What to Do on School Breaks and Days Off: A Guide for Working Parents
Every working parent knows the feeling: you look at the school calendar and spot another day off. Teacher work days, parent-teacher conferences, winter break, spring break. They add up fast, and most jobs don't give you that much time off. Here's how to plan ahead, and what good school break care looks like.
## Map out the year now
At the start of each semester, put every non-school day on your calendar: professional development days, conference days, holidays, and breaks. Many families find they need coverage on 15 to 25 days a year beyond summer. Seeing them all at once makes it much easier to plan.
## Your options
Most families mix a few options: taking vacation days, trading days with another parent, relying on grandparents, or enrolling in day-off camps. Day-off camps tend to be the most reliable, because they're scheduled around the school calendar and run full days.
## What to look for in a day-off camp
A good school break camp should offer full-day hours with drop-off and pickup windows that fit a workday. It should be active and engaging, not a day of screens. Staff should be trained and background checked. And it should be easy to book only the days you actually need.
## How Cadet Care covers breaks
At schools with Cadet Care, we run full-day break camps on teacher PD days, conference days, and winter and spring break. Kids get the same enrichment they love during the year, like drones, foam-tipped archery, STEM builds, and sports clinics, in a full-day format.
Break-day camps are a separate, additional charge from regular care, and you pay by the session. Only pay for the coverage you need.
## Good for your school, too
Every break-day enrollment earns the school the same revenue share as regular Cadet Care. Keeping the building active on days off puts money back into the school's budget, with no extra work for school staff.
## Not at your school yet?
The Recreation Academy also runs school break camps across our cities. Check our locations page to find one near you. If you'd like Cadet Care, with break coverage included, at your child's school, share therecreationacademy.com/schoolcare with your principal or PTO.