Back-to-School time can be exciting– and stressful. Whether you’re the student returning to school or the parent of a returning student, it can be a high pressure period. Here’s an excerpt from an article by Cindy Krischer Goodman of The Miami Herald about the challenges working parents face during back to school time and the tricks to a successful balancing act. Check it out, then click the link below to read the full article.
As we embark on another school year, there’s no denying that back-to-school worries can be as stressful for working dads and moms as they are for kids. We find ourselves scurrying to buy supplies and adopt new routines to blend our children’s school schedules and activities with our work hours — and can only try to do our best.
Getting the right arrangements in place can be crucial to our job performance and our child’s school success. Many parents adjust strategies yearly, tweaking for new school hours or tapping new resources. Still, getting it right can be a challenge. In a new Pew Research Center survey, 56 percent of working moms and 50 percent of working dads said they find it very or somewhat difficult to juggle work and family life.
Those who can tap work flexibility are fortunate. Last school year, Anguin, a single father and an executive chef, hired a sous chef to help in his restaurant’s kitchen and allow him to get home earlier to go over homework and put his daughter to bed. While his goal was to be home by 7 p.m. and take a day off midweek, it didn’t always happen.
This school year, he has an additional sous chef and plans to try harder to be home to supervise homework, pop out to take his daughter to ballet class, and have a weekday off. If he succeeds, he wants to use that day to volunteer at his daughter’s school: “I am hoping to cook for the kids or teach them about preparing food.”