Excerpts
Families in Vancouver looking for out-of-school care face years-long waitlists and stressful daily scrambles, according to a trustee who is hoping the board will take the first step towards a “big solution” at next week’s meeting.
...
The motion she is bringing to the April 20 meeting is admittedly modest. It asks for the board to allocate $50,000 to conduct a feasibility study for a pilot program that would see licensed child-care spaces set up at multiple schools, staffed wherever possible by existing board employees.
But the move comes after years of hearing from parents, mostly moms, about the heavy toll the struggle of trying to find safe, reliable and consistent child care is taking.
...
Last year, the province amended the Education Act in order to “remove barriers” to districts providing childcare on school grounds in order to increase the number of spaces available across B.C. allowing schools to access funding, enabling them to offer care to infants and toddlers, and making it possible for childcare to be delivered on non-school days are among the changes.
...
The relief that consistent school-based care would bring is something she thinks is almost impossible to quantify when trying to decide whether investing in the option is worthwhile.
“I understand how budgets work. But I think we have to think really carefully about what the societal cost is of having a large group of people, children, who are not able to be in reliable, secure care; and what it means for a very large number of people in society, parents, who are making very difficult decisions,” she said
“It’s just the right thing to do.”