Anonymous wrote:It's validating to hear that other DCPS families have made career sacrifices to handle kid's schedules. At our elementary I often feel like the only mom who has a "mommy track" job to accommodate this stuff and sometimes feel judged for it.

But most families we know either have family help or some kind of at-home childcare (nanny, au pair) and those weren't an option for us so I downshifted at work. It's not ideal and I miss working in an office and being FT (and making more money). I guess I'm glad I'm still working in my field at all. It's hard.

We know so many DCPS families where one parent has an extremely flexible schedule -- contract work, independent wealth, part time work (even if the part time work seems lucrative, like law). And, SAH parents. Maybe the first category seems less visible but that's why they family is less stressed.

I stepped back to project-based work when I had kids, and my husband I think still doesn't realize how many gaps I fill in throughout the year. He was stunned by the "80 days" number for example.

It's validating to hear that other DCPS families have made career sacrifices to handle kid's schedules. At our elementary I often feel like the only mom who has a "mommy track" job to accommodate this stuff and sometimes feel judged for it.

But most families we know either have family help or some kind of at-home childcare (nanny, au pair) and those weren't an option for us so I downshifted at work. It's not ideal and I miss working in an office and being FT (and making more money). I guess I'm glad I'm still working in my field at all. It's hard.

Anonymous wrote:There’s a common mindset shift that happens with parents of kids who are school aged, which is an acceptance of more days off from work, or half days. Relatedly, afternoons where you don’t always work into the evening as much as you would have before, because your kids have practice or other activities. People focus on the baby and toddler years as if they have the biggest career impact but I honestly found that easier. Yeah it’s possible to have your kids in before care, school, aftercare, and camps every day off school, but I felt like it started to take a toll on my kids after a while. (Among other things, they were exhausted). PreK is the hardest because your kids still need supervision. But having a middle to upper elementary kid home for a day while working from home is not impossible.

+1

We actually went to having a SAHP after our child started Kindergarten. Not only is the schedule more unpredictable, the kid benefits greatly from parental involvement at older ages (in our experience more so than in the infant/toddler years). Also there are lots of opportunities to get involved in the community at schools and in activities for the parents.

We have only made it work by having flexible jobs where we usually don’t have to work a full 40 hours. On top of the scheduled days off, yeah you have to be prepared for multiple unexpected days off, or early closure or late start, sick days, lice days, water main burst days, etc.

Anonymous wrote:Often times the aftercare program provides full day care on the off days. There are also camps at various activities. Or you can swap playdates with friends.

+1 at MCPS but our aftercare does this and also half days they cover the rest of the day.

Anonymous wrote:There’s a common mindset shift that happens with parents of kids who are school aged, which is an acceptance of more days off from work, or half days. Relatedly, afternoons where you don’t always work into the evening as much as you would have before, because your kids have practice or other activities. People focus on the baby and toddler years as if they have the biggest career impact but I honestly found that easier. Yeah it’s possible to have your kids in before care, school, aftercare, and camps every day off school, but I felt like it started to take a toll on my kids after a while. (Among other things, they were exhausted). PreK is the hardest because your kids still need supervision. But having a middle to upper elementary kid home for a day while working from home is not impossible.

It’s very hard. And those of us with two demanding careers and slightly older (now late elementary school) kids had to deal with Covid when our kids were in PK. So all of the sudden we had no school or childcare and we still had to work all day every day! You will figure it out, especially if you are financially secure.

There’s a common mindset shift that happens with parents of kids who are school aged, which is an acceptance of more days off from work, or half days. Relatedly, afternoons where you don’t always work into the evening as much as you would have before, because your kids have practice or other activities. People focus on the baby and toddler years as if they have the biggest career impact but I honestly found that easier. Yeah it’s possible to have your kids in before care, school, aftercare, and camps every day off school, but I felt like it started to take a toll on my kids after a while. (Among other things, they were exhausted). PreK is the hardest because your kids still need supervision. But having a middle to upper elementary kid home for a day while working from home is not impossible.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's hard. DCPS takes an *incredible* number of days off.

lol what 180 days is a standard. Some school districts do less.

And many states across the country do not even offer universal FREE pre-k tha is past 1:00pm.

Some people just complain!

Schools do not actually provide 180 days of instruction. Count 'em up. They don't. They are ignoring the law.

There is no ‘law for pre-k.’

Keep your nanny.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It's hard. DCPS takes an *incredible* number of days off.

lol what 180 days is a standard. Some school districts do less.

And many states across the country do not even offer universal FREE pre-k tha is past 1:00pm.

Some people just complain!

Schools do not actually provide 180 days of instruction. Count 'em up. They don't. They are ignoring the law.

Anonymous wrote:As others have said, it's hard to find camps that take PK kids, especially PK3, and those that do are expensive. As a result, we opted to pass on DCPS for PK3 and kept our kids at their daycare.

And this is fine, if you want to waste money or have a lot extra to burn.

Anonymous wrote:It's hard. DCPS takes an *incredible* number of days off.

lol what 180 days is a standard. Some school districts do less.

And many states across the country do not even offer universal FREE pre-k tha is past 1:00pm.

Some people just complain!

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The one bit of advice we received is to not mentally count one any magical new wellspring of disposable income now that the daycare/home nanny days were over.

Aftercare, camps, playdate trade offs, vacation time.

Definitely true!

+100

Two early elementary kids in DCPS and no family in the area. All our child care help is paid. The combined cost of summer camp, after care (unless you're at a T1 school where this is no cost), and day-off camps for the two kids is very significant. Less than we were paying for daycare/nanny, but maybe not by much.

Even with all this, one parent absolutely experienced the career downshift a PP mentioned. We can't split dropoff and pickup (one parent does almost all of it) and there are also the unplanned things like kids getting sick or delayed starts/early dismissals.

The families we know with two full-time working parents both able to super-devote themselves to their career have au pairs or seemingly full-time nannies.

We live in Petworth and when our kids were in PK3 we used Casa Lala for day-off camps, it was one of the only places that took 3 and 4 year olds at that time and it was somewhere around $100/120 a day then. We knew several families who sent their preschoolers back to their old daycare for the days off, it seemed like a lot of daycares allowed this especially if a younger sibling was already there.

As others have said, it's hard to find camps that take PK kids, especially PK3, and those that do are expensive. As a result, we opted to pass on DCPS for PK3 and kept our kids at their daycare.

You’re wise to be looking ahead at this. My feedback is that unless you have another adult who can be on-call - a grandparent, nanny, etc - one of you will have to downshift your career. It’s just not doable to have two parents who both work non-flexible jobs especially if you have more than one kid.

Find a daycare that takes drop-ins near your house for the preK years. Camps that take 4yos fill up fast. Once your kids are K age it’s easier and you’ll have more options.