Fury as School Is Calling Mom Over Dad in Emergencies Even Though He's WFH

A frustrated dad has turned to social media to vent about his daughter's schoolteachers refusing to call him in an emergency.

The Reddit post, titled "Our kids' school keeps calling my wife despite repeated requests that they call me first," has racked up 21,000 upvotes in less than 24 hours.

The dad of two, who goes by u/Tiberius_Jim, explained that his daughters are in second and fourth grade and sometimes need to be picked up before school ends.

"My wife works in the medical field and is often unable to answer her phone due to being with patients," he wrote. "I work from home and am pretty much reachable at every moment unless I'm on a call, but even then, I can call back right away."

A stock image shows a little girl holding her dad's hand at school. A frustrated dad has turned to social media for advice because his daughter's school won't call him first instead of her mother,... April Story/iStock/Getty Images Plus

Therefore, he and his wife decided to list him as the primary contact and his wife as the secondary one. But the school has not followed this.

"They have had to call us a few times this school year, and each time, they call my wife (leaving a message, because again, she can't answer most of the time), and then... they don't even call me at all."

He went on: "I only find out what's going on once my wife is able to check her phone and relay the message. The last time this happened, we reminded the school of the situation, and they told us that they usually just call the mother because 'the mom is usually the easiest to get hold of,' totally disregarding our repeated reminders of our situation and me being the primary contact person."

On Monday, the dad discovered through his wife that his youngest daughter got hurt during recess.

Newsweek reached out to a parenting expert to discuss why society still considers mothers as the primary caregivers.

Chioma Fanawopo, who is based in London, said: "It's time to rethink societal norms that automatically place mothers as the primary caregivers, even when fathers may be better positioned to step in during emergencies.

"Some dads work closer to home, have more flexible schedules or are simply the first available, yet schools and others often default to calling the mom first," she said.

Fanawopo encourages people to challenge these "outdated assumptions" and share caregiving responsibilities more equally.

"It's not about replacing one parent with the other but about recognizing both as capable and available caregivers. Change starts with us," she told Newsweek.

Reddit Reacts

So far, the post has received over 800 comments, many of which offer advice.

The top comment, which has 12,000 upvotes, says: "Start a written email chain stating what happened, at what date and time, whom you spoke to. Point out that the school's in-practice policy is to only call a female parent, and not a male parent, despite specific instructions to the contrary. State how the school's practice of differential sex-based interaction with parents has harmed / affected your child. You get the idea."

Another user wrote: "Get stern with the school management, calling the mom by default is ridiculousness when you have a literal directive in the file for 1st and 2nd contacts on the priority list. Also, what if a student has 2 moms? What's their magic formula there?"

A third commenter said: "I would ask them for this sexist policy in writing. It's time to get a meeting with the principal before something serious happens and your kid is left waiting somewhere."

Newsweek reached out to u//Tiberius_Jim for comment and could not verify the details of the case.

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