“School is not childcare”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
School is, of course, childcare, and our entire economy is built around that assumption. I have no idea why DCUM is obsessed with this fiction.



EXACTLY. Of course one of the functions that school serves is to take care of children. I, too, think DCUM is weirdly obsessed with thinking this isn't the case and there is something wrong with a parent who took a job assuming their kids would be in school during certain hours M-F.

Um, no.

People who say "school is not childcare" are trying to remind parents that teachers are not simply glorified childcare providers who they can look down their nose at. They are licensed professionals who work very hard to develop lessons for their students, provide learning, and support students socially and emotionally. Yes, other parents depend on the school day as a place where their children are cared for during the day. But it is not a "weird obsession" to remind certain uppity DCUMers that teachers are highly trained professionals and not their nannies.

And those people need to get off their high horses and accept they’re both childcare and educators.

That’s ridiculous. When I take my daughter to highly specialized music lessons, a positive externality is that I get “childcare” for 2 hours. That does not make her violin teacher a nanny. Same for ballet. Same for school.

YOU need to get over yourself.

I used to be an elementary teacher. A more level-headed one than the DCUM set apparently.

[Anonymous]

This is so massively STUPID.

Premise: Adults need to work. Can we accept that?

Ok, what is one necessary prerequisite for that? Kids need somewhere to be for large portions of the day. This is the case for the vast majority of jobs.

Another premise: Children need to be educated. That is not only objectively true, but it is also the law.

Put those two things together and you get the following: Schools act for two purposes:

1. To educate kids

2. For them to have a place to be, so adults can work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
School is, of course, childcare, and our entire economy is built around that assumption. I have no idea why DCUM is obsessed with this fiction.



EXACTLY. Of course one of the functions that school serves is to take care of children. I, too, think DCUM is weirdly obsessed with thinking this isn't the case and there is something wrong with a parent who took a job assuming their kids would be in school during certain hours M-F.

Um, no.

People who say "school is not childcare" are trying to remind parents that teachers are not simply glorified childcare providers who they can look down their nose at. They are licensed professionals who work very hard to develop lessons for their students, provide learning, and support students socially and emotionally. Yes, other parents depend on the school day as a place where their children are cared for during the day. But it is not a "weird obsession" to remind certain uppity DCUMers that teachers are highly trained professionals and not their nannies.

What? Are you new to DCUM? This is my comment and I fully respect teachers as licensed professionals.
DCUM people who say school is not childcare are not denigrating teachers (unfortunately, we have a lot of people who do that on DCUM also, and there may be some overlap). They do it to say that schools should not open in the fall and who cares if that means parents can't work. Parents shouldn't be depending on schools to take care of their children because, according to them, "school is not childcare" and so parents should have foresaw the pandemic closing schools and have a backup plan.

[Anonymous]

Can I be your sister??

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:School is, of course, childcare, and our entire economy is built around that assumption. I have no idea why DCUM is obsessed with this fiction.

Then something in the last 20 years or so went very, very wrong. And it explains a lot why schools have watered down curriculum in this country. I hear people from other countries describing what happens abroad and it sounds a lot more like school when I was a kid. The AAP program in FCPS is basically what school expectations (except possibly for math) were for EVERYONE in school. Now it is considered advanced. I guess people just want it to be daycare so that’s what it’s become.

[Anonymous]

Who care about the "school is childcare" argument. Whatever.

OP, tell you sis that you'll continue to look after her children but they have to be on your homeschooling curriculum. If they don't want that, the kids can watch tv at your house while you teach your own children and your sis and her lovely DH can do elearning after they get home from work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The real issue is that you are graciously providing free childcare and in return they decided it is appropriate to crap on your life choices. What a-holes!

Saying they want their kids to participate in their online schooling is not crapping on OP’s life choices. OP may not have the bandwidth to do it, in which case the sister can remove her kids from OP’s care, which it seems like she’s doing.

From the OP: "her husband wrote me a strongly worded email about how homeschooling is good enough for my kids but not theirs"

Huh? OP homeschools by choice, I assume. Her SIL and BIL don't want that. I really doubt he said "good enough for your kids but not mine." He probably said "we want them to do the online curriculum from their school." OP is projecting.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This is so massively STUPID.

Premise: Adults need to work. Can we accept that?

Ok, what is one necessary prerequisite for that? Kids need somewhere to be for large portions of the day. This is the case for the vast majority of jobs.

Another premise: Children need to be educated. That is not only objectively true, but it is also the law.

Put those two things together and you get the following: Schools act for two purposes:

1. To educate kids

2. For them ONE POSSIBLE to have a place to be DURING A PARENT’S WORK HOURS, so adults can work.

Fixes that for you. Not all parents work during daylight hours. How do schools accommodate single parents who work the night shift or afternoons ? As far as I know schools aren’t running alternate schedules for them. They also don’t provide childcare for parents who work weekends and holidays.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is so massively STUPID.

Premise: Adults need to work. Can we accept that?

Ok, what is one necessary prerequisite for that? Kids need somewhere to be for large portions of the day. This is the case for the vast majority of jobs.

Another premise: Children need to be educated. That is not only objectively true, but it is also the law.

Put those two things together and you get the following: Schools act for two purposes:

1. To educate kids

2. For them ONE POSSIBLE to have a place to be DURING A PARENT’S WORK HOURS, so adults can work.

Fixes that for you. Not all parents work during daylight hours. How do schools accommodate single parents who work the night shift or afternoons ? As far as I know schools aren’t running alternate schedules for them. They also don’t provide childcare for parents who work weekends and holidays.

Oh for the love. The vast majority of adults with school-age children work regular hours. Stop creating strawmen.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is so massively STUPID.

Premise: Adults need to work. Can we accept that?

Ok, what is one necessary prerequisite for that? Kids need somewhere to be for large portions of the day. This is the case for the vast majority of jobs.

Another premise: Children need to be educated. That is not only objectively true, but it is also the law.

Put those two things together and you get the following: Schools act for two purposes:

1. To educate kids

2. For them ONE POSSIBLE to have a place to be DURING A PARENT’S WORK HOURS, so adults can work.

Fixes that for you. Not all parents work during daylight hours. How do schools accommodate single parents who work the night shift or afternoons ? As far as I know schools aren’t running alternate schedules for them. They also don’t provide childcare for parents who work weekends and holidays.

What a ridiculous argument. The vast vast majority of people work during the day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
School is, of course, childcare, and our entire economy is built around that assumption. I have no idea why DCUM is obsessed with this fiction.



EXACTLY. Of course one of the functions that school serves is to take care of children. I, too, think DCUM is weirdly obsessed with thinking this isn't the case and there is something wrong with a parent who took a job assuming their kids would be in school during certain hours M-F.

Um, no.

People who say "school is not childcare" are trying to remind parents that teachers are not simply glorified childcare providers who they can look down their nose at. They are licensed professionals who work very hard to develop lessons for their students, provide learning, and support students socially and emotionally. Yes, other parents depend on the school day as a place where their children are cared for during the day. But it is not a "weird obsession" to remind certain uppity DCUMers that teachers are highly trained professionals and not their nannies.

Sometimes that's what people mean. And sometimes they mean that they think that working parents are entitled for thinking that school should be open. You see that line all the time when schools close for only marginally bad weather and people complain about having to burn through their annual leave. Or when working parents complain about too many random closures for PD. They aren't supposed to expect school to be open on any given day, and they're treated like they're abdicating responsibility for their kids because they have structured their working lives around the fact that full-time education is the norm. Everyone is supposed to have multiple forms of backup care and never complain that it's hard when they have to go to work and schools are closed. It's often a way to dump on working parents, especially ones who aren't well-off enough to have nannies or au pairs or whatever zillion forms of backup care they're supposed to have.

And the sister in this case sounds like she's not expecting school to just be childcare, otherwise she'd presumably be fine with OP homeschooling her kids because that would provide her with free full-time childcare. In fact, she seems to want her kids to actually go to school because she thinks its a better education.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Who care about the "school is childcare" argument. Whatever.

OP, tell you sis that you'll continue to look after her children but they have to be on your homeschooling curriculum. If they don't want that, the kids can watch tv at your house while you teach your own children and your sis and her lovely DH can do elearning after they get home from work.

Except that what sis actually said was that OP didn't have to provide any care at all. Because her parents agreed to do so. Which is really what OP is unhappy about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
School is, of course, childcare, and our entire economy is built around that assumption. I have no idea why DCUM is obsessed with this fiction.



EXACTLY. Of course one of the functions that school serves is to take care of children. I, too, think DCUM is weirdly obsessed with thinking this isn't the case and there is something wrong with a parent who took a job assuming their kids would be in school during certain hours M-F.

Um, no.

People who say "school is not childcare" are trying to remind parents that teachers are not simply glorified childcare providers who they can look down their nose at. They are licensed professionals who work very hard to develop lessons for their students, provide learning, and support students socially and emotionally. Yes, other parents depend on the school day as a place where their children are cared for during the day. But it is not a "weird obsession" to remind certain uppity DCUMers that teachers are highly trained professionals and not their nannies.

What? Are you new to DCUM? This is my comment and I fully respect teachers as licensed professionals.
DCUM people who say school is not childcare are not denigrating teachers (unfortunately, we have a lot of people who do that on DCUM also, and there may be some overlap). They do it to say that schools should not open in the fall and who cares if that means parents can't work. Parents shouldn't be depending on schools to take care of their children because, according to them, "school is not childcare" and so parents should have foresaw the pandemic closing schools and have a backup plan.

You said this more succinctly than I did. It's a line that's been used for a long time on here to say that parents aren't supposed to expect school to be open, ever (snow days, PD days, random holidays) and parents who do are entitled and just think that school is basically daycare. We're all supposed to foresee that school might stop at any moment and have backup plans for every contingency, otherwise, we're crappy parents who have abdicated responsibility for raising our own children. It's nonsense, and usually tossed out by SAHPs or wealthy WOHPs who can have nannies and whatnot. It's a way to avoid expressing sympathy for parents who are thrown for a loop by school being closed because they can't leave their kids home alone while they work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
School is, of course, childcare, and our entire economy is built around that assumption. I have no idea why DCUM is obsessed with this fiction.



EXACTLY. Of course one of the functions that school serves is to take care of children. I, too, think DCUM is weirdly obsessed with thinking this isn't the case and there is something wrong with a parent who took a job assuming their kids would be in school during certain hours M-F.

Um, no.

People who say "school is not childcare" are trying to remind parents that teachers are not simply glorified childcare providers who they can look down their nose at. They are licensed professionals who work very hard to develop lessons for their students, provide learning, and support students socially and emotionally. Yes, other parents depend on the school day as a place where their children are cared for during the day. But it is not a "weird obsession" to remind certain uppity DCUMers that teachers are highly trained professionals and not their nannies.

Sometimes that's what people mean. And sometimes they mean that they think that working parents are entitled for thinking that school should be open. You see that line all the time when schools close for only marginally bad weather and people complain about having to burn through their annual leave. Or when working parents complain about too many random closures for PD. They aren't supposed to expect school to be open on any given day, and they're treated like they're abdicating responsibility for their kids because they have structured their working lives around the fact that full-time education is the norm. Everyone is supposed to have multiple forms of backup care and never complain that it's hard when they have to go to work and schools are closed. It's often a way to dump on working parents, especially ones who aren't well-off enough to have nannies or au pairs or whatever zillion forms of backup care they're supposed to have.

And the sister in this case sounds like she's not expecting school to just be childcare, otherwise she'd presumably be fine with OP homeschooling her kids because that would provide her with free full-time childcare. In fact, she seems to want her kids to actually go to school because she thinks its a better education.

PP - you have articulated my thoughts perfectly. Every time I hear the debate about reopening schools so that people can get back to work, I hear the "School are not childcare" refrain in my head. It takes me back to the days when I had three young children, and we had random marginal snow days or delays during the same months as profesional days and work days, when I was barely holding it together.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:School is, of course, childcare, and our entire economy is built around that assumption. I have no idea why DCUM is obsessed with this fiction.

Then something in the last 20 years or so went very, very wrong. And it explains a lot why schools have watered down curriculum in this country. I hear people from other countries describing what happens abroad and it sounds a lot more like school when I was a kid. The AAP program in FCPS is basically what school expectations (except possibly for math) were for EVERYONE in school. Now it is considered advanced. I guess people just want it to be daycare so that’s what it’s become.

Are you sure you got a great education? Because not once did anyone say "people just want it to be daycare...." People are acknowledging that school has more than one function.