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American Morning
In Ridgewood, New Jersey, Community Has Scheduled 'Family Night'
Aired March 26, 2002 - 08:50 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: Family time often gets lost in the shuffle between school, and homework, and sports, and music lessons and dance class. You get the busy picture. Well, in Ridgewood, New Jersey, they're doing something about it. Tonight, the community has formally scheduled "Family Night," where parents and kids are supposed to do absolutely nothing, but enjoy each other's company.
The idea was the brainchild of Marcia Mara, and she joins us this morning from Ridgewood with her daughter Caroline. Also with her Jenny and her son Peter.
Good morning.
Thanks for doing something today. We appreciate your spending some time with us.
So, Marcia, what is it you and your family will be doing tonight on this family night?
MARCIA MARRA, PARENT OF RIDGEWOOD STUDENT: My kids just wanted to make a family dinner. We're going to try get some recipes out and cook together, and then we'll see what happens after that.
ZAHN: You have three kids.
MARRA: No pressure, that's the idea. I have three kids.
ZAHN: No pressure sounds like a good idea to me.
You have three kids. How different will tonight be from an ordinary night around your house?
MARRA: Well, even as busy as families are in Ridgewood, we still do have some time to be families and have dinners but what's special about tonight is everybody's doing it tonight together. And we won't have to be rushing out to drop someone off at 6:00 somewhere and pick someone else up at 7:30. We'll all be home with nowhere to run to.
ZAHN: And, Jenny, I know the theme of tonight is "ready, set, relax." How much madness do you have in your normal day-to-day life with your three kids?
JENNY BREINING, PARENT OF RIDGEWOOD STUDENT: I think I have the typical amount of madness that everybody, not just in Ridgewood, but in most of the country has, rushing around to get the kids to various sports activities, extracurricular things. Myself, I have meetings at night sometimes through volunteer work. It's hard to get together and all eat at once or all be able to continue to stay at the table together without somebody having to rush up and drive somebody somewhere and pick up somebody, or -- you know, it's pretty typical I think of everybody in this country.
ZAHN: Marcia, is there a certain irony in the fact it took almost six months and 18 people to designate tonight family night in Ridgewood?
MARRA: Well, there's an irony to it. But one of the reasons it took so long was we wanted to be sure we had all the support of the schools, and the sports council and the religious leaders before we set the date. We weren't sure if anybody would be interested in doing this at all. So we went out and met with people and everyone said yes, this sounds good. Let's give it a try.
ZAHN: So, Caroline, are you relieved that you're not going to have to do homework tonight, because I your school has agreed not to assign homework, no music lessons, no doctor's appointments, no nothing, except family time.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, I am relieved that I don't have homework.
ZAHN: And what do you plan to do tonight, help mom in the kitchen?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Yes, and I don't normally cook, so that's kind of different for me.
ZAHN: What about you, Peter? What do you plan to do tonight?
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Well, normally I'd be going to lacrosse, but I think I'm probably just going to hang out, have dinner with my family, and, you know, have fun.
ZAHN: Well, I think it's a wonderful idea. I know, Marcia, there are a number of communities across the country that are assessing the workload of these kids. I think we all have the frustration of thinking our kids are overprogrammed no matter how resistant we are to structure. What are you hoping will be the long- term impact of tonight?
MARRA: Well, what we hoped on our committee was to get our town talking about this. We know that a lot of parents think they're the only ones feeling overwhelmed. And we wanted to be sure that we came together as a community and shared ideas. So what we hope is to raise awareness about the impact of overscheduling, and then see what the community wants to do, and move forward from there.
ZAHN: Jenny, I think you guys have come up with a great idea. How about making this a national night? BREINING: That sounds wonderful to me. We'd like to see it happen certainly more than once a year. We hope we can get it on the schedule a little earlier next year here in Ridgewood, so we can maybe have two or three of these. Nationally? That would be great. It's something everybody needs.
ZAHN: We hope you have a night completely free of chaos in all your homes in Ridgewood, New Jersey. Thank you all for joining us for a chunk of time here this morning. Appreciate it.
MARRA: Thank you.
BREINING: Thank you.
ZAHN: Good luck, Caroline and Peter. Happy no homework tonight.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Thanks.
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