By Bibeka Shrestha
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A child sings to her toy at Yellow Brick Road |
Tammy Woods’ six weeks of maternity leave was up. She had to return to her job at Wal-Mart and, like many other parents, find child care for her newborn.
“I had trouble when he was first born,” she said, referring to a smiling 16-month-old son whose picture greets customers under her name tag. Woods asked co-workers for names of people who provided child care from their homes and made sure to meet the candidates before choosing just the right one.
“You have to see if you can trust them with your child,” she said. “It’s hard to find people for the overnight shift…not a lot of people do child care around here.”
Her experience echoes those of millions of parents in the United States who face the dilemma of obtaining high-quality child care for their young.
Families find themselves in a “dire situation” today, according to Leslie Cintron, an assistant sociology professor at Washington and Lee University.
Cintron said that people from all classes struggle to find high quality, affordable child care. It is hard for the working poor to find licensed care for the hours they work, which are likely to be outside of the normal 8.a.m. to 6 p.m. workday, Cintron said.
Meanwhile, members of the upper class face competition in getting high quality care for their children. “They even put unborn babies on waiting lists,” Cintron said.
“But the middle class is often squeezed the worst,” Cintron said. They do not have access to subsidies or scholarships set aside for lower-income families. The middle class spends a huge proportion of their income on child care, Cintron said. “They settle for whatever they can get.”
Licensed child care facilities don’t have it any easier. Yellow Brick Road, a non-profit child care center in Lexington, relies a great deal on the community’s support for its existence.
“We are heavily funded by the United Way,” said Pam Toney, the executive director of Yellow Brick Road. “If they don’t get enough money from the community, it decreases what they give to us.”
Stephanie Hodde, who directs The Montessori Center for Children in Lexington, said as a not-for-profit organization, they have to fundraise and look for grants. “Our tuition just covers our operating costs,” Hodde said.
The American child care industry faces more than its share of turnover of employees. “Caregivers are not making a good wage,” Cintron said. “They make so little that they can’t afford to send their own kids to the facility they work in.”
“The people who work here are professionals but they are not paid as such,” said Fay Campbell, who will soon take over as director of Yellow Brick Road.
Toney confirmed that child care professionals are not well paid but said that Yellow Brick Road has a very slight turnover. “We’re very fortunate,” Toney said.
Though the government has taken an initiative in supporting child care needs by providing early education programs like Head Start, Cintron said more should be done.
One such initiative, the Family Medical Leave Act, allows eligible employees 12 weeks off every year for the birth and care of a newborn child or for illness in the immediate family. The 12 weeks are unpaid, however. “Those who can afford it are few,” Cintron said.
Toney said the government should get more involved by helping child care facilities with funding and providing tax exemptions.
According to Cintron, the United States is an “outlier” among its peers. “Britain, Australia and Canada have much more support for families,” she said. Historically, most Americans’ benefits have originated in the private sector.
However, Cintron argued that this is actually a significant and public issue. “Our children matter…the circumstances in which they grow up matter,” she said. “We are all dealing with this issue.”
Toney said the community should also be more concerned about making child care available and affordable. “If nothing is available for parents, they won’t be able to work,” she said.
While institutions like Yellow Brick Road do provide need-based scholarships for low-income families, many of these families still rely on unlicensed child care.
“Family members are our biggest competitors,” Toney said. According to Cintron, children may need more than babysitters. “A lot of professional knowledge goes into how to properly take care of children,” Cintron said.
Though Campbell said most people grant that child care is important, their actions do not reflect that belief. “The community needs to put their money where their mouth is…if for no other reason, these are the people who will take care of us in the future.”
Produced by Washington and Lee journalism students.
Lead supervisor: Prof. Claudette Artwick
Reporting supervisor: Prof. Doug Cumming
Editing supervisor: Prof. Pamela Luecke
Technical supervisor: Michael Todd