Child Care Issues Facing Seattle Families

My two year old told me he is ready to go to preschool. As a M.Ed. in early childhood education, I'm not opposed to finding a quality, part-time ECE program for him to attend; but also due to my education and experience in the field of ECE, I also know some of the drawbacks too. I started looking into a preschool for him, knowing what I had in mind: starting in September, 2-3 days a week, 3-4 hours each day with a quality, developmentally appropriate curriculum.

Being new to the child care scene as a parent, and not very familiar with child care in Seattle, I started investigating. I was disappointed by what I found. There are at least 4 aspects of child care in Seattle that apply to my situation and do not meet the needs of our family. I may be unique, but I expect that there are other families who have similar wants for child care but are not able to find what they are looking for.

First, the majority of the child care centers I have looked into only provide full-time child care (7+ hours a day; 2,3 or 5 days a week). For my child, I am not interested in full-time child care. Instead I am looking for part-time education. I understand that the strong demand for early childhood education services is coming from families who rely on child care to be able to work. But what about the stay at home families who want supplementary educational services for their children? A parent could choose to pay for full-time care and follow a part-time schedule for their child's day but how many families, especially those who take the cut in pay for one parent to stay home, would choose that?

Many people have suggested parent co-ops to me. They have their own drawbacks that make them not useful for our needs. I would love to participate in the curriculum and planning of an ECE program; afterall, that's what I'm trained to do. But I will not participate at the expense of other children. In order to enroll my 2 year old in a preschool co-op, I would have to be willing to put my infant in another child care setting for the times I'm required to be present at the school. I'm not going to do that.

Another option is finding a family childcare home. I know that I'm not the first Seattle parent to discover that there is a surprising derth of family day care providers within the Seattle city limits. The reason for that is that operators of family day care home must own their home. They cannot be renting. With the average housing prices in the city, and the low amounts of pay that is generated by a family day care home, it is not a very good business proposition for those who are interested in becoming a family child care provider. Not only are renters kept from pursuing something that would contribute to their community, they are not allowed to do something that they might enjoy and might assist in supporting their families without having to find childcare for their own children. I could be counted among this group. I might consider starting a family child care out of my apartment, but it is prohibited by state law.

I also encountered child care centers that do not accept state child care subsidies for low income children, making child care less accessible for low-income families. These families are limited in their choices already, due to their lack of resources. Being excluded from upper-scale child care centers cannot help, especially if a low income parent is living in a pocket of the city were only upper-scale child care centers are available. I am surprised that child cares can opt out of accepting state subsidies because that appears to be discrimination based on income level. Is the city of Seattle really that elitist?

Because low-income families are effectively kept out of many childcare centers and they do have very limited access to family day care homes if they live in the city limits, another option available is exempt providers. This category of child care worker is defined as a family member, friend or neighbor who takes care of a child other than their own. Washington state law has a strange addendum to this: the exempt provider much take care of the child in the child's own home if the state is going to provide the family with a child-care subsidy. This is very different from California where exempt providers are able to receive child care subsidies when caring for another family's child in the provider's home. This is an indepensible option for many low-income families and only makes sense to make that option available to Washington families.

I look at these issues from a pragmatic, intellectual viewpoint; one that has been taught to view child care policies as impacting families across a spectrum of needs. If I were to assess these issues on a more personal level, I would say that the child care policies of the area make the decision for me: its best to stay at home with my child and provide educational preschool opportunities at home while interfacing with established informal playgroups around the city.