet paper can’t do that from their home office. Teachers, like most of us on this board, figured out how to do their jobs from home. A lot spent a lot of time complaining they shouldn’t have to. I had to figure out how to do my job from home, too, which I was never trained for and didn’t expect. And no one was posting memes about how I should earn $1 million a year for doing my job at home. I just did it and I was grateful I could because I was lowering my risk profile by working at home. My BFF teaches 5th grade at a private school and she flipping LOVED distance learning.
This all sucks. For everyone. Not just schools. And everyone is adapting and adjusting. Not just schools. That’s what the original post missed.
Our school did a fantastic job and they did flip everything in one day. Compared to the stories on here they were absolutely amazing.
But the quote was that other businesses did not have to adapt which is simply not true.
Now I suspect that quote is in context to schools having a fully elearning schedule or a part time schedule. And yes I think many businesses will help with that or people will take leave under the extended FMLA.
Those businesses who were jerks are probably still going to be jerks. But many jobs need a certain number of people there to operate like hospitals for example who have also lost millions and deal with their own difficulties. Just one example how not every industry can work around a total elearning or a 2 day a week schedule unless their employees get childcare elsewhere than the schools.