Hey Student Parents: Lets Cut the Waiting List!
by: Aysha Alkusayer
Enrolling a child in PSUs Childrens Center or The Helen Gordon Child Development Center can now take up to three years. And any parents who have looked over their options know that the cost for putting children in a decent childcare center outside of PSU can range from $600-$1000 a month for full time enrollment, while full time care at PSU costs almost half of that.
PSU has a capacity of almost 25,000 students. The centers, on the other hand, have a capacity of only 300 children. And with a ratio of accepting only 10 new infants and 10 new toddlers in The Child Center, what should parenting students do as they struggle to survive, financially and academically, at PSU?
The Helen Gordon Center has existed for 30 years. The Childrens Center is much younger. It started nine years ago, and Kim Allen, the Director of TCC, says it was the result of parents getting together and saying, we need more space!
Theres also the option of trying to contact St James Child Development Center, which is located very near PSU in order to help by lending the school some of their space, Advises Mrs. Allen. But I dont know. It is up to concerned parents to find out the possibility and to contact student governments for their views.
Courtney Morse, the Student Body President, believes that the issue concerns both PSU and state legislators. As for PSU, she says that student fees allocate money to both HG and TCC, and that the childcare centers should propose a funding increase accompanied by a well-researched study documenting its necessity.
Students can also help by engaging dialogue with HG and TCC to seek other options through which their funding can be increased.
The state legislators, on the other hand, are those who decide how much state funding can be given to childcare in schools.
Unfortunately, says Morse, nobody is really searching how many parenting students there are in the states.
April Chastain, a graduate student in the Urban Planning program, has had her child on the waitlist for a year now, and was told that she is number 45. She worries that even by next year she may not make it.
After we stir some awareness of the problem, says April, a grad or PhD student could use it for a project to help come up with some solutions. I don't really know if it's appropriate or not, but maybe someone in the community development part of Urban Planning could take it on as a project. I know that grad students do a lot of projects and it seems to me that having adequate childcare is a necessary part of a community.
Sadly, until the problems of space, good planning and sufficient staffing are addressed, students children will languish on the waiting list and often never make it into PSU supported childcare centers.
And as parents are the number one party affected, it really is up to them to stand up and demand their right for equal chances at PSUs childcare centers. Whether they choose to start a publicity campaign, run for student office or seek funding themselves, ultimately the fight is theirs, and the time has come for them to act.