Best return on investment: nanny, private elementary/middle/high school, or private college

[Anonymous]

Private High School.

[Anonymous]

I'll never have the money to have OP's dilemma, but wanted to comment on the "when to be around more" debate. It's not all or nothing (toddlerhood v. adolescence). I work a reduced schedule (32h, 1 day from home) so that I can be w/ my kids (3 & 5) more. I pick them up by 3:30 at the latest every day, and I plan to (hopefully) continue this schedule to be able to be home when they get home from school as they get older. The situation didn't fall in my lap. I worked my butt off to prove myself, then advocated for a flexible arrangement, and make sure I'm working beyond expectations. It's a financial sacrifice, so maybe we won't be able to afford a prestigious college, but I plan to be around to help them fill out the scholarship applications!

[Anonymous]

Not sure how working vs. staying home made it in here but if you are passionate about your career, you can find a way to make it parent teens and stay in the workforce. If your husband is worthless and uninvolved I suppose it's harder but millions of women have done it successfully.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think your best money spent will be on one parent staying home FT until school starts.

Disagree. I think the most crucial time for one parent to be at home is when your child is in middle school. Their peers have become far more influential then; their hormones are going crazy; and those are the years that they can get into really bad stuff. Being present is essential then.

I totally agree with you. If you look at a bunch of 4-5 year olds, there is no way you would know which of them was in daycare, had a SAHM or had a nanny. The important thing is that they be given quality childcare, but you can find that in any of those settings (and in any of those settings, you can also find that the care isn't so great).

But I think moms in general are fooling themselves if they think it is more important to be home during the baby years. Anybody who has an older kid will tell you that this just isn't the case.

As a parent of teens, I completely agree with you. I worked full-time when they were small, and work part-time now in order to be available to them in the afternoons.

Statistics re: teens getting into trouble bear this out:

http://blog.teenhelp.com/2009/11/teen-after-school-hours.html

After school hours for teens are a crucial time. This time is either used for growth and development or it can be used for high risk behaviors like teen drug use. It is important for parents and educators to make sure that teens have what they need during these hours of the day.

The National Youth Violence Prevention Resource Center states that these hours are when very high risk behavior including criminal activity, drug use and alcohol use take place for teens. Most experts will agree that after school programs keep kids safe and boost the teens academic progress.

After-school programs help, but are not a panacea and in any case are not full-time/every day events.

This is largely based on income, sadly. Socio-eocomic status is a critical component here.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

There is no argument, just your opinion which is, an opinion, and one that I couldn't disagree more with. As the parent of two high achieving, college bound teens, my kids are involved in sports, voluneering, and of course studying. We are their parents and we are there for them, but there is plenty of time for both my husband and I to pursue careers, get a healthy, homemade meal on the table that we all share every night, and be involved in their school, education, and other aspects of their life. I supposse you are planning on having your kids live with you in college (if they are college bound)?

And sorry, it's hard to breast feed your kids if they are in daycare. I have NOTHING against parents working when their kids are young and no issue with high quality care in the infant and toddler years, but there are some things that a provider can't do that a mom can. Not to mention, economically it makes more sense to not pay for infant daycare if you have the choice and desire to stay home. Stats wise, there are a lot more moms home in the early years than in the teen or elem. school years, no doubt because if my children will be out of the home between 30-40 hours anyway, I might as we well be earning a living.

You seem to have completely misinterpreted what I have said. I never said that there wasn't time for both parents to have fulfilling careers. I merely think that teenagers need their own parents - not surrogates - more than toddlers do. Any loving caregiver can take excellent care of a preschooler - whether the child is breastfed or not.

I am glad that your kids are doing well. My mom worked, and I never got into drugs or premarital sex (helped no doubt my my strict Catholic upbringing). But there are many factors that go into whether teens get into trouble. And statistically, risky behaviors are far more likely among teenagers who are unsupervised. I responded initially to the person who said that the most crucial time for parental care-taking is when your child is 1-3. I - and, in fact, several other posters on this thread - disagree with that reasoning, and gave many reasons why. Your anecdotal refutation of our position is interesting, but hardly incontrovertible authority. You can disagree as much as you like, but your defensiveness about differing opinions is rather bizarre.

But how are teens unsupervised if they are doing school sports or school-sanctioned volunteer activities? Latch key kids are a very different topic here. But these days there are many supervised activities teens will be in regardless of whether their parents work. My kids would have done these activities even if my husband or stayed home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

There is no argument, just your opinion which is, an opinion, and one that I couldn't disagree more with. As the parent of two high achieving, college bound teens, my kids are involved in sports, voluneering, and of course studying. We are their parents and we are there for them, but there is plenty of time for both my husband and I to pursue careers, get a healthy, homemade meal on the table that we all share every night, and be involved in their school, education, and other aspects of their life. I supposse you are planning on having your kids live with you in college (if they are college bound)?

And sorry, it's hard to breast feed your kids if they are in daycare. I have NOTHING against parents working when their kids are young and no issue with high quality care in the infant and toddler years, but there are some things that a provider can't do that a mom can. Not to mention, economically it makes more sense to not pay for infant daycare if you have the choice and desire to stay home. Stats wise, there are a lot more moms home in the early years than in the teen or elem. school years, no doubt because if my children will be out of the home between 30-40 hours anyway, I might as we well be earning a living.

You seem to have completely misinterpreted what I have said. I never said that there wasn't time for both parents to have fulfilling careers. I merely think that teenagers need their own parents - not surrogates - more than toddlers do. Any loving caregiver can take excellent care of a preschooler - whether the child is breastfed or not.

I am glad that your kids are doing well. My mom worked, and I never got into drugs or premarital sex (helped no doubt my my strict Catholic upbringing). But there are many factors that go into whether teens get into trouble. And statistically, risky behaviors are far more likely among teenagers who are unsupervised. I responded initially to the person who said that the most crucial time for parental care-taking is when your child is 1-3. I - and, in fact, several other posters on this thread - disagree with that reasoning, and gave many reasons why. Your anecdotal refutation of our position is interesting, but hardly incontrovertible authority. You can disagree as much as you like, but your defensiveness about differing opinions is rather bizarre.

But how are teens unsupervised if they are doing school sports or school-sanctioned volunteer activities? Latch key kids are a very different topic here. But these days there are many supervised activities teens will be in regardless of whether their parents work. My kids would have done these activities even if my husband or stayed home.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

There is no argument, just your opinion which is, an opinion, and one that I couldn't disagree more with. As the parent of two high achieving, college bound teens, my kids are involved in sports, voluneering, and of course studying. We are their parents and we are there for them, but there is plenty of time for both my husband and I to pursue careers, get a healthy, homemade meal on the table that we all share every night, and be involved in their school, education, and other aspects of their life. I supposse you are planning on having your kids live with you in college (if they are college bound)?

And sorry, it's hard to breast feed your kids if they are in daycare. I have NOTHING against parents working when their kids are young and no issue with high quality care in the infant and toddler years, but there are some things that a provider can't do that a mom can. Not to mention, economically it makes more sense to not pay for infant daycare if you have the choice and desire to stay home. Stats wise, there are a lot more moms home in the early years than in the teen or elem. school years, no doubt because if my children will be out of the home between 30-40 hours anyway, I might as we well be earning a living.

You seem to have completely misinterpreted what I have said. I never said that there wasn't time for both parents to have fulfilling careers. I merely think that teenagers need their own parents - not surrogates - more than toddlers do. Any loving caregiver can take excellent care of a preschooler - whether the child is breastfed or not.

I am glad that your kids are doing well. My mom worked, and I never got into drugs or premarital sex (helped no doubt my my strict Catholic upbringing). But there are many factors that go into whether teens get into trouble. And statistically, risky behaviors are far more likely among teenagers who are unsupervised. I responded initially to the person who said that the most crucial time for parental care-taking is when your child is 1-3. I - and, in fact, several other posters on this thread - disagree with that reasoning, and gave many reasons why. Your anecdotal refutation of our position is interesting, but hardly incontrovertible authority. You can disagree as much as you like, but your defensiveness about differing opinions is rather bizarre.

But how are teens unsupervised if they are doing school sports or school-sanctioned volunteer activities? Latch key kids are a very different topic here. But these days there are many supervised activities teens will be in regardless of whether their parents work. My kids would have done these activities even if my husband or stayed home.

I'm curious, how do working moms get their kids to all their after-school activities? I'm currently a stay at home mom to elementary school kids and if I worked there's no way that my husband or I could get home in time to take them to their activities. I've thought about returning to work in a few years, but this is actually one of the reasons why I am hesitant to do so.

[Anonymous]

A lot of the activities seem to be at school.

[Anonymous]

We put the money into a private nanny ages newborn to K. Neurologically the brain is wiring itself and establishing all those pathways for the long haul....then we went to public...but we're lucky that our kids have been selected on GT track so they are getting the very best of public...who knows what is next...but we put it into the very early years, the thought being that you are forming all of those connections, shaping temperment, developing discipline, and allowing a natural sleep cycle. not sure it's "best", but am confident it was "best" for our particular kids......

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:A lot of the activities seem to be at school.

The Middle School my kids are districted for gets out at 2:30. If I worked I would not be able to pick them up at 3:30 or 4pm. Just wondering how working moms deal with this.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I think your best money spent will be on one parent staying home FT until school starts.

Disagree. I think the most crucial time for one parent to be at home is when your child is in middle school. Their peers have become far more influential then; their hormones are going crazy; and those are the years that they can get into really bad stuff. Being present is essential then.

Agree. Middle School Parent here. Also did private middle school and thought that was a worthwhile use of money for our family.

[Anonymous]

My opinion is that a nanny is not better than daycare unless you can afford it and it makes your life easier. SAH is great, but if that's not what you want to do, then daycare makes more sense to me than a nanny. Then, in this area, I'd send my kid to a good public elementary (at least try it out). Then I'd try to go public for middle and high school if possible and fund whatever college my kid wanted/could get into so they didn't have debt.

SAH is fabulous, and I do it, but in the end quality care for the first few years is the most important, and you can get that at daycare or with a nanny (although my preference would be for daycare because many nannies I see around here don't personally seem to me to be offering better care than a really good daycare). But a good nanny is nice too. Public school if it'll work for your kid is so good in so many ways.

[Anonymous]

After just having high-caliber conversations with your kids at the dinner table, I would say:

#1: Invest in MS through HS. If your kid is going to a school where expectations are low, there's little chance to be creative, and the general culture is one of mediocrity, then I'd say get the heck out of Dodge. Sorry to say, IMO most DCPS fall into this category. Invest in knowing your kids' teachers, and try to help them get into the best classes with the best instructors from start to finish.

#2: Invest in educational experiences in the summer. Send your kid abroad to learn a foreign language; volunteer in the National Park Service; do Outward Bound; whatever. Note that the experiences don't have to be academic ones, but it ain't a ad idea to find university-based summer programs so your child grows up feeling like a college/university campus is familiar and "fits".

#3: Take a really great parenting class or see a family therapist if your relationship with your kid needs some sprucing up. Don't underestimate how important you are.

That's where I'd put my $$$.

[Anonymous]

"I'm curious, how do working moms get their kids to all their after-school activities? I'm currently a stay at home mom to elementary school kids and if I worked there's no way that my husband or I could get home in time to take them to their activities. I've thought about returning to work in a few years, but this is actually one of the reasons why I am hesitant to do so."

1) some of the activities are at school;
2) the activity place picks them up at school; or
3) carpool.

Does your question mean you've never discussed logistics with any of your WOHM friends (?). Aren't you the slightest bit curious how your real life friends who work full time get their kids to activities ?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:A lot of the activities seem to be at school.

The Middle School my kids are districted for gets out at 2:30. If I worked I would not be able to pick them up at 3:30 or 4pm. Just wondering how working moms deal with this.

Middle school kids can bike or arrange carpools to activities, the ones that aren't at school.