Okay you sucked me in with #5. Here I go. This is what the article states and my response will be in between the lines. For the time being, I'll accept the statistics that are used below since I haven't researched prior.
5. Invest in affordable, high-quality child care and early childhood education
Each day, 11 million children spend time in the care of someone other than a parent. Among children under age 6, 65 percent either live with only a single parent who works or two parents who both work. For parents of young children, particularly those who are low-income, the lack of affordable, high-quality early childhood programs can prevent working parents from ensuring that their families are cared for while they fulfill the demands of their jobs and can inhibit their long-term success.
We already have affordable child care and early education in this country. We've already invested in it. What more should we be doing? Be specific. And I make that request already knowing that you (and whomever wrote these initiatives) aren't prepared to meet it.
Give me any state and I'll show you their programs for affordable child care.
Furthermore, child care costed more than median rent in every state in 2012, yet access to reliable child care is a requirement for working parents to maintain employment.
No question about it. Infant care in particular comes with a huge price tag. There's a reason for that. A solid reason for that, that these types of articles fail to address. And yet, as I stated above, there are state and federal programs that provide assistance to parents seeking affordable quality care and education for young children.
Legislation such as the proposed Strong Start for America’s Children Act invests in high-quality and sustainable early learning environments for young children, working families, and the future of our country. Investing in affordable, high-quality child care creates long-lasting structures that support both working parents and children, increasing women’s ability to keep a job, excel in the workforce, and lower the gender wage gap.
I've been looking at such proposals for a good thirty years now. Going back into the 80's (yep, I can) early childhood education primarily involved part-day educational programs for young children and their parents. Yes, we educate parents as well. That's where I entered the scene.
What we think of today as child care or day care centers, didn't start to grow until the late 80's and early 90's and that coincided with an influx of mothers re-entering the work force. That is NOT to say that child care programs or family child care didn't exist until that time. What I am saying is that the field grew exponentially during that time period and for the first time we began to see day care facilities spring up around the nation until today when the for profit chains have become, more often than not, the visible norm vs the non-profit programs that dominated the field even 20 years ago.
What the article is missing and probably every article I ever read is missing are the following:
1. We already have state and federally funded quality programs. Pick a state and I'll show you what they have to make child care affordable to parents. Better yet, if you're serious about the topic, do your own homework. Get on your state's department of human or social or family services. The tuition assistance program isn't difficult to find.
2. We want higher quality programs and yet the article (like most all articles of this nature) fails to define just what "quality" is. We know we want it. We just don't know what it is.
3. If we want higher quality programs that in turn means that we want quality staffing and THAT'S where the problem as I see it, truly lies. Back in the 90's the NAEYC (National Association for the Education of Young Children--largest organization of ECP's in the country that sets the standard for quality in the nation and accreditation for programs--though it's not the only game in town) announced it's Worthy Wage Campaign in order to promote living wages for early childhood educators such as myself.
A worth living wage never happened.
Unless one is in an adminstrative position, teachers and TA's (many of whom are degree holding candidates or at least meet their state's requirements) do NOT make a living wage. This is why there is a high turnover rate in the field and the only reason that someone like myself could stay in the field for so long was because I didn't need the income to start with though I did earn a healthy income as admin for a period of years--never accept a salaried position.
Anecdotally, at my last (state owned) program exactly NO single unmarried lead teachers (male or female) or TA's were living on their own because they made crap money.
And yet, some years back (without ever achieving the goal of providing a living wage) the NAEYC in it's infinite wisdom (sarcasm) published new quality standards with a proposal that all ECE teachers in a lead position, must hold a Bachelor's degree by 2020.
And yes, my state does have some forms of tuition assistance for professional development so that teachers can earn their degrees.
But listen to what I am telling you now. Let's say you're a single lead teacher who has been informed that you need to meet the new criteria. You have earned whatever credential you needed in order to meet state standards to teach in a lead position, likely working full time and going to school either part or full time, you aren't making a living wage--and now you have to go back to school while fufilling the responsibilities of a lead teaching position (this work is all consuming trust me on that) when you can barely afford to gas up your car and put clothes on your back that don't come from Goodwill because you're making crap money and state funded tuition assistance doesn't pay for books at 300$+ a whack--so you are NEVER going to dig yourself out of the financial hole you're in, you're never going to be able to afford to move out of your parent's home and so...you walk on it.
We have a primarily female dominated workforce, most of whom are highly dedicated to and well suited for their work, who are not making anything close to a living wage, and who are reading proposals such as this article contains demanding more affordable child care and education and not one of these articles gives a rock solid damn that the field itself is demanding that you further your education and while you have a strong desire to do so you know that money for funding to increase the quality of programs and environments (when these articles are written by people who don't know how to define it) isn't going to fall out of the sky, it sure as hell isn't going to fly into YOUR pockets because the folks demanding higher quality have forgotten about the very people who devotedly facilitate those programs--you.
These calls for "higher quality" are BS. I can provide a high quality learning environment and program on a shoe string budget and I
have. Give me some square footage, a reasonable start up budget, give me some time to scrounge, and I'll light it up like a Christmas tree and show you what I can do with very little money. It doesn't take tons of state or federal dollars to raise the quality of a program. What it takes is for this I want, I want, I want, society--to develop a healthy respect for the children and the adults who teach and care for young children and provide
incentives for those adults to stay in the field.
Because quality doesn't come from purchasing new classroom furniture, colorful plastic crap or technology. Quality comes straight from the motivated hearts and heads of our early childhood professionals.
And we fail miserably in compensating them for the outstanding service contribution they provide to our children and families. So they become demoralized and
they walk.