ACOT Message Board

Would anyone like to share their thoughts on this?
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_kids_at_w ... -container

well, I have my child at work with me today - cause she's sick and I'm a stay at home mom. But, it means I'm not at the store doing the grocery shopping...

I went with my mom for years when she was a medical assistant to the Dr. office she worked at. I wasn't allowed in the exam rooms, of course, but I did help pull charts and play gopher. Oh, and every year that I did it, I had to write a reoprt about what my mom actually does, what I did while I was there, what I observed, and how I felt about my mom's job. I think that it isn't necessarily a bad thing if the child is getting something more out of it than just "I don't have to go to school today, Hooray!". But, I do agree with the comments about the article that ask why it can't be in the summer when most kids are out of school.

I think it just depends on the child, on the parent, on what the parent does, and how many days the child has missed, etc. It should be left up to parents to decide.

Wish I'd known about this in the morning - Xander has spring break this week and I could've brought him in to help me and give him a better idea what an administrative assistant does all day. Well, besides chatting on here!

Originally it was just Take Your Daughters to Work Day. Then due to complaints a Take Your Sons To Work Day was started. That was during the summer. The boys complained that they didn't get to miss a day of school whereas the girls did. (My supervisor's son definitely complained.) So apparently they combined the two events into one and kept the original date. I agree that it is a bad date with all the standardized tests going on.

deerewife wrote:well, I have my child at work with me today - cause she's sick and I'm a stay at home mom. But, it means I'm not at the store doing the grocery shopping...

ROFL! That was a really good one

I can't see where the complaint on missing one day and affecting the child's learning is legitimate since children miss school all the time for illness or because mom and dad took them out to go on vacation. The children should still be responsible for any missed school work just as they would on any other missed day. I bring my son to work with me any day that he doesn't have school because I have no other option. It's boring here. He'd rather be at school! I agree that it would be more appropriate to make the day during the time when schools are traditionally on break and then there would not be a disruption to the regular classroom routine.

I think it is a worthwhile program when done right. Our company sponsors the program. While I don't agree that missing one day is going to ruin a child's educational experience, I do agreaa that this is a bad time of year for kids to miss. Many people declined to particiapate today because of Standardized Testing that is happening right now.

deerewife wrote:well, I have my child at work with me today - cause she's sick and I'm a stay at home mom. But, it means I'm not at the store doing the grocery shopping...

I love this Jenna!


Everyday is a workday for Jenna and I. Living the lifestyle we choose there is not a day we do not work. Farmers and Ranchers work every day to bring you your food! Children and Grand-children of farmers and ranchers have the incredible blessing of understanding our complex simple life every single day.

My favorite part of being on this site is seeing Jenna's layouts of her life!

Now why wouldn't DuPont allow me to go to work with my Dad.....oh yeah, it is only the safest company in the world to work for.

I used to bring the kids to work with me when they were sick. I'd put a sleeping bag on the floor for them and bring along books and crayons and coloring paper. They HATED it - so there no chance of them ever wanting to go to work with me on the appointed day!

I still recall the one time my daddy took me to work.


I think I was 4. Daddy was home alone with me one night. I don't remember where Mom was or even what night of the week it was. Daddy got a call to come into work to fix something. Work was Eglin Air Force Base. My daddy was a civilian engineer. The something that needed fixing was some part of something in the cockpit of whatever was the kind of fighter jet they had there back in the early 60's. With no mom around Dad took me in with him. I vividly remember him picking me up and throwing me over his shoulder and carrying me as he climbed up that little ladder into the fighter jet cockpit in the dark (I think it was actually parked outside the hanger). It seemed like it was a mile high!!!! Daddy put me in the back navigator seat with strict instructions not to touch anything (I didn't) while he went to work up front doing whatever to fix whatever the emergency that couldn't wait was.



The next day Dad caught some grief for having me there since everything was so classified and I did not have a clearance. Yea, like what was a 4 year old going to tell the Soviets?

Our company has a really good program they put on for the kids every year. They split them into 3 different conference rooms by age group. When parents get to work the kids shadow them for the first hour, then they go to their conference room. Each age group has something different going on - the elementary school children were having discussions on their career choices (I think there was more to that, but that's all I got out of the child I was talking too, lol), the middle school children had a project where they had to get into groups and form a business (they had to design products to sell, build an organizational chart, etc.). Not sure what the high school kids did, my friends children were in elementary and middle. Then the parents take their children to lunch, have another hour of shadowing on the job, and the children go back to the conference rooms to learn about our company, the corporate world, etc.


The middle school child that I spoke with was able to define CEO, CFO, Lead Designer, and several other leadership terms after completing his group project. Personally I think it's a great idea and if it's done right the children can learn a lot.

Okay, kids/teenagers miss school for a lot of reasons, and because their parents took them to work on "Take Your Child to Work Day" is certainly not the worst one (it's not like it's "Take Your Child To Work WEEK" or something...). Not only do the kids learn, but they can see what Mom or Dad does when they're at work, and it gives them a little more understanding of what their parents are doing while they're there. I know as a kid I would get confused when they told me what they did at work... I couldn't understand it without seeing it. Then my mom started working at the same Elementary school I went to, and I got to see her every once in a while doing her job, so I understood what she did and how it was important. Since my dad works with a lot of dangerous machinery, I never had that chance, and to this day I'm completely clueless when he talks about things at work. To me, if the parent actually takes the kid to work, and shows them what they do, it is as much a learning experience as a day spent in school, and it's one that will probably stick with them longer and mean more to them.

killarney_rose wrote:

deerewife wrote:well, I have my child at work with me today - cause she's sick and I'm a stay at home mom. But, it means I'm not at the store doing the grocery shopping...

I love this Jenna!


Everyday is a workday for Jenna and I. Living the lifestyle we choose there is not a day we do not work. Farmers and Ranchers work every day to bring you your food! Children and Grand-children of farmers and ranchers have the incredible blessing of understanding our complex simple life every single day.

My favorite part of being on this site is seeing Jenna's layouts of her life!

Now why wouldn't DuPont allow me to go to work with my Dad.....oh yeah, it is only the safest company in the world to work for.

lol - the girls are usually upset when daddy actually starts planting because they have to go to school and can't ride along...