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Marriage-can’t compromise on school for child

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    #32
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    Would vote for the local school too, but I think you need to have a frank conversation with your husband about your future work wishes (which I also agree with btw). 50 mins is too much of a commute for an adult, imo, let alone a kid. We shouldn't be normalising long commutes especially if there's decent facilities nearer for the kid to use.


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    #33
    LirW
    Registered Users Posts: 4,825 ✭✭✭LirW


    I'm driving a lot since we're living rural and only have one car, I have to drop and pick himself up from his point of carpooling or bus. At least 1,5h a day with all runs but this will change this summer.
    I have my son who's primary school age with me and he hates it and while he's my son and I love him, having a bored child on the car is not helpful when driving.

    I fully get where he's coming from but what if he moves his job closer to home one day? What if the circumstances surrounding him change and he no longer can provide the same way to work?
    If he had to call in sick for a longer period of time you'd have to drive or the child misses school.

    I'd go with the school closer to home. I had a pick of several small schools here, I picked the one with the best reputation, it's in the next village 5km away since our village doesn't have a school. Other kids in the neighborhood go to different schools but if one parent can't drive we all help each other out. That said, I wouldn't run a child for 2 weeks that's in a school 50 minutes away.

    I spend SO much time ferrying my older one around between CW, WW and WX that I'm glad I can save myself a way. You'll spend a lot of time driving the child in a rural location anyway. Don't make it more difficult for yourselves. They're my kids, I do it no questions asked but I spend a lot of time driving.


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    #34
    wiggle16
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 3,022 Mod ✭✭✭✭wiggle16


    You made the right decision sending him to the country school.

    50 mins is too long a commute for a child - I know some kids do have to do this but in a situation where there is a closer option you'd be mad not to take it.

    From the child's perspective it is better for him too. People sometimes forget how important school is for socialisation, not just education. He will be in school with his friends - a school so far away could be isolating for him. I knew a girl whose father was her school principal and she said it always made her feel awkward with the other kids when he was around. I know thats not a deciding factor but it's still something to have considered.

    I don't really see the benefit in the child attending your husband's school, at all. He would not be permitted to interfere in any issues that may arise because of the conflict of interest. If your child were bullied (or even bullied another child) he wouldn't be able to interfere in that and it could also cause tension with other teachers. Seems the only benefit there is the childcare but the benefit of the local school outweighs the drawback there.

    To answer your question, I don't see much room for a compromise. You and your husband wanted different things. What you thought was best is what won out. There wasn't really a halfway point to find ground on... not being blunt but I'm sorry, he will just have to put on his big boy pants and get over it!

    Sorry, also: small class size trumps ANY other reason to send him to another school. That's one of the biggest factors influencing the education the child receives.


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    #35
    BettePorter
    Registered Users Posts: 2,257 ✭✭✭BettePorter


    As someone said it's swings and roundabouts but I'd go with the local too. Your husband seems to have an idealised view of what the shared commute with your kids will be like. After a week the novelty will have worn off and it will be what most kids do in the car on long journeys ....argue and want to be somewhere else. Two days a week I pick up my nieces and it's a minute journey home ... If I even attempted to make a detour into town on way they go crazy. They want to be home/having their dinner / playing /getting homework over with. At least with the local your kids would be home and presumably engaging with the childminder or siblings. Not sitting in the car listening to matt cooper or having their da asking them about their day every day for 8 years .


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    #36
    Jambalaya
    Registered Users Posts: 26 ✭Jambalaya


    I would go to the local school.

    The only way I would consider going to a different school would be if I lived in a housing estate where lots of kids go to different schools. Where I live, lots of children go to different schools but they still have "local" friends because they live in a housing estate.


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    #37
    fatherted1969
    Registered Users Posts: 2,164 ✭✭✭fatherted1969


    Children need to identify where they are from imo, that means going to the local schools participating in whatever activities their community has to offer as a local. You don't want them pretty much a stranger trying to do all that. They'll develop friendships within their locality too. I'd be going local anyway, I'm presuming it's primary school ?


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    #38
    screamer
    Registered Users Posts: 6,133 ✭✭✭screamer


    I wouldn’t mix home life and work, and this is no different. Having a child of your own in the school sets them up for bullying too, being teachers pet. I also saw many kids whose parents taught in the school given preferential treatment and leeway compared to the other kids, which meant the vast majority disliked them.
    Have you asked your daughter what she wants to do? Presumably all her friends will be going to the other school, maybe she doesn’t want to change to somewhere she knows no one. But I do agree going to school an hour away means she will be a stranger in her own village, so it’s a tough one.

    Last thing I will say is that we all need to learn how to deal with things and stand on our own two feet, your child will not have to do that with daddy there to hover. It might be wonderful in primary but can be a tough lesson in secondary. The vast majority of us send our kids to school with no one familiar to guide/ mind/ protect them, and tough as it is, it’s real life and the lessons they learn as they navigate that really builds their character.


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    #39
    PressRun
    Registered Users Posts: 3,129 ✭✭✭PressRun


    I'd definitely go with the local school. It's more beneficial for them to have friends who are near them so that it's not an ordeal for them to visit or play with friends on weekends or after school. What's stopping them from participating in after school activities at the local school either? I think your husband's ideas about what the commute will be like is not really what reality would be. Bonding time isn't going to happen on a 40 minute journey during rush hour.
    I would also be swayed by smaller classes. From my experience, children thrive in smaller classroom settings where they aren't competing with many other children for the attention of a busy teacher.


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    #40
    beauf
    Closed Accounts Posts: 22,651 ✭✭✭✭beauf


    I would say local school for sense of community etc. I didn't do this and I wanted this for my kids.

    But I don't think you can do this unless one of you works locally.

    If the husband changes job what then...


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    #41
    annoyedgal
    Registered Users Posts: 769 ✭✭✭annoyedgal


    Teacher here and married to a teacher. Our kids will go to the local school despite this meaning a minder for drop offs and pick ups after school.
    We want them to have local friends and local after school activities.
    I need to prep lessons before and after school so don't need to be minding my own kids while doing so! Also meetings, croke park hours etc, just can't imagine having them sitting in a corner reading or doing homework in an empty school building while I work.
    Total waste of their downtime being stuck in a car for a commute and haven't even gotten into the potential issues around teaching my own child or having a colleague do so. Just plain messy in my opinion. I'd only entertain the idea if the local school did not have a good reputation which is not the case here.


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    #42
    BettePorter
    Registered Users Posts: 2,257 ✭✭✭BettePorter


    Imo more than anyone you should listen to annoyedgal above. She speaks as someone who is in exactly that situ. You won't know it til you've lived it.

    In other news have you considered the small.incidental stuff. If you've a few kids there will come a time you will literally have a different kids party to go to every other weekend. Do you really want to be also commuting on your weekend and having to hang around killing time for 2 hours rather than being able to go home for the duration?


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    #43
    heretothere
    Registered Users Posts: 616 ✭✭✭heretothere


    You've had a lot of responses, but I'll throw in my two cents! I for secondary school I was sent to a secondary school that under ideal conditions should have been a 45 min drive, but could take up to an hour.

    I hated missing out on things with my friends. Not the big things, but the little things, like they'd meet up after dinner and go to the park or something which clearly I couldn't do with them, I didn't have primary friends to fall back on either as we had moved away for a few years just before secondary school. I know that won't be a consideration for you for a while but by the time he's 10+ he might ask if he can go to xyz's house to play for a few hours after dinner and you'll most likely have to say no.


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    #44
    jester77
    Registered Users Posts: 11,262 ✭✭✭✭jester77


    As someone who grew up in the country side, I wouldn't wish it on any kid. It is lonely enough living there without feeling like an outcast because you don't go to the local school and never have the chance to form friendships with the other kids who live "close" by.


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    #45
    ChrissieH
    Registered Users Posts: 117 ✭✭ChrissieH


    jester77 wrote: »
    As someone who grew up in the country side, I wouldn't wish it on any kid. It is lonely enough living there without feeling like an outcast because you don't go to the local school and never have the chance to form friendships with the other kids who live "close" by.

    I love that you've said this; I grew up in a town, and so many of my adult friends are obsessed with living in the countryside because they have this idea that it's better for children; as if being around people is going to corrupt them.
    Consequently, many of my friends spend astronomical amounts of "spare" time driving their kids around. It's no fun for anyone!
    I know how lucky I was that I could walk to visit friends and go to the shop with our pocket money on Saturdays, which is why I feel bad for my siblings who didn't have children their own age living close to us; they might as well have grown up in the middle of nowhere, they didn't have any friends in our town until secondary school and had quite lonely childhoods. Being in a classroom with other children but then not seeing them again until the classroom setting the next day is not conducive to forming strong friendships, and friendships provide really important life lessons.


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    #46
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 0 ✭ [Deleted User]


    jester77 wrote: »
    As someone who grew up in the country side, I wouldn't wish it on any kid. It is lonely enough living there without feeling like an outcast because you don't go to the local school and never have the chance to form friendships with the other kids who live "close" by.

    I grew up in the countryside and I absolutely loved every minute of it and wouldn’t dream of bringing up my own kids anywhere but the country side. It’s just better in pretty much every way and that’s before even adding in the massive advantages in keeping an eye on your teens and keeping them out of trouble etc as they can’t just hang out round the town, have to be collected and dropped places so I much easier know what they are doing etc etc.

    I also had plenty of friends close by, most of my primary school friends were within a 5 minute drive and some could be walked to etc. There is a lot of myths about county side living floating around nowadays.


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    #47
    aloneforever99
    Registered Users Posts: 179 ✭✭aloneforever99


    Moses Prickly Teamwork wrote: »
    I grew up in the countryside and I absolutely loved every minute of it and wouldn’t dream of bringing up my own kids anywhere but the country side. It’s just better in pretty much every way and that’s before even adding in the massive advantages in keeping an eye on your teens and keeping them out of trouble etc as they can’t just hang out round the town, have to be collected and dropped places so I much easier know what they are doing etc etc.

    I also had plenty of friends close by, most of my primary school friends were within a 5 minute drive and some could be walked to etc. There is a lot of myths about county side living floating around nowadays.

    If you fit in, play GAA etc growing up in the country can be great.

    If you're any bit different/ an outsider it's awful. I hated it.

    I think growing up in the country going to school in the city is the best of both worlds.


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    #48
    Ursus Horribilis
    Closed Accounts Posts: 6,168 ✭✭✭Ursus Horribilis


    I grew up in the countryside and have no interest in the GAA. There were other kids around and I never felt lonely. Honestly, some of the horse**** that people who've never lived in the countryside come out with at times.. We had electricity and running water too, by the way.


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    #49
    wiggle16
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 3,022 Mod ✭✭✭✭wiggle16


    OP's kids are being reared in the countryside regardless, so the dis/advantages of growing up in a rural area aren't really what's being discussed.

    Let's get back on topic :)


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    #50
    aloneforever99
    Registered Users Posts: 179 ✭✭aloneforever99


    Ursus Horribilis wrote: »
    I grew up in the countryside and have no interest in the GAA. There were other kids around and I never felt lonely. Honestly, some of the horse**** that people who've never lived in the countryside come out with at times.. We had electricity and running water too, by the way.

    If that's directed at me I think you misread my post, I also grew up in the country.

    If you fitted in it was great. If you were a goth/emo, if you were gay, if you'd moved from abroad (even England) etc etc, you could be bullied mercilessly for being different.

    As i said OP, the city school gives your kid the best of both worlds.


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    #51
    LirW
    Registered Users Posts: 4,825 ✭✭✭LirW


    aloneforever99 wrote: »
    If that's directed at me I think you misread my post, I also grew up in the country.

    If you fitted in it was great. If you were a goth/emo, if you were gay, if you'd moved from abroad (even England) etc etc, you could be bullied mercilessly for being different.

    As i said OP, the city school gives your kid the best of both worlds.

    I'm a now adult former goth from abroad who moved into a rural village with like 200? People. We had no problems at all, my son has loads of friends here.
    You can be bullied for being different anywhere really, it largely depends on the people around you, either at home or in school.


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    #52
    aloneforever99
    Registered Users Posts: 179 ✭✭aloneforever99


    LirW wrote: »
    I'm a now adult former goth from abroad who moved into a rural village with like 200? People. We had no problems at all, my son has loads of friends here.
    You can be bullied for being different anywhere really, it largely depends on the people around you, either at home or in school.

    That's true, I just always envied my cousins in Dublin for having wider social circles available to them. When I got to college, I felt like I had ARRIVED - finally I could find people with the same interests as me and didn't feel like an outsider any more.


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    #53
    wiggle16
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 3,022 Mod ✭✭✭✭wiggle16


    Mod note:

    This is going very off topic - once again, this thread is not about the benefits or growing up in the country vs a town or city. You can be bullied/exluded as a child no matter where you're from.

    OP, if you're still reading, I'm going to close this thread this evening as I don't believe there's much more advice to be given, if you've no objection.

    Thanks


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    #54
    wiggle16
    Moderators, Society & Culture Moderators Posts: 3,022 Mod ✭✭✭✭wiggle16


    As per above, thread is a week old, OP hasn't been back and I don't think there's much else to be said, so I'm closing this thread - reluctantly, as it was a very interesting thread.

    Thanks & grmma all for posting, there's a lot of food for thought and some great advice was given to the OP.

    Thread locked.


This discussion has been closed.
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