[quote=Rhett] . . . Like the original poster, we had a *major* problem with Miramar Ranch’s bell schedule. Our problem was the reverse – the 7:30 start is just way too early for us, and we’d much prefer a 9:00 start. But, like BearishGirl said, you can always use the after hours program and just adjust (though it makes for a LONG day for your child, and that isn’t so great)….[/quote]
Rhett, before and after-school programs for the elementary-school set are coordinated with school breakfast programs, have “homework help” and recreational activities in the afternoon and are specifically designed to cater to the needs of FT-worker parents, most of whom commute to work. I myself used them from 7-5:30 or 7:30-6 five days per week for decades. Kids should keep a schedule most convenient for their parents who support them, not the other way around, IMO. Kids are resilient and will fall into the routine that their parents set for them. Believe me when I tell you that they will still graduate from HS and get accepted into college…latchkey or no. In most cases, I believe kids who are socialized from infancy in daycare, pre-K, and a before and afterschool program are not only better-equipped to deal with HS, college and thus “real life,” they generally live in more solvent, stable households than a one-earner family with kids who stay home with ONE of the parents or other relative who may tend to over-coddle or cloister them into select pre-approved playmate groups (based upon the religious beliefs of the parents, for example). This type of parent is doing their kid(s) a great disservice, IMHO. It is these same families with kids who have only been allowed to watch 2-3 (prescreened) channels on TV (or none at all) who end up with a rebellious MS-aged child, pregnant teen or a HS-aged son secretly stockpiling weapons in his bedroom. In the past decade-plus, over-the-top “child-centric” and/or “helicopter” parents have proliferated enormously in the US, cranking out mostly inept social misfits (at the very least) in the name of “protecting them” from “bad influences” (read: people not like us). It’s wacky, IMHO. The world is just not that bad of a place.
I’m not suggesting that the OP here is one. I’m just saying that I think a lot of today’s parents make dumb or misguided decisions re their children or overly burdensome, expensive decisions on their behalf which are not necessary and don’t ultimately make their kids any happier or give them a better growing-up experience.
