With most districts choosing a hybrid model for school this fall, parents of younger pupils are scrambling to find child care coverage on the "virtual" days when they may have work but kids are home.
Child care providers are scrambling to find ways to meet the enormous need while following state guidelines that haven't always kept up with the changing COVID-19 world.
“School-aged care providers are certainly trying to figure out how to meet the needs of parents who would need care during those distance learning days, and there's lots of different ways that they're looking at doing that,” said Vicki Caramante, executive director of Child Care Resources of Rockland, a nonprofit that serves as the county's child care resource and referral agency.
Just like schools, child care providers across the region face concerns about safety, staffing, space and funding.
“For school-age programs that normally operate in a school building, the challenge is made that much tougher,” Caramante said.
In many districts, a provider like a local Y normally manages after-school care right on campus. But some programs are getting squeezed out of their usual space because schools need more room for instruction and more time to sanitize.
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That's the case for Polly Peace, executive director of the Country Childrens Center in northern Westchester. The center usually cares for about 300 children in their after-school program, with most kids staying at their school in the Katonah-Lewisboro and Bedford school districts.
“We don't have the ability to provide before- and after-care anymore in the schools, which is really devastating for us,” Peace said. “We've been in some schools since the '70s. So it's a big deal.”
Country Childrens Center also operates its own child care centers. Three of them are currently licensed to provide care to school-age children.
Peace said 20 school-age children can be accommodated in each building, and that if children are coming in every other day, capacity could double. It won't be near enough.
“We're going to do the best we can, but we will nowhere come close to fulfilling what parents need right now,” she said.
By the rules
Many providers want to find more space, and Peace said she hopes to find more space to add more slots. But any new facility would likely need to be reconfigured for safe learning and would need state approval. She hopes that licensing process could get done by September.
Licensing spaces for child care is a highly regulated process, Caramante of CCRR said, and is especially tough now.
“The New York State Office of Children and Family Services has been faced with some challenges in terms of their own staffing, so we are seeing that where a child care provider wants to have a new space licensed, that's taking a bit of time,” Caramante said.
She said she hopes Gov. Andrew Cuomo will issue executive orders to modify certain regulations and speed up licensing.
Monica Mahaffey, a spokesperson for OCFS, said the agency has worked with the governor's office and his Child Care Availability Task Force to address issues as they come up and provide regulatory flexibility.
"OCFS is aware of the challenges that hybrid learning models are creating for parents of school age children," Mahaffey said.
OCFS continues to explore ways to support changing child care needs, Mahaffey said, so families "can return to work with the peace of mind that their children have quality child care when they are not in school."
More than money
In Mount Vernon, the Youth Community Outreach Program provides after-school care for up to 75 children at the First United Methodist Church.
Y-COP director Henry Wilson said his phone has been buzzing with calls from parents who are looking for options in the fall because their children will only be in school part time. The district, so far, plans to have half of the student body attend in-person classes on Mondays and Tuesdays and half on Thursdays and Fridays.
It’s hard for Wilson to give parents a firm answer. He's waiting on two organizations that are not his own. “So not only are we trying to navigate the decisions of the school district, we're also trying to navigate the decisions of the church,” he said.
Wilson said the program would need more room, both to social distance and to have a separate area for remote learning. Staffing is as big a concern as space. Many of Y-COP’s after-school staff work in Mount Vernon schools and wouldn’t be available for a daytime program. Others aren’t comfortable returning to work.
There is a small possibility that Y-COP won’t be able to operate a program and will have to look at rebooting in 2021.
“These are the types of hard decisions that have to be made,” Wilson said. “They have to be made with the parent and the child in mind as a priority. If programs are concerned about revenue, then they're gonna miss the mark on providing a good service.”
But revenue remains a huge concern, especially after the hit many providers have taken the last few months.
“The economics of child care is very tough,” Caramante said. “Profit margins can be slim under normal circumstances, and the pandemic has certainly exacerbated that situation.”
Country Childrens Center cut capacity by about a third, reducing revenues.
“It's hard, financially,” Peace said. “I would say a lot of child care centers, including us, are just hanging on.”
New models
At the JCC of Rockland, which has operated after-school programs at several elementary schools in the Clarkstown and Nyack districts, this year's summer camp at its West Nyack campus inspired a new format.
"Parents in the carpool line would ask, 'will you have anything like this when school starts,'" JCC of Rockland COO Eliza Millman said.
The nonprofit has designed "All Day at the J." Kids can attend from 7:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. on their virtual learning days. They can't mix up days, though, because that would defeat the goal of limiting exposure to others.
So far, the JCC program can only accommodate children in Clarkstown schools because it follows that district's distance-learning calendar: an "A" group of students attends in-person school on Mondays and Wednesday; a "B" group of students attends in-person school Tuesdays and Thursdays; the groups alternate in-person attendance on Fridays.
Kids will have time to play and socialize, all with safety precautions like mask-wearing and social distancing, but there won't be supplemental instruction.
"We’re not teachers," Millman said. "We’ll help just like we help with homework help, provide outdoor play."
With space for 120 children each day, Millman said the JCC will be able to accommodate 240 children in kindergarten through fifth grade. Spaces are filling up fast, Millman said.
In the Nyack school district, Superintendent James Montesano said that many families want an alternative for their children on virtual learning days. Nyack plans to have two cohorts with every-other-day in-person attendance.
The district's administration building is housed in a former elementary school. Montesano said the district is looking at reconfiguring it for school-age care for students who are participating in virtual-learning days.
The Rockland YMCA, which operates after-school programs at two of the district's three elementary schools, could operate it, Montesano said. State licensing would be needed for the new site.
There's also the question of busing, and how many children would need transportation to the site.
Various cobbled-together plans will still likely fall short for many families, Millman said. She commutes daily to the JCC campus from New Jersey and has a high schooler and fifth-grader. The plan now, she said, is for her husband to work from home and watch the younger child.
It's workable, Millman said, but far from ideal.
JCC's in-person camp demonstrated what so many kids and parents alike missed during the spring when schools shuttered, Millman said. "They’ve had an amazing time," Millman said of the campers.
Millman anticipates that in-person child care on virtual learning days will provide youngsters the same experience.
"It’s like a big team out there," Millman said. "A team that stays safe."
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