7 ms·

I can't stand that schools don't like to acknowledge their role as childcare (i.e. babysitting) in addition to education. People set up their entire lives aroun

I can't stand that schools don't like to acknowledge their role as childcare (i.e. babysitting) in addition to education. People set up their entire lives around the fact that their kids will be watched at school most days. Unless you are fairly wealthy, hiring private babysitters is extremely expensive and out of reach for most families. Yes, the education aspect is more 'prestigious'. But getting kids out of the house so parents can work and into a social environment where they see other kids is extremely important for most families and society as a whole. The attitude of a school board member implying babysitting isn't their job must be coming from someone who either doesn't currently have young kids or comes from a wealthy enough background that they can't even fathom why this would be an issue for others.

MattGaiser 6y ago
The problem is the attitude towards education that often comes with that. They aren't sending their kids to learn, but are rather just getting them off their own hands. Anecdotally, from when I was in school, the parents who first and foremost treated school as daycare and expressed such sentiments also didn't really care whether their kids learned all that much or behaved well.
- LanceH 6y ago
  They are sending them because they are legally required to do so. There is nothing optional about it for most people. Parents have their jobs planned around their kids being at school -- again, because it is a legal requirement that the kids be there. Suddenly withdrawing that -- going on indefinitely now -- is causing all sorts of strain, especially in households where the parents can't work from home.
- bilbo0s 6y ago
  This does cause problems, but maybe if schools acknowledged that they were childcare they would be better equipped to deal with some of those problems? Or even the structure of schools might change to better accommodate this requirement. Now whether or not schools should be primarily childcare is an entirely separate debate.
  - 23iofj 6y ago
    Exactly. If schools explicitly acknowledged their dual purpose, then they could more cleanly separate the two functions. I think doing so would even improve the educational component. I've volunteered in high school classrooms quite a lot. The amount of wasted time is astounding. Hours upon hours of boring nonsense that somehow actively detracts from learning. Students are so bored from sitting around all day. Also, they instinctively learn that 80% of every lecture period is filler nonsense but are quite bad at guessing which 20% they should be paying attention to. Even in subjects that shouldn't be cut (e.g., Geometry) the lecture periods could be safely halved and probably improve educational outcomes. Schools are great facilities for child care, BTW. Computers, gyms, fields, sports equipment, books, ... Why not just admit that about half of the classroom time alotted to most subjects exists for fill-up-butt-in-seat-time purposes only and then openly embrace the fact that the school is an educational institution whose physical plant is also useful for leisure/childcare? Heck, university campuses already do this...
CalChris 6y ago
I think schools understand this perfectly well but it's the parents who don't want to hear it. Hence the (somewhat forced) resignation.
quadrifoliate 6y ago
It's concerning that this conflation of teaching and childcare is being normalized now. It leads to unnecessarily long school hours in the US. The school is set up as the only source of social interaction, that absolves parents from setting up any other sort of familial and social interactions for their kids. > But getting kids out of the house so parents can work and into a social environment where they see other kids is extremely important for most families and society as a whole. Yes, and that can be accomplished in a variety of ways, of which schools are one way (probably the riskiest way, in the current pandemic). Take your kids to the playground in the evening. Set up social playdates with other families. Let your kid sleep over at the neighbor's house. Let them visit their cousins and grandparents. Let them walk to school with other kids. Give a firm "no" to your boss for that 4pm meeting! From what I have seen, most American kids seem to have no friends near where they live, and most American families have too many helicopter parents to let these normal channels of social interaction to work as intended. So they prefer that teachers serve as the helicopter for the majority of their workday instead. Normalization of the workday to adjust to the fact that most families have working parents is what's needed, not saddling teachers with absorbing that extra load of childcare in addition to teaching.
- massysett 6y ago
  This is an odd conclusion considering that US school days are shorter than many other countries and that the US has fewer school days than many other countries.
- anonAndOn 6y ago
  Optimal child health requires this happen on a daily basis. Schools facilitate 5/7ths of this. Do you have the time and energy to pick up the slack?
  - kiba 6y ago
    When I was young, I played outside with other kids, adventure to other neighborhoods. Pretty much about the most dangerous things are the traffic when we cross over. The adults don't need to set up playdates, but they do need to think about traffic and general safety.
geoduck14 6y ago
The terms "teacher" and "babysitter" denote QUALITY of care. Both roles perform similar functions (at a high level), but a "teacher" adds more value. By calling themselves "babysitters" they are expressing they are being insulted by the parents. They are trying to convey that they deserve more respect than what they are receiving.
- bilbo0s 6y ago
  I think the primary concern with this school board, (probably many school boards), is that the expectation is based on how well they perform the babysitting function. Whereas the metric is based on how well they perform the teaching function. There are likely a large number of school board members, teachers, and even parents who complain because they want more emphasis on the teaching and less on the babysitting. I can imagine a lot of tension in the future around this fundamental contention.
thomascgalvin 6y ago
> Yes, the education aspect is more 'prestigious'. If education was prestigious, we'd pay teachers more than $30k per year.
- MattGaiser 6y ago
  More prestigious than childcare, which pays less than that. https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes399011.htm https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes399011.htm
- nradov 6y ago
  It varies tremendously by school district. In Texas the average starting salary for teachers is $55k and goes up with experience.
  - throwaway0a5e 6y ago
    Exactly. Teachers start their careers in poor underfunded districts and retire from rich over-funded districts.
- colinmhayes 6y ago
  Everything is relative
- falcolas 6y ago
  I wouldn't be so quick to condemn the value of people we underpay. We routinely underpay people who do work that's critical to the function of our society. In the case of teachers, we take advantage of their passion for helping children, even to their own detriment (i.e. buying their own school supplies).
brainless 6y ago
I think if we (including schools) acknowledge schools role, also, as childcare, then we are doomed. Education and keeping a child busy are very very different things and should be different. Else the quality of education, which is already not held as high as it used to be, will erode further. IMHO.
silicon2401 6y ago
Teachers are not babysitters, just like they're also not parents, even though all of these roles involve some level of overlap. There's a reason we have different words, and it's to express different roles in this case. The teacher's job is to teach, hence the name. Babysitting is not their primary function, it just comes as a secondary effect of having the children around all day and needing to provide a safe and focused space for learning.
adkadskhj 6y ago
It may also be a legacy issue. This - i imagine - hasn't always been the case. If a two parent household only had a single parent working this idea would be quite sound, imo. That ideally shouldn't be the schools responsibility here. I want them to focus on what really matters, education. However these days it's often necessary for both parents to work, and thus no one is available to watch the kids (and i'm glossing over single parents for simplicity).
kiba 6y ago
You mean we decided to put them into an extremely artificial environment which they can't leave without getting into trouble, in which the primary skill of focus are academics at the expense of everything else. Then, when they graduate from school, we expect them to swim and thrive in an environment that they have very little experience in, and that which a lot of people somehow muddle through life without certain vital skills like cooking. OK. School functions as 'daycare' center. Sure. Because our society is structured such that parents are forced to work two jobs.
- colinmhayes 6y ago
  I really can't agree that the primary focus of school is academics over everything. Primary focus of elementary school is learning to socialize. Primary focus of high school is learning to manage responsibilities. Even college the primary focus is networking. People complain about not learning how to cook or do taxes in school all the time, but they must not have paid attention, because school provides all the skills that are needed to perfect those relatively easy tasks.
  - kiba 6y ago
    They do? That's news to me.
    - colinmhayes 6y ago
      Should've paid more attention I guess. Taxes is literally just reading instructions and adding some numbers plus multiplying them. Cooking is just reading instructions. Following instructions is exactly what you learn to do in school.
      - kiba 6y ago
        I don't see how high school does anything for learning responsibility. You go to school, do work, get grade. Same thing we did in middle school and in elementary school. Except more bullshit and people giving you way too much homework.
wavefunction 6y ago
I was surprised during the pandemic by the level of people complaining they couldn't bear to be around their own kids all day.
anonAndOn 6y ago
Don't forget the energy delta factor. Your home may be a gilded cage, but it's still a cage. Much like many other pack animals, kids are social creatures that need to burn through a significant amount of calories every day for optimal health and well-being.

MattGaiser 6y ago

The problem is the attitude towards education that often comes with that. They aren't sending their kids to learn, but are rather just getting them off their own hands. Anecdotally, from when I was in school, the parents who first and foremost treated school as daycare and expressed such sentiments also didn't really care whether their kids learned all that much or behaved well.

LanceH 6y ago
They are sending them because they are legally required to do so. There is nothing optional about it for most people. Parents have their jobs planned around their kids being at school -- again, because it is a legal requirement that the kids be there. Suddenly withdrawing that -- going on indefinitely now -- is causing all sorts of strain, especially in households where the parents can't work from home.
bilbo0s 6y ago
This does cause problems, but maybe if schools acknowledged that they were childcare they would be better equipped to deal with some of those problems? Or even the structure of schools might change to better accommodate this requirement. Now whether or not schools should be primarily childcare is an entirely separate debate.
- 23iofj 6y ago
  Exactly. If schools explicitly acknowledged their dual purpose, then they could more cleanly separate the two functions. I think doing so would even improve the educational component. I've volunteered in high school classrooms quite a lot. The amount of wasted time is astounding. Hours upon hours of boring nonsense that somehow actively detracts from learning. Students are so bored from sitting around all day. Also, they instinctively learn that 80% of every lecture period is filler nonsense but are quite bad at guessing which 20% they should be paying attention to. Even in subjects that shouldn't be cut (e.g., Geometry) the lecture periods could be safely halved and probably improve educational outcomes. Schools are great facilities for child care, BTW. Computers, gyms, fields, sports equipment, books, ... Why not just admit that about half of the classroom time alotted to most subjects exists for fill-up-butt-in-seat-time purposes only and then openly embrace the fact that the school is an educational institution whose physical plant is also useful for leisure/childcare? Heck, university campuses already do this...

CalChris 6y ago

I think schools understand this perfectly well but it's the parents who don't want to hear it. Hence the (somewhat forced) resignation.

quadrifoliate 6y ago

It's concerning that this conflation of teaching and childcare is being normalized now. It leads to unnecessarily long school hours in the US. The school is set up as the only source of social interaction, that absolves parents from setting up any other sort of familial and social interactions for their kids. > But getting kids out of the house so parents can work and into a social environment where they see other kids is extremely important for most families and society as a whole. Yes, and that can be accomplished in a variety of ways, of which schools are one way (probably the riskiest way, in the current pandemic). Take your kids to the playground in the evening. Set up social playdates with other families. Let your kid sleep over at the neighbor's house. Let them visit their cousins and grandparents. Let them walk to school with other kids. Give a firm "no" to your boss for that 4pm meeting! From what I have seen, most American kids seem to have no friends near where they live, and most American families have too many helicopter parents to let these normal channels of social interaction to work as intended. So they prefer that teachers serve as the helicopter for the majority of their workday instead. Normalization of the workday to adjust to the fact that most families have working parents is what's needed, not saddling teachers with absorbing that extra load of childcare in addition to teaching.

massysett 6y ago
This is an odd conclusion considering that US school days are shorter than many other countries and that the US has fewer school days than many other countries.
anonAndOn 6y ago
Optimal child health requires this happen on a daily basis. Schools facilitate 5/7ths of this. Do you have the time and energy to pick up the slack?
- kiba 6y ago
  When I was young, I played outside with other kids, adventure to other neighborhoods. Pretty much about the most dangerous things are the traffic when we cross over. The adults don't need to set up playdates, but they do need to think about traffic and general safety.

geoduck14 6y ago

The terms "teacher" and "babysitter" denote QUALITY of care. Both roles perform similar functions (at a high level), but a "teacher" adds more value. By calling themselves "babysitters" they are expressing they are being insulted by the parents. They are trying to convey that they deserve more respect than what they are receiving.

bilbo0s 6y ago
I think the primary concern with this school board, (probably many school boards), is that the expectation is based on how well they perform the babysitting function. Whereas the metric is based on how well they perform the teaching function. There are likely a large number of school board members, teachers, and even parents who complain because they want more emphasis on the teaching and less on the babysitting. I can imagine a lot of tension in the future around this fundamental contention.

thomascgalvin 6y ago

> Yes, the education aspect is more 'prestigious'. If education was prestigious, we'd pay teachers more than $30k per year.

MattGaiser 6y ago
More prestigious than childcare, which pays less than that. https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes399011.htm https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes399011.htm
nradov 6y ago
It varies tremendously by school district. In Texas the average starting salary for teachers is $55k and goes up with experience.
- throwaway0a5e 6y ago
  Exactly. Teachers start their careers in poor underfunded districts and retire from rich over-funded districts.
colinmhayes 6y ago
Everything is relative
falcolas 6y ago
I wouldn't be so quick to condemn the value of people we underpay. We routinely underpay people who do work that's critical to the function of our society. In the case of teachers, we take advantage of their passion for helping children, even to their own detriment (i.e. buying their own school supplies).

brainless 6y ago

I think if we (including schools) acknowledge schools role, also, as childcare, then we are doomed. Education and keeping a child busy are very very different things and should be different. Else the quality of education, which is already not held as high as it used to be, will erode further. IMHO.

silicon2401 6y ago

Teachers are not babysitters, just like they're also not parents, even though all of these roles involve some level of overlap. There's a reason we have different words, and it's to express different roles in this case. The teacher's job is to teach, hence the name. Babysitting is not their primary function, it just comes as a secondary effect of having the children around all day and needing to provide a safe and focused space for learning.

adkadskhj 6y ago

It may also be a legacy issue. This - i imagine - hasn't always been the case. If a two parent household only had a single parent working this idea would be quite sound, imo. That ideally shouldn't be the schools responsibility here. I want them to focus on what really matters, education. However these days it's often necessary for both parents to work, and thus no one is available to watch the kids (and i'm glossing over single parents for simplicity).

kiba 6y ago

You mean we decided to put them into an extremely artificial environment which they can't leave without getting into trouble, in which the primary skill of focus are academics at the expense of everything else. Then, when they graduate from school, we expect them to swim and thrive in an environment that they have very little experience in, and that which a lot of people somehow muddle through life without certain vital skills like cooking. OK. School functions as 'daycare' center. Sure. Because our society is structured such that parents are forced to work two jobs.

colinmhayes 6y ago
I really can't agree that the primary focus of school is academics over everything. Primary focus of elementary school is learning to socialize. Primary focus of high school is learning to manage responsibilities. Even college the primary focus is networking. People complain about not learning how to cook or do taxes in school all the time, but they must not have paid attention, because school provides all the skills that are needed to perfect those relatively easy tasks.
- kiba 6y ago
  They do? That's news to me.
  - colinmhayes 6y ago
    Should've paid more attention I guess. Taxes is literally just reading instructions and adding some numbers plus multiplying them. Cooking is just reading instructions. Following instructions is exactly what you learn to do in school.
    - kiba 6y ago
      I don't see how high school does anything for learning responsibility. You go to school, do work, get grade. Same thing we did in middle school and in elementary school. Except more bullshit and people giving you way too much homework.

wavefunction 6y ago

I was surprised during the pandemic by the level of people complaining they couldn't bear to be around their own kids all day.

anonAndOn 6y ago

Don't forget the energy delta factor. Your home may be a gilded cage, but it's still a cage. Much like many other pack animals, kids are social creatures that need to burn through a significant amount of calories every day for optimal health and well-being.