The author’s first day substituting in an elementary school front office revealed the job’s intense reality, far from her initial perception. She handled 35 ice packs, three lunches, a translator, a sick child, and even led impromptu karate. The front office, she learned, is the „epicenter of the public school funding crisis,“ encompassing nursing, lunch duty, and constant student tracking – more like a pilot and air traffic control than a flight attendant. Parents are encouraged to grasp this demanding role: be patient, email about absences, complete volunteer paperwork promptly, and respect staff as professionals who genuinely care for children despite immense pressure.
On my first day working in the front office, I made thirty five ice packs (this averaged out to approximately one ice pack every 11 minutes, for the entire school day). I oversaw three lunches (only one child fell, their lunch tray sliding the entire length of the cafeteria, before their chocolate milk hit my ballet flat and splashed up my leg), downloaded one Spanish language interpreter for a parent who stopped by the office, and walked a sick child home three blocks in the rain, because their parent was unable to come pick them up. I ended the day doing literal karate chops;the bus for the after school martial arts program didn’t show, and there were 15 kids upset and ready for some karate moves led by me, a woman who has never trained a day in her life.
I’ve long watched the admins at my kids’ elementary school and figured I knew the job: answering phones, maybe if things got exciting you’d get to make an announcement about student of the week over the loudspeaker. This is what I thought they did when I was a kid, and honestly that vision didn’t change much as I parented my kids through elementary school. This was still the version of the front office I had in my head when I signed up to substitute at the elementary school across the street from my house. I pictured long nails clicking away cheerfully on a keyboard, cute kids in the background waving at me saying “Hello, Ms. Kathleen!”, an occasional hug, and maybe even a phone call or two. The reality couldn’t have been farther from that.
Instead, I found the epicenter of the public school funding crisis, the bucket that was absorbing all the holes. Nursing is part of the job now, and not just ice packs and Band-Aids. They’re the ones deciding whether a stomachache is a stomachache or a call home, then administering the medicine that comes with that call. Lunch duty is part of the job, which means they are also, functionally, a waitress, a bouncer, and a janitor. Tracking every single kid’s whereabouts, all day, is a legal requirement, not a courtesy, so if a parent is even five minutes late for pickup, it’s recorded. In fact, tracking every single body in the building, literal hundreds of people, is the expectation: to know who is background-checked and approved to be on campus, to be sure students are safe.
As I’ve subbed, I’ve taken to thinking of the school as an airplane: the front office is the pilot, air traffic control, and ground crew all at once. The stakes feel that high, and the logistical difficulty that complex. Which is fine, except for the parents‘ expectation that they are, well, also the flight attendants.
This is important information for you, as a parent, to have. When you or your kids arrive, you’re expecting a flight attendant: a warm greeting, someone showing your kid to their assigned seat. What you’re actually walking into is a cockpit mid-flight, with no idea what kind of morning it’s been. But there are things you can do to make it easier on your front office administrators, and I will say, they do notice. (They notice who makes things harder, too…. Just, as a warning):
Be aware of what you’re walking into. There are likely things happening that you, as a parent, cannot and should not be aware of, and it may be an emergency. If you have to wait to be greeted, know it’s not personal. If they seem stressed, it’s because they are: a kid may have walked in with pink eye, or a parent may have called with a family emergency, or the district probably implemented a new attendance software that no one can access yet. Being patient and understanding is your best move.
Please email the school if your kid is going to be out. The alternative is a front office staffer trying to figure out, by process of elimination, whether your child is home sick or unaccounted for. Ask the front desk how they prefer to be communicated with, and then be sure to inform them about illness, appointments, or late arrivals.
Fill out your volunteer paperwork, and make your spouse do the same, early in the year. The new rules about getting approved to be in the classroom can be a pain in the neck, and the office isn’t the reason why, but they’re the ones who have to chase it down. Anything you can do to make their jobs easier is desperately appreciated.
And finally, if you’d like to befriend your front office staff, talk to them like professional adults who deserve more than apple-themed gifts. These are people juggling a hundred things at once, ice packs and applesauce pouches among them, and they didn’t sign up for this because of the paycheck. They did it because they believe kids, and schools, are worth showing up for. You might need to wait a second before they say hello. Please know they’re glad you’re there, and they love your kid so much that they already made them an ice pack.
Kathleen Donahoe is a writer and poet living in Seattle. Publications include Cup of Jo, Romper, NYTimes and her popular humor substack A Little Laugh. She is currently writing her first novel.
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