This past week, kids all over Guelph celebrated their third snow day in three weeks, and many others have enjoyed additional bus cancellation days the last few weeks. My own children have enjoyed their snow days at home, reading books, watching TV, playing with their toys, and getting some outdoor play time when it’s safe to do so.
As parents, the logistics of a snow day can be difficult to manage. A snow day once in a while can be fun. It’s a chance to relax, unwind, and spend some cozy time with your kids. But when it’s as regular as it’s been in 2019, snow days can cause significant challenges.
Unluckily for me, the snow days this year have all fallen on days that I would typically be working. As a work-at-home parent, I have had to create a system where I’m able to get work done, which has meant hiring a nanny to watch my youngest while I get my work done a few mornings each week. But during snow days my nanny is unable to come to my home, and there’s absolutely no way I can get my work done with three kids requiring constant supervision.
Just because a snow day cancels schools doesn’t mean it cancels work, and my husband has been going to work most days when school is cancelled. It’s posed a challenge as we have the discussion about whose work takes priority, and why is it that way, exactly? In two-parent, male and female households, my guess is that women are the ones taking more time off than men, but that’s just a guess based on zero data or analysis.
I did an informal poll on my Facebook, asking who takes time off when kids are home from school. In my poll I discovered that 86 per cent of moms stay home during snow days, and 14 per cent of dads stay home. Forty-three people responded to the poll, and there was some interesting discussion as well.
Parents who are teachers naturally are home with their kids during snow days, unless that parent teaches in a different school district, which can make things a bit more complicated. A few of the mothers who commented were stay-at-home moms, or on maternity leave. Others worked from home or have flexible jobs, where they can easily work on their laptops at home. But many also noted that, more often than not, even if both parents worked outside of the home, mom was the one who would end up staying home with the kids.
No family is the same, and a simple poll can’t possibly deliver the nuances of each family type. I know, having grown up in a single-parent home, I would have stayed home with a babysitter or my grandparents. There was absolutely no way my mom could have afforded to take a day off work. In my husband’s family, his mom was a stay-at-home mom. Naturally, she would have been home with the kids.
My neighbours, Sarah and Michele, have two young kids and must navigate their schedules when figuring out who stays home during snow days.
“Since we are both women, and both feminist, our duties as parents and partners are not based on gender. They are more based on our interests and abilities.” shared Michele.
When it’s a snow day, typically, Michele stays home because she has paid sick days and personal days, but when those run out, it takes additional navigating to figure out if Sarah is able to stay home and make up her hours elsewhere.
As a mom who has only recently started prioritizing her work, I have been really challenged by the idea that my work should take a back seat to my husband’s. On Tuesday I had to cancel an important phone interview, which pushed my work back, and that means I won’t get paid for that reported article until later. I’ve wrestled with the idea that the automatic answer is that a woman’s work is less valuable, and even though I don’t believe that’s true in my home, it certainly could have been perceived that way this past week.
Still, my husband’s job is flexible, and his workplace is extremely understanding. The last few weeks, we’ve both worked together, each of us having to make compromises with our work schedules, and we’ve both managed to get our work done. It’s been more complicated and stressful, but we’re lucky to have each other to fill in when we need to. As we adjust to the growing pains of having two working parents, we are also discovering how to manage and prioritize our work amidst raising kids with unpredictable schedules.
For parents who don’t have a partner, or for parents who aren’t salaried and miss out on pay, I can’t imagine the stress that’s caused when you’re consistently missing work due to snow days. Securing the safety of our kids is absolutely the top priority, and I’m thankful for the school board that makes these decisions, but it’s also important to navigate and problem solve some of the challenges families might face due to school closures, too.
When navigating work schedules and unexpected school closures, I think the most important thing is that both partners agree on the end result. In my poll, it seemed that many of the mothers who stayed home were happy to do so. There was also a lot of compromise, discussion, and taking turns, all things that continue in my own home.
Still, if you asked me how I felt about snow days — yay or nay — I’d have to say nay.
