PSLE leave: For or Against?

[Imami]

beanbear:

If we emphasize the reason for taking leave to be JUST PSLE, it appears to be parents' kiasu metality or over-kancheong-ness over an exam. However, if you're the kind of parent who chooses to be with your child at important milestones of his life or believes in providing emotional support or being a cheerleader for anything THE CHILD regards to be important, then it makes sense to be around.


I took leave to attend my child's first sports meet in primary school, first school music performance on stage, first drama performance, his first triathlon, etc, etc. PSLE is considered as important as the rest of these events, hence I took leave or at least schedule myself to be available when my DS skipped school for revision. As long as I make myself useful to my child ie a source of good emotional, intellectual and spiritual energy to my child, it's good to take leave.

Like! Like! Super like!

I want to be a parent like what bean bear have describe - to be there. I don't care if it makes a difference to my kid or not, whether he appreciates or not but I want to be there at every milestone of his life as long as he allows/ wants me to.

[nms1]

beanbear:

If we emphasize the reason for taking leave to be JUST PSLE, it appears to be parents' kiasu mentality or over-kancheong-ness over an exam. However, if you're the kind of parent who chooses to be with your child at important milestones of his life or believes in providing emotional support or being a cheerleader for anything THE CHILD regards to be important, then it makes sense to be around.


I took leave to attend my child's first sports meet in primary school, first school music performance on stage, first drama performance, his first triathlon, etc, etc. PSLE is considered as important as the rest of these events, hence I took leave or at least schedule myself to be available when my DS skipped school for revision. As long as I make myself useful to my child ie a source of good emotional, intellectual and spiritual energy to my child, it's good to take leave.

For some parents and some children it does make sense to be around but I think the issue that I, and some others, have is that the implication by introducing PSLE leave is that you need to be there and that parents will be selling their child short if they are not.

I take time off for concerts, parent-teacher meetings, some school events etc. and I do my best not to travel at important times e.g. I refused to attend our annual sales conference in the US when my daughter started P1 as I would have been away during her 2nd week and I didn't know how she would be coping.

However, I doubt that I will take time off when it comes to PSLE as I think that, for my daughter at least, me being around will add to her stress. My m-i-l is of the view that I should be around for all exams and moves like OCBCs' only go to strengthen the argument.

And with 3 children it's a lot of leave to use up just staying and home and boiling soup

[kwcllf]

kwcllf:

Inversely speaking, what if I am a PSLE parent and want to take leave. If there is no labelling and be clear, there is a risk of leave application not being approved.

BeContented:

SAHM too long....cannot remember :oops: Correct me if wrong.
Believe there is a 'Remarks/Reason column' that employees can fill in. If Mgt has given the 'directives' to approve PSLE leave, labelling is not required isn't it?
Otherwise, I believe most leave can be disapproved regardless of labelling or not.

[/quote]
Well.....I am in no position to comment on other companies' policies. But I believe you are usually required to state clearly what leave you are applying for, like compassionate leave, child care leave, annual leave, etc...
If OCBC wants to implement PSLE Leave, then I believe employees have to state them clearly when they apply for leaves.

As far as mine is concerned, we have to state what leaves we are applying for. Even for MC, you need to state what illness you are suffering from that require a MC after you come back to work.

[verykiasumummy]

the stress over the new labelled leave could be self-imposed… one can choose not to self-impose such stress over whether one should take psle leave or not… in other words, we as parents do not need to account to anyone except ourselves for things that we choose to do or not to do for our own kids…

[Kissgurami]

I do agree with JT’s view that placing emphasis on "PSLE leave" will not help the current situation. I would reckon terming it as "Family leave" which is inclusive of allowing the parents to bring additional days over be it PSLE, P5 SA2 , P1 - the first moments of your kid joining primary school would be more ideal. Every step along the way is much better than placing obsessive craziness on this PSLE.


My colleagues who have PSLE kids did not take leave this year. They still came to work and they have more than sufficient days to take the off days if they like. They just felt there isn’t a need to stay home and hover around which stresses their kid even more.

My worry which is the same of the rest is terming is it as "PSLE Leave" and other parents being judgemental at those who does not conform to the "normal way" of taking leave to be there for their kids’ PSLE. Can’t imagine how it would be like if you have a boss who is anxious about their child’s PSLE and start asking why aren’t you taking leave for it since they are taking it.

[resgmom]

To me, this announcement by OCBC is a PR move to feed on the media’s frenzy whenever the PSLE is on, and while the government has been talking about reforming PSLE and all that talk. The executives at OCBC know that the papers will give this news a prominent place at this time of the year to attract reader’s attention.


Many companies allow accumulation of leave for at least 1-2 years, so to label this as "PSLE" leave makes me wonder whether they are indeed using this announcement to cast themselves with a pro-family light, to gain more brownie points with the public/government agencies/political leaders. Of course the comment by JT just shows that sometimes PR move can backfire.

[kwcllf]

Lilac66:

kwcllf:

Inversely speaking, what if I am a PSLE parent and want to take leave. If there is no labelling and be clear, there is a risk of leave application not being approved.

I see where you're coming from esp about the leave not being approved if it's not made clear. However, if it's an internal implementation, then leave it as that. There's no need to make public the company's \"pro-family\" move.
In fact, I'm wondering if this implementation will backfire on them ..

If there are a handful of PSLE parents in a dept requesting to take this leave at the same time, won't the rest of the colleagues be made to take on so much extra work? OCBC's HR also does not have any grounds to reject these leave as one PSLE parent is as entitled as the next one to take it.

Also , if every other company were to follow in OCBC's footsteps, \"feeding into parents' fears\" will indeed become a dreadful reality.

In the first place, I doubt OCBC has the intention of \"feeding into parents' fear\".

Inversely speaking, it may have already been seeing many such occurrences of parents taking leaves during PSLE period. Maybe, it is also trying to project itself as a caring organisation and take up the govt's challenge of having work-Life balance.

So, we should give it the benefit of the doubt.

You mentioned that what happens when many employees take PSLE leaves at the same time and increasing the workload on the remaining colleagues. I believe they must have considered this potential problem and if it a big problem that cannot be overcome, then I don't believe they will implement the PSLE Leave policy.

By the way, I don't work for OCBC but I do appreciate such niceties.

[verykiasumummy]

media coverage, attention and topics are what the ocbc manangement is expecting… they could be up to some other campaigns coming up next so they want a big share of hot topics to talk about just before their launch…

[verykiasumummy]

this thread was just started today by daddy d and its 9 pages long now… just all that they want to expect…

[Chenonceau]

nms1:

For some parents and some children it does make sense to be around but I think the issue that I, and some others, have is that the implication by introducing PSLE leave is that you need to be there and that parents will be selling their child short if they are not.

This is the part I dun understand... the company does not force staff to take PSLE leave. Why would you see it as implying anything?

nms1:

I take time off for concerts, parent-teacher meetings, some school events etc. and I do my best not to travel at important times e.g. I refused to attend our annual sales conference in the US when my daughter started P1 as I would have been away during her 2nd week and I didn't know how she would be coping.

I dun attend concerts... PTM... 2 weeks before DS' prelims I went on a 2 week trip. The fact that you take leave for stuff that mean nothing to me and my DS, doesn't pressure me to take leave for those. That there were chronically stressed parents who obsess about assessment books didn't change my travel plans either. I don't attend anybody else's graduation or awards either... including my own. DD collected all her awards and her graduation cert without me because I couldn't bear to sit through 2 hours of clapping.

If there is leave... there is leave, it is your choice to take it or not. I would. You won't. Why would either of our actions imply anything about the other parent?

nms1:

However, I doubt that I will take time off when it comes to PSLE as I think that, for my daughter at least, me being around will add to her stress. My m-i-l is of the view that I should be around for all exams and moves like OCBCs' only go to strengthen the argument.

And with 3 children it's a lot of leave to use up just staying and home and boiling soup

And the fact that I did take 2 whole weeks of PSLE leave doesn't seem to have changed your mind about what you will do when your time comes eh (mother-in-law notwithstanding)?

To me, it's a non-issue completely. OCBC shouldn't get slammed because it concerns no one else but the company. Even if it did force people to take PSLE, so what? Indeed, banks force BLOCK leave on their staff. People are generally grateful for having to take leave without having to risk leave rejection. They can spend their PSLE leave on an overseas trip too.