Working for Lifestyle/Extras
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| Mon, 11-20-2006 - 11:13am |
Hi Ladies :)
This is my first time on this debate board and I have been dying to jump into some of the topics, but I feel as though they are sooooo long (one in particular is over 1000 replies, yikes!) that starting my own specific one might work out better.
Anyhow, a recurring theme here seems to be what Moms should and shouldn't be going to work for. It seems some are of the opinion that is OK for Mom to work if she must to pay her bills but NOT if its to afford a nice car, house, good neighborhood. This is considered keeping up with the Johnses (who are they???) and thats bad.
Well, I want to know what in the heck is wrong with a women working to have nice things? I don't mean working and leaving baby in child care 16 hours a day, everyday...thats pretty extreme.
I enjoyed a certain lifestyle before having a child, should I have downsized that lifestyle once baby came so I didn't have to work? What about me *wanting* to maintain a certain lifestyle for myself, my husband, and my child makes me a (a) workaholic or (b) striving to keep up with the Joneses?
Don't some people (like myself) simply enjoy living in a nice place with nice things and want their children to have the same experience?
So please, anyone who thinks a women is wrong for WOH if she is not doing so to financially survive but does it to maintain a certain lifestyle...whats wrong with this?
Thanks all :)

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See, I'm not afraid of that because I do think it's mainly about socioeconomics, not bad teachers or bad schools or whatever. 40% of the kids in our school are on free or reduced lunch, so I know there are going to be kids who don't do as well as mine. Many of these kids are being bussed from lower-performing schools (our district has open enrollment). Our school doesn't have a 90% pass rate, but the schools in our district that do are all-white and upper-middle-class. I've checked them out, and I don't think they're "better," even though they have "better" scores than ours. We're just looking for something a little different.
But I understand your willies. I've been criticized for not planning to send my kids to the neighborhood middle school, which I consider *too* low-rated.
I agree which is the reason I have the willies about sending my daughter to the local elementary where the reading and math scores are in the 60 percentile and 68% are on reduced or free lunch. Lucky our school district allows for school voucher (i'm not really sure how that works yet).
My DH want to send our daughter to a private school (he greww up in the area and knows the public school. I just don't know that even with two incomes we could afford it. Yes we pay for DC now but that will hardly cover the cost of private school.
Well, my understanding is that studies show up to a 50/50 split (50% lower-ses kids/50 higher-ses kids) has no effect on how the higher-ses kids do and a positive effect on how the lower-ses kids do. So for me, more than 50% would be an issue, which is why I don't want to do the neighborhood middle school, which has a worse ratio than that.
I don't know how your voucher system works, but we have open enrollment here, so I can send my kids to a different middle school, which is what I will likely do. We have several good magnet programs. Edited to add that maybe your voucher system will allow you to do something like that. Our kids don't go to the neighborhood school now (actually, since we moved it is now our neighborhood school, but when we started it wasn't.)
Edited 12/20/2006 8:56 pm ET by mom34101
Jennie
Jennie
Jennie
Sabina
Oh, life is a glorious cycle of song,
I agree with your post. I still say the cards we have are fun and interesting and there is nothing wrong with fun and interesting on a child's level if they enjoy it.
My four year old doesn't use flashcards except the ones my 17mo likes and she uses them because she likes to be the teacher
"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&
"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&
"Besides this we have our living prophet, for whom I am grateful, and I hope to follow after him all the days of my life.&
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