School’s closed for lunch?
I was perusing the world wide Interweb, and, ran across this letter to the editor in a Halifax, N.S. newspaper.
Maybe it’s just a cultural difference, but, help me out here, is it common around the world for school age children to be “off” at lunch? You have to bring them home or arrange child care for lunch? Really?
The discussion centers around whether or not the schools are responsible for kids during lunchtime, and, what working parents are supposed to do with their kids.
That sounds like a nightmare to plan for to me, but, maybe I’m just uninformed.
However, I will never again grouse when I can’t get someone to a sports practice or something after school.
Tags: Career and Kids, Halifax, school-lunchRelated Stories
POSTED IN: Childcare
5 opinions for School’s closed for lunch?
Loth
Sep 8, 2007 at 3:08 pm
Good grief no! When I was at school it was the opposite - we were barred from leaving school grounds at lunchtime and the same rule still applies to my kids today. (Probably something to do with protecting the populace from roving hordes of schoolkids!) I think having to organise child care over lunchtime might just push working parents right over the edge.
Paul
Sep 9, 2007 at 4:23 am
My first experience with kids leaving school at lunch time was in Guatemala. I have also witnessed the same thing for kids in rural/remote areas of Honduras…the kids either walk back home or, sadly, do not eat anything at all. It happens more than you think.
Kate
Sep 10, 2007 at 5:23 am
When I was a kid in Ontario, everyone except for kids who were bussed in went home for lunch. Things have changed now, but usually teachers aren’t responsible for lunchtime supervision. Instead, there are usually “lunch room supervisors” who sell milk and babysit during lunch.
When school budgets were cut in response to “provincial downloading” (the federal govt transferred responsibility to the provinces without transferring more money), a lot of schools lost the money to pay the lunch room supervisors.
It’s not all bad. A few stay-at-home mothers have turned into work-at-home mothers by becoming lunch care providers and some area eateries run student specials.
JayMonster
Sep 14, 2007 at 7:51 am
Around here, back when dinosaurs walked the earth and I was in grammar school, around here virtually everybody went home for lunch. The few kids that had two working parents, usually just hung around the schoolyard until the afternoon sessions started.
Then around 1975 or so, they started offering lunch to underprivledged kids. Lunch was served during the last 15 minutes of class before lunchtime, and again, everbody left the building to either play in the schoolyard or went home for their own lunch.
It wasn’t until my 8th grade year (’78) that they actually started having monitors to watch the kids, and started an actual lunch program that kept those kids at school for the full day.
Devra
Mar 30, 2008 at 1:10 pm
I went to elementary school in NY until 4th grade and beginning in 2nd grade we would “go out” for lunch in small groups. We ate at a local park, or sometimes we went over to someone’s house. No adult with us, zippo. And guess what? No one ever tried to abduct us or show us their genetalia. Although in 4th grade, 7 of us tried to share one “True” brand mentholated ciggy in the walk-in closet in Nadine’s bedroom. But that was the most trouble we ever got into all on our lonesome.
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