The “Child Care for All: Eliminating Child Care Deserts” webinar offered great insights. For example, Dionne Dobbins noted the importance of needs assessments to identify the locations that need child care and the type of care – after school, before school, not traditional hours. She added that real-time data about the open child care slots were crucial to helping parents find child care.
Lakesha Petty added that Alabama now allows parents to check-in their children electronically. Both Dionne and Lakesha agreed that better data about the need for and availability of child care is necessary. You can watch a recording of the webinar here.
Child care was also the topic of an interview with a reporter from Agence France Presse. It was an opportunity to share key takeaways from the webinar, share our analysis from the Household Pulse Survey, and to remind him of what Fatima Gross Graves, president and CEO of the National Women’s Law Center, pointed out – school closures made this economic downturn different from others.
I pointed out to the reporter that K-12 public/private education is not considered “child care,” nor are they in the same industries. So the discussion about the number of women who have left the labor force due to child care has conflated what we traditionally think about as child care, care for children under 5, with the service schools systems provide.
Do you consider the public/private school systems part of the child care industry?
As I age, my appreciation for those who have provided care and guidance has changed. Namely, I appreciate how their advice, mentoring, and expectations have shaped who I am today. On August 1 (Monday), we will kick off our annual WISER Women Campaign, which celebrates women who have been influential in your life. The campaign will last the month of August. This year, I’ll be celebrating women 30 and younger who have been influential in my life.
I hope you’ll donate.
