End of the Year (non) Madness

Any teacher, parent or student knows that the end of the school year means complete craziness and overbooked days, afternoons and evenings.  It is kind of like that at the beginning of the school year as well but then everyone is refreshed from the summer break.  At the end of the year it is like you are dragging yourself over the finish line of a marathon. 

Or at least that is how I always felt as a teacher and as a parent in Seattle. 
We keep saying that living here and the kids' school in particular, is like living in 1975 in all of the best ways.   End of the year did see an uptick in activities but mostly just for the kids.  They had end of the year parties and treats.  The treat/sugar thing here is NUTS. Every kid brings in cupcakes or some other sweet treat for their birthday so at least 25 days of the year they get those, teachers hand out candy weekly if not daily, they can buy treats at the snack bar.  It's all I can do to

look the other way and try to limit treats on our end.  Each grade does a class picnic.  They take the entire grade - so 125+ students- They all walk to a nearby (1 mile or so) park and have 4-5 HOURS of completely unstructured time.  They play soccer, frisbee, hang out and talk, play on the playground.  Whatever they want.  Then at the end they walk back to school or if you talked to the teacher, your child can stray off at their bus or train stop if they happen to pass it on the way back to school.  At Benjamin's picnic there were several parents.  At Josie's we were honestly the only ones.  We just dropped off our frisbee because Josie forgot to bring it.  We thought we might stay for a bit as we did at Benjamin's but it was clear from the very unenthusiastic way that she greeted us that we weren't really invited - by her 😉
End of the school year gift in Seattle was always a huge undertaking.  I was classroom parent for both kids in all their years at school there.  I would start weeks in advance collecting money from parents, organizing a gift and then buying and presenting it.  Here the classroom reps (I'm just an alternate here... maybe next year I'll be up for the challenge) gathered money at the beginning of the year. It wasn't really a donation, it was more of a mandatory thing so every parent contributed.  This money went toward both the Christmas gift and the end of the year gift for the teacher as well as field trips and other classroom expenses.  It wasn't that much, I can't remember exactly but maybe 30 Euro.  But when everyone contributes it adds up!  The end of the year gift was a 15 Euro book.  And the teacher was unbelievably grateful!  So much less pressure here.  I think the end of the year gifts last year for the kid's Seattle teachers were in the several hundreds of dollars in gift cards and other fun things.  What a difference.  And what a difference it makes in how not burned out I feel.  Must have been what 1975 felt like.  I'll have to ask my mom. 😉