Questions about working at your child's school.

Eleven011 · Jun 24, 2016

I work in the school my 3 kids go to, ages 10, 13 and 15. I've been working at this school a few years, but only in the nurse for this last year.

1. Its hard to know which way this will go, i'd suggest playing it by ear during the interview - are they fellow moms, friendly, visiting, or are they all business, admin types. I don't think it will make or break your chances. Everyone knew me and knew my kids obviously went to my school, its the only one in our town.

2. My kids love having me at the school (although the older one won't admit that). The younger one feels much safer and relaxed knowing that he has me right there if he needs anything. And I think it gives him a boost seeing me in the halls sometimes ( I know it does me!). The older ones like the convienience. It outwieghs having your mom at school (gasp). Its quite handy to pop into the nurses office and proclaim "I forgot I needed $5 today for the party". They also love to come in and eat my snacks!

3. This is a small town, so often I have to send kids of friends/neighbors home. But I generally have good reason and once I, as nice and possible, explain it to them, I haven't had issue. I get more flack from parents I don't know than those I do.

Good Luck!

rbytsdy · Jun 30, 2016

I spent the last several years working in the school where my children attended. It was good and bad. I was the 6th nurse in 8 years because the school was too insane to keep a nurse. The superintendent approached me at a concert and asked if I'd be interested in interviewing for a full time position (I had submitted an application to sub).

1. The fact that you have children shouldn't even come up. I wouldn't go out of my way to mention it but if you live in town they should be able to guess that it's possible that you will have kids coming through the school.

2. My kids loved having me there but I worked in a school that only went up to 3rd grade. Moms are still okay in those grades (if I worked in the middle school, my middle schooler probably would have been mortified)!

3. For the most part, it was fine but sometimes you learn things you don't want to know. I don't live in an upscale town and we had a lot of CPS visits. I hate having to call CPS on my neighbors. I've been threatened (to the point of calling the police) by some parents over stupid things and that is always uncomfortable knowing they only lives blocks away. My daughter seemed to hang out with a nice crowd so I would text those parents info and get a feel for what they wanted to do (unless it was clear cut with fevers, repeat vomiting, etc). I did have angry parents post on facebook about me when they were convinced I was letting lice get out of control in the school. The truth is that I had no idea so many kids (all cheerleaders) had lice. Their parents never said anything so when I found a few, random cases, I never thought anything. But another teacher/parent in the school was telling other parents that there was lice in her classroom that I knew about. Yes, I knew about that 1 case and would never sent letters or do mass checks over 1 case. But I had no idea a bunch of cheerleaders had lice. It was a very uncomfortable situation! Our new superintendent (not the one that hired me) is convinced that lice is highly contagious in the classroom (she told me the story of all the girls in her 5th grade classroom having lice one year) so she went along with the parents.