By Corrine Hendrickson
GCCCN Secretary
This week, May 2-6, is Teacher Appreciation Week and the Green County Child Care Network (GCCCN) would like to recognize and thank the teachers who care for and educate their students from the day they are enrolled in early care and education (as early as 2 weeks because there we are one of only seven countries in the world with zero guaranteed paid family medical leave) through the college years.
It may seem odd to include the words “care for” when talking about what teachers do, but humans of all ages need positive relationships to feel safe and trust others. When you don’t feel safe, your brain is in flight, fight, or freeze mode, and it cannot make the necessary connections to take in information and process it-a requirement for learning.
As we are learning more about Adverse Childhood Experiences (examples are poverty, abuse, malnutrition, and homelessness) and ameliorating the effects, we are learning that it only takes one caring adult relationship to start repairing the damage. For young children, this is frequently a child’s teacher since children spend multiple hours per day with that person.
Currently, early childhood education programs have extremely high turnover (40% per year) and even the K-12 system has seen an exodus of teachers over the last few years. This high rate of turnover is impacting the quality of education. The lack of respect and nonprofessional treatment of educators at all levels is a significant contributing factor.
Turnover is especially high in child care because of the low wages and lack of benefits. Average wage is $10.66, $7.42 for family child care, an hour-bottom 4% of all jobs. This, in turn, affects children’s ability to thrive. The reason wages are low is because child care businesses cannot charge the true cost of care and remain affordable for working parents. Parents already pay 13-24% of income per child — 7% is the affordable amount calculated by economists. Green County average monthly tuition at family child care programs is $675 for infants and $913 for group centers.
However, Department and Children and Families has calculated the true cost at $1,800 a month. The approximate $1,000 loss comes out of wages since the high cost of food, insurance, building, utilities, taxes, vehicles, and maintenance gets prioritized before wages are calculated.
In conclusion, this year, we are asking you to reflect on the teachers you, or your children, have had and how they impacted the trajectory of your life and take a few minutes to write or call your elected representatives, share that story, and ask them to invest in child care, k-12, and secondary schools so that we have thriving communities for everyone.
An opportunity to do this in person will be Monday, May 9. A Day Without Child Care event is being held in New Glarus Village Park Gazebo from 8-10:30 a.m. Child care educators, parents, other business owners, elected representatives, and community members will talk about the vital importance of investment in early childhood education/child care. Everyone is welcome to attend and there will be opportunities for attendees to share their stories as well.
