By Luke Diamond
Ed Hegemann is still following his normal morning routine.
The only difference is that now, when says goodbye to his family of seven, he looks for a quiet place to work from within the noise of his home instead of the silence of his office near Utah State University’s campus.
For parents across the nation facing a "new normal" during the coronavirus pandemic, working from home can be a challenge. For parents in the state with the highest number of children, however, there are unique challenges — and opportunities.
“It sounded impossible to work from home,” said Hegemann, the director of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ Logan Institute of Religion. “I got interrupted so many times in Zoom meetings by my kids asking me if they could jump on the tramp or watch a movie. But now that I’ve found a quiet place, I get a lot done.”
For many parents, finding a secluded space to work from has been crucial to their productivity. But for parents with larger families, finding a quiet place to work from has led them to different parts of their homes that are not meant to be converted into offices.
“It certainly has been different,” said Chad Simon, a professor at Utah State University and a father of six. “What I do is I go down into one of my children’s empty bedrooms and I pull out my laptop and I can be kind of sequestered.”
Other parents work a tag-team system of passing children between each other when they are occupied.
“It’s been stressful with the kids,” said Nate Farnsworth, while shoeing one of his four children from his room and being asked to speak quieter by his wife. “I have to try to tell them that even though I’m here, I am not the one to ask if they can watch a movie or play on the iPad. They can go to Mom.”
Regardless of the distractions present in a large family, many families are enjoying more time together at home.
“With all five kids home, we are at our fill capacity,” Hillary Campbell said. “But it is a beautiful mess.”
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