How many requests do you get from your children’s school to volunteer? Amy, the mother of 6- and 16-year-old private-school kids in Bethesda, Md., has lost track. “The question presupposes that I am reading the endless e-stream of volunteer opportunities, fund-raising requests, snack sign ups, homework assignments, enrichment opportunities or reminders.”
She’s hardly alone. Many parents find themselves bombardedwith requests to get involved in school activities.
A few enterprising and well-off Manhattan parents have stumbled upon one solution: They outsource.
As The Post reported recently, moms and dads at the ritzy city prep schools have taken to sending their nannies and housekeepers to do some of these tasks. The Marymount and Buckley schools (where tuition is nearly $40,000 a year) have scolded parents for sending stand-ins to do crossing-guard duty.
A memo on Buckley’s Web site warns, “Parents are the only acceptable option for patrol. Caregivers, housekeepers, etc. may NOT walk safety patrol.”
Yes, it’s easy to make fun of these wealthy parents for sending someone else to perform these tasks. But at least there’s none of the hypocrisy you find in, say, Park Slope. You may recall two years ago that members of the famous food co-op in that neighborhood were reportedly paying their nannies to work their shifts.
People who join the co-op agree to work a certain number of hours each month in order to receive their share of beautiful, fresh produce — and that lovely scent of moral superiority. But even in a socialist wonderland it becomes untenable to ask professionals who are paid $500 an hour to spend their afternoon stacking arugula.
Volunteering at your child’s school is different, in at least two ways. First, for all the school’s talk of creating community, most parents don’t sign any document promising to do menial tasks just because their child is enrolled. Second, parents trying to send their kids to private schools (or even to public schools in pricey neighborhoods) actually need to spend time earning a living so they can afford the education they’ve chosen for their kids.
As one city parent told The Post, “These schools are exorbitantly expensive, they hit you up for school fees, donations, and then they want your time. . . I have three kids at three different schools. If I can send my nanny, I’m happy to do it.”
Keep in mind that many parents are happy to volunteer occasionally. But when they do, they’d like to have some kind of meaningful interaction with the kids — not watching them cross the street. But that’s not what schools are looking for.
One Scarsdale mom told me that when her son entered kindergarten, she was asked to come help the kids “make books.” No, she didn’t sit with the kids in class coloring and talking about stories — she was sent to a small room in the attic and put in front of a sewing machine for several hours.
Amy, the suburban Washington mother, was asked during the DC sniper attacks a few years ago to recreate a pumpkin patch inside her child’s school. Bales of hay included.
Laura, a writer living outside of Philadelphia, tells me she’s happy to volunteer for field trips once or twice a year. “You get to know all the kids while they’re having fun and enjoy a special experience with your kid.” She appreciates the parents who can volunteer more of their time, but she’s just not in a position to do as much.
For others, the guilt can be difficult. Abby, a mother of three in Pittsburgh, tells me that she volunteers at her oldest child’s kindergarten at least once a month. But as her other kids enter school, she knows the demands will increase. “I can’t not go.What does it say if I don’t show up?”
And that’s what schools are counting on. The guilt that parents will feel, particularly from their kids who see other parents there and want to know why theirs are not.
It made at least one mother I spoke to long for her own childhood. “When I was a kid,” she told me, “any normal kid would be embarrassed to have their mom show up at school.” Those were the days.