| From: Silvia Stein | Posted on: 2006-11-10 |
| My stoic patience was stressed by WSU student and staff mothers who did not have the routine pregnancy and childcare assistance and leave time so normal in civilized nations like Ireland, Canada, and Germany. In Italy and other southern nations there is an extended family network to assist - but not so in the US model. I hope WSU can be part of a trend to standardize efficient federal and state as well as private systems protecting not only parents and children - but their friends too from insufficient institutional services that bring the whole community down. | |
| From: Silvia Stein | Posted on: 2006-11-10 |
| My stoic patience was stressed by WSU student and staff mothers who did not have the routine pregnancy and childcare assistance and leave time so normal in civilized nations like Ireland, Canada, and Germany. In Italy and other southern nations there is an extended family network to assist - but not so in the US model. I hope WSU can be part of a trend to standardize efficient federal and state as well as private systems protecting not only parents and children - but their friends too from insufficient institutional services that bring the whole community down. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-05-23 |
| When WSU recruited my wife, they showed her the excellent \"on-site\" child care facilities. After we arrived, we got on the waiting list and paid the waiting list fee. During the interim, we found excellent care at Building Blocks Child Care Center. About one year later the WSU STUDENT child care center called us and told us they still did not have a spot for us.
It seem WSU should really describe the on campus facility as a student child care facility. While the WSU child care facility says they are funded mostly by ASWSU, they do not account for the subsidy the university provides such as facilities, improvements and utilities. Not to mention the funding for the full time staff. | |
| From: April Seehafer | Posted on: 2006-05-23 |
| After it took 18 months for my son to get a spot at the WSU Children\'s Center I learned my lesson. When I took the at home pregnancy test with our second child the first phone call I made was not to my family, not to my best friend, not to my OB/GYN\'s office; it was to the Children\'s Center to get the baby on the waiting list.
Even with over one year of lead time (pregnancy+maternity leave) and sibling priority, we had to juggle schedules and beg an in-home care provider (who was trying to close her business to accept a position at the university) for 6 weeks of care before our daughter\'s spot opened up at the Children\'s Center. I was working half time when my children started at the Children\'s Center--it was pretty amazing to have that choice since most child care centers in Pullman don\'t let you have that option or require that you pay the full-time rate. Unfortunately, with two kids in daycare my entire paycheck was going to pay for their care. We made a decision as a family that I would to return to full time work and in December of 2004 I was offered a full time job. However, due to space, the Children\'s Center couldn\'t accommodate my request for full time care until the following May. Luckily my employer was willing to have me work on a half time basis for those 6 months otherwise I would not have been able to accept the position. To put it simply, day care rules our lives at the moment. Everything from our job choices and our daily calendar, to our finances (we pay more each month in daycare than we do on our mortgage) and our vacation schedules. We were prepared for sacrifices and difficult choices when we decided to have children, however, we certainly didn’t realize that finding high quality care (we’ve already given up on the hope that the care be both high quality and affordable) would be such a driving force in our lives. | |
| From: Anna Enger | Posted on: 2006-05-21 |
| When my spouse and I had our first child I sought to place our unborn daughter at WSUCC. A position became available when she was eleven months old. We spent a vast amount of time trying to juggle schedules so that I could return to work. My work did not revolve around the University or it\'s scheduled Holidays. I gave up my SRC membership because I found I never could get in at a conveniant time to take a class and have my childcare needs met. Eventually, I became the \"traditional\" stay at home parent after the birth of our second daughter. I wonder how often women fill this expectation because of societal pressure and a lack of safe and adequate childcare. The bookie conversion is an excellent idea. I believe the old PMH building could have also met the criteria of safer parking access and a visible location for a \"world class\" facility. We have forgone several years of my earning potential in order for my spouse to have fewer childcare difficulties interrupting his work environment. However, that isn\'t an option for all families and hasn\'t necessarily been the option I would have chosen, if I would have had less conflict with the number of closed/holiday/training days that the Center has I would probably have kept working in my profession. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-05-15 |
| Although I am long past the age of needing infant/childcare services, I have been in the workforce long enough to have seen the needs of working parents not improving significantly in this area. I noted the \'message\' from the working parents who have made a decision regarding employment in another community based on the availability of subsidized daycare provided by their employer. Washington State University is long overdue in moving into the 21st Century in this arena of \"Need\"! \"World Class....\" needs to be removed from all of the advertisements until this lack of adequate infant and childcare services has been provided. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-05-01 |
| My husband and I have been waiting to have children, now that we\'re getting closer to becoming parents, we\'ve been looking into daycare costs. I called and emailed around town and to wsu and there are hardly any daycares with spots open, especially for infants. We cannot afford to allow one of us to stay home and not work, but if there are no child care facilities out there, we will be forced to... and I don\'t want to leave my job. | |
| From: Peg Collins | Posted on: 2006-04-28 |
| I have two children who are now in middle and high school and are old enough to be beyond childcare age. When they were young it was very difficult to find adequate child care in Pullman. My son is now 16 so things have not changed at all in at the last 16 years. When I became pregnant and looked for infant spots, the first place I looked was at the WSU child care center (even smaller and with fewer spots in those days). I was told it was just for students and not to even bother putting my name on any list. I worked for months before I was finally able to secure a spot for my infant son in a family day care. Even though this is no longer a problem for me personally, I see it as a big problem for the WSU community. If we want to attract faculty and staff to take jobs at this University this issue must be addressed. I am happy to see this new effort by the child care committee. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-04-27 |
| When my husband and I moved from Ohio five years ago, we had two pre-school aged boys. Finding day care from afar was hard enough, but finding room for two boys in the same day care was even more difficult, and they were 2 and 3, not infants. Sheer luck brought us to an off-campus day care facility with enough space for both boys, and we have had a positive experience there during our stay in Pullman, including getting a spot for our newest child, a girl, because we already had two children in the same center. The down side? We have paid no less than $14,000 per year since our arrival for care for our children. That is 25% of our combined yearly salaries. Do the math. Since our arrival in Pullman, we have paid more than $55,000 for day care, and every year costs for care go up, while our salaries remain the same. This has prevented us from purchasing a home and making long-term connections with the Pullman community. Needless to say, we are looking to move on and the most appealing offer we have received, and thus the one we have accepted, has (you guessed it) on-site, subsidized day care for employees with children under the age of five (available from 6am to 7pm, no less!), and after school options for parents with school-aged children, also subsidized. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-04-27 |
| Both my husband and I are WSU employees. I registered my daughter to WSU daycare months before she was born and didn\'t get in till she was 14 months. Looking for a daycare in Pullman was a very frustrating experience and the only thing you could get was disappointment. Hope the situation can be improved through our efforts. Children and childcare are such important parts of our life. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-04-27 |
| Both my husband and I are WSU employees. I registered my daughter to WSU daycare months before she was born and didn\'t get in till she was 14 months. Looking for a daycare in Pullman was a very frustrating experience and the only thing you could get was disappointment. Hope the situation can be improved through our efforts. Children and childcare are such important parts of our life. | |
| From: Susan Bentjen | Posted on: 2006-04-27 |
| I had my first child after years of fertility treatments almost 8 years ago. Since I knew I was pregnant at 2 weeks due to the extensive medical intervention I immediately applied to the WSU Childcare Center. I finally managed to get in when my son was several months old, although then as now the prices for the few faculty and staff slots were extremely high in order to subsidize the student slots. If it were not for the support of my supervisor (I worked at a grant supported project associate) who allowed me to bring my son in while I tried to find him a place, my family would not have been able to make it since I made more than 60% of our combined salary. Now that my son is in afterschool care, there is no shortage of available licensed providers for which I am thankful. In fact, the after school programs in Pullman are the only ones not usually completely full with waiting lists. This is due to the fact that most student parents have younger kids, not school aged.
I was blessed with a surprise pregnant last spring. Not finding out I was pregnant until nearly 8 weeks along, I quickly tried to find an infant slot I knew I would need. There were waiting lists at every licensed provider in Pullman where I live. Finally someone I know said she would talk with her licensed in home provider to see if she would be willing to take an infant. I am very lucky, my provider was planning to drop her infant progam and just take toddlers and up until I pleaded with her for my soon to be born baby. I am so lucky that she is a wonderful woman that my daughter just adores. I did have to take two more weeks of maternity leave (thus completely depleting my vacation and sick time) in order for the provider to accomodate her. So now I pay about 25% of my take home pay just for my daughter and my son\'s after school program eats up another 10%. I have to drive to two different parts of town everyday after I work until 5pm and get both of them picked up by 5:30pm (when their care places close). Next week, during finals, my infant care provider will not be operating three days that week due to the fact that she has sold her house and is moving to another and needs to get the licenser out to re-certify her. I am out of vacation and sick leave and now I have a different A/P position and cannot bring my daughter to work. My nearest relatives live thousands of miles away and all our friends are also working parents. So, do I take leave without pay in order to care for my child? Do I work at night next week and split shifts with my husband and go without sleep? It seems like the university cares more about the student parents than the faculty and staff ones. Yet without us, the university simply would not run at all. | |
| From: Kathy Cross | Posted on: 2006-04-27 |
| My own children are beyond the need for childcare, but as I raised them here the lack of available options startled me. A few years ago, my oldest child moved back into my home with my (then) infant grandchild, and we faced the same struggles all over again -- but multiplied by the fact that we sought care for an infant. My daughter had to postpone her education at WSU because of lack of adequate childcare. After my grandchild\'s first birthday, we found a home daycare provider that was willing to take her. She is now four years old and in preschool, but the path to get there has been a constant struggle. The most astounding part of this whole process is that parents are faced with situations where there are no options. This can cause parents to settle for ANY childcare that is available rather than what is best for their children. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-04-26 |
| As a WSU employee with children, I have actually sought daycare other places. I have been very blessed with the home daycare that I have. Having said that I am very aware of how difficult it is to find care in Pullman, and somewhat affordable care as well. It is absolutely astounding to me that a friend of mine pays about $1400.00 per month for two children and she has an average staff support position on campus ($26,000 to $30,00 per year). As a side note while we are talking about child care, we could talk about the fact that all preschool\'s in Pullman including the one at WSU have hours that are geared towards stay at home parents. I work 8:00 to 5:00 how am I suppose to get my 3 year old to preschool at 9:20 then come back two hours later to pick her up? Could the WSU child care facility take the preschool kids for an hour and a half in the morning? | |
| From: Tania Swanger | Posted on: 2006-04-26 |
| My children are now old enough to \"take care of themselves\" (I think, ages 14 & 16 are \"old enough\"? just kidding!) but I well remember the days of having to call in to work because my provider was sick! I can\'t say that I had the BEST childcare, but it was what I could afford (being young and just starting my career) and I felt relatively comfortable leaving them at the facility/providers home. However, it ALWAYS weighed on me that I was leaving my children at such a young age. I was fortunate enough to get them into a very good pre-school at age 4 and finally felt comfortable leaving them. I CAN NOT imagine having to do this in this day and age. The cost of childcare (although, how can you really put a price tag on it) has skyrocketed since my kids were in daycare and I simply couldnt afford it now. THERE IS A DEFINATE NEED for QUALITY childcare in this area and I very much sympathize with those that are in the situation. Good luck and you have my support in this endeavor! | |
| From: Kate Painter | Posted on: 2006-04-26 |
| My fears of leaving an infant with caregivers in a private home were borne out when I arrived earlier than anticipated, to find the child left crying in a crib while the caregivers watched TV in another room. The caregivers didn\'t speak English so it was difficult to communicate with them. They left our baby in her outdoor clothing and covered her with more blankets in a crib. When we decided after two days that we weren\'t comfortable using their daycare, they tried to keep our baby monitor and they did keep our $300 deposit. When you don\'t know anyone well enough to leave your child with them, a WSU center or something equally credible is the only place you want to consider leaving your children.
When we had our second child, the could not afford the expense of two children in WSU daycare. As a post-doc I was considered faculty. I simply couldn\'t afford to work at WSU and have two children in the daycare there, yet I felt uncomfortable leaving them anywhere else. I left the job market for several years. | |
| From: Caryn Lawton | Posted on: 2006-04-26 |
| I have two children, both born while I was employed at WSU. Although I worked only part time until my youngest was in first grade, my salary was absolutely necessary for our family, as is often the case. Yet we were fortunate. We had a great childcare situation with a private, licensed, home caregiver a few blocks away from our home and my kids\' school, and we never had to change providers. She became their second mom--another person who adored them, and her children are still like older siblings to mine. As my children grew, they walked to her home after school. Now my husband works mostly from home, so he is there when my kids come home, and we only need childcare in the summer. I have found my supervisors at WSU to be very supportive of me as a parent. For example, I have a late starting and ending time so I can get my kids off to school in the morning. I have appreciated the support greatly, and I try to give back even more. Although I have not experienced the childcare stresses expressed by others, I still recognize the need, and strongly support an additional campus childcare facility at WSU. Housing prices have skyrocketed, making it extremely difficult to support a family on one income. Pullman\'s population is growing, thus creating a strain on childcare openings. Additionally, state law regarding caregiver to child ratio makes it more profitable to care for children over age 3, so oftentimes providers opt not to accept infants. I believe that flexible schedules (when possible) and providing easy access to childcare will pay off greatly for all involved, including the university. Based on news articles I have read, this has proven to be the case for many businesses. | |
| From: Alaina M | Posted on: 2006-04-26 |
| I am an AP Staff member and was blessed with twins last year. When I found out I was pregnant I checked the ‘waiting lists’ at several of the larger daycares in the area (including WSU), the waiting lists for one infant were long & for two – impossible! I did find several ‘in-home’ and small daycares that had openings, but like the larger centers none of them had space for two infants. Finally a relative volunteered to take care of my infants. Last month I moved them to an in-home daycare, which is working well, and the caregiver is a godsend, but I was hoping to have the children closer to where I work, and in Early Childhood Education type care.
While I want the best for my children, cost is also an issue. With two infants, and an unexpected third one on the way, the cost at the WSU Childcare center would take nearly 75% of my gross monthly salary. I hope that not only the need for more daycare will be seriously addressed, but the cost as well. | |
| From: Gleyn Bledsoe | Posted on: 2006-04-25 |
| As a resident of Pullman and former faculty member at WSU, I have seen the results of the lack of appropriate day care in Pullman. In particular, the lack of day care adversely affects faculty, staff and students alike, particularly single parents. The end result is often the production of a number of latchkey kids, in many cases far too young to be on their own; or the often severe restriction in the activites of their parent(s) which in turn, affects everything from job performance to grades and even acquiring the maximum benefit from college education.
Quite frankly, there is no excuse for WSU not to have an active day care system that fills the need of WSU\'s \"family\". | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-04-20 |
| My children are grown and gone from home. However, they were raised during the earlier years of my work at WSU. I would have paid almost any amount of money to have had child care for them during those years. There wasn\'t anything that could help me balance my responsibilities as a parent and being a WSU employee. Over the years I have had at least 8 WSU staff working for me that either had babies during their tenure in my office or had very small children. These mothers and fathers had horrible experiences trying to make sure that their children were being taken care of and they as parents felt they were being negligent. This not only causes disruption of the employees\' work and state of mind, but it ends up being very counter productive for the unit. Under very special, temporary circumstances the office has allowed the mother/father to bring the baby or young child to work if they weren\'t too disruptive. The majority of the time it was because there wasn\'t any care available for infants and they were on the waiting list, or the private day care had decided to take the week off, etc. | |
| From: Roger Crawford | Posted on: 2006-04-20 |
| What a great use for the Bookie building: WSU Child Care North. Walking distance to the central campus, multiple floors, water, sewer, power, etc. Convenient to the Northside dining area, so parents could see our children and grab lunch.
The parking lot in front could be converted to a drive through pick up/drop off area. Or better yet (Roger\'s crazy day dream), we create a new pedestrian area all around the Bookstore and Northside dining area. Specifically: - convert the parking lot on the east corner of Colorado and Thatuna into a bus stop and drop the bus stops in front of the Bookie; - convert the parking lot on the west corner of Colorado and Thatuna into a sitting/eating/play area serving the Northside Center and Child Care North. However this would require an executive decision. And here we are creating a petition just to get some attention to the lack of day care. The likelihood of our executive branch catapulting themselves beyond that and into the enhancement of the entire academy setting is... <hesitating>... really small. | |
| From: Susan Seaman | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| My three children are currently university students. When they were preschoolers, and I was teaching full-time, quality childcare was difficult to find and a significant issue. When it was lacking, my mind could not fully concentrate on the work at hand.
Providing WSU employees wih the opportunity to access quality preschool care for their children will tangibly demonstrate a valuing of and commitment to employees, will result in their peace of mind and enhanced proiductivity, and will be a lifelong benefit to their children. | |
| From: Rob Ronald | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| When our daughter was born she was nursed until 15 months. This would never have worked, except that I was able to support her mother on my grants, she is also a fine chemist, and convert part of my office into a nursery so mother and child were in constant contact. In a sense Isabela grew up in the lab. Later we put her in Building Blocks daycare center, but this was only possible by her mother working only part-time in the lab so that she could spend adequate time raising Isabela. If my wife had been on a tenure track, or had had to work fulltime for economic reasons none of this would have been possible. | |
| From: Richard Nelson | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| As a graduate student, I had to have access to day care after my daughter was born. Fortunately, I was able to get her in WSU childcare after a 6 month wait.
Being my first child, I had not considered this problem far enogh in advance and was told that some people apply to get on the waiting list prior to the pregnancy! I have nothing but praise for the WSU Childcare staff. My daughter also benefited from her interactions with the Students. WSU childcare did indeed educate my daughter and helped her prepare for entry into school. While more spaces are needed weshould not lose sight of the quality issue. For this reason I\'m leary of \"privatization\" and contracting out childcare. | |
| From: Michael Pavel | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| To be a world class institution, we must be in a position to support the family structure of our world class faculty. Too often, too little is available to meet the needs of our families and as a consequence has an impact on our productivity and ability to recruit the next generation of world class faculty. | |
| From: Lisa Shipley | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| I was hired in spring 1996 while pregnant with my first and only child. I immediately put my name on the waiting list for WSU child care. When I arrived on campus in January 1997, no space was available for my 4 month old son. We remained on the waiting list for the next 3 years. Every semester I was told that priority went to WSU students and there were no openings for my child. During that period I sought help from WSU faculty women\'s association and others to try to find ways to offer more on-campus care for children of faculty, to no avail. Balancing a new baby with a new tenure-track faculty position was difficult, and I believe that for WSU to attract and hold new faculty, it needs to provide more access to quality child-care, not just for students, but for faculty as well. As an advisor to numerous female graduate students and a mentor to other students, I frequently hear that the perceived difficulties in balancing family and academics is the main reason they do not intend to seek tenure-track research/teaching positions at universities. Providing more on-campus child care and other support at WSU seems to me an easy way to address some of these concerns. | |
| From: Lisa Shipley | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| I was hired in spring 1996 while pregnant with my first and only child. I immediately put my name on the waiting list for WSU child care. When I arrived on campus in January 1997, no space was available for my 4 month old son. We remained on the waiting list for the next 3 years. Every semester I was told that priority went to WSU students and there were no openings for my child. During that period I sought help from WSU faculty women\'s association and others to try to find ways to offer more on-campus care for children of faculty, to no avail. Balancing a new baby with a new tenure-track faculty position was difficult, and I believe that for WSU to attract and hold new faculty, it needs to provide more access to quality child-care, not just for students, but for faculty as well. As an advisor to numerous female graduate students and a mentor to other students, I frequently hear that the perceived difficulties in balancing family and academics is the main reason they do not intend to seek tenure-track research/teaching positions at universities. Providing more on-campus child care and other support at WSU seems to me an easy way to address some of these concerns. | |
| From: Kristine Kuhn | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| I put my name on the WSU waitlist when I was four months pregnant; a slot did not open up until two years later. By that time, my daughter was enrolled at the U of I child center, where the wait was only(!) 16 months.
I\'d also like to add that the lack of child care options in Pullman hurts recruitment for both men and women faculty. A new Ph.D.(male) that my department was trying to recruit last year asked about child care during his campus visit, as he was expecting his first baby at the time; being honest while not too discouraging was a challenge. | |
| From: Elizabeth Siler | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| Finding adequate childcare in Pullman has been a tremendously taxing experience. My daughter was in many different types of day care when we first moved here from Los Angeles almost 21 years ago. It seemed centers were always closing, or promising spots they didn\'t have. Forewarned was forearmed: when I got pregnant 11 years ago with my son, I decided to get on a waiting list when I was only SIX WEEKS pregnant. My husband thought I was crazy, but experience was my teacher. Even with that, we ended up with problems. The worst was the center where my son was bitten by an unknown animal while in the sand box. The arm was severely punctured -- mauled would be a better word -- and yet no one could seem to figure out how he had been bitten. (My son couldn\'t tell us because he was less than 2 years old). We ended up having to get him the whole RABIES series on the advice of our doctors. That particular center was a disaster in other ways -- it seemed there was a new home room teacher each week. I tried to get my son into WSU Center, but that was impossibly hard. It seemed NO reason would get us moved to the front of the waiting list. Somehow we survived those years. I really pity any parent who is trying to find day care in Pullman. | |
| From: Elizabeth Siler | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| Finding adequate childcare in Pullman has been a tremendously taxing experience. My daughter was in many different types of day care when we first moved here from Los Angeles almost 21 years ago. It seemed centers were always closing, or promising spots they didn\'t have. Forewarned was forearmed: when I got pregnant 11 years ago with my son, I decided to get on a waiting list when I was only SIX WEEKS pregnant. My husband thought I was crazy, but experience was my teacher. Even with that, we ended up with problems. The worst was the center where my son was bitten by an unknown animal while in the sand box. The arm was severely punctured -- mauled would be a better word -- and yet no one could seem to figure out how he had been bitten. (My son couldn\'t tell us because he was less than 2 years old). We ended up having to get him the whole RABIES series on the advice of our doctors. That particular center was a disaster in other ways -- it seemed there was a new home room teacher each week. I tried to get my son into WSU Center, but that was impossibly hard. It seemed NO reason would get us moved to the front of the waiting list. Somehow we survived those years. I really pity any parent who is trying to find day care in Pullman. | |
| From: Barbara Rasco | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| I am a professor with no family within 3500 miles. I have struggled with child care for the past 8 years. Families with children younger than mine face even greater difficulties than I did with the pitiful full-time day care situation in this community which has not improved since we moved here. Infant care is the most crying need, but programs for older children are also lacking. Those that exist are underfunded and piecemeal at best. My child is 14 now, and the biggest problem we had in Pullman has been reliable, quality after-school, after hours, and summer care. Work related travel had caused the greatest difficulties. If it was not for the support of some very good friends, mostly other parents, who have been willing to care for my child when I have had to travel as part of my job representing the university in various capacities, working here would have been impossible. | |
| From: Augusta Rohrbach | Posted on: 2006-04-19 |
| I was hired in August of 2006 as Assoc Prof and Co-Editor of ESQ. Finding childcare for my now four-year-old twin girls was THE MOST stressful part of our relocation. We were not able to get a spot at the WSU program--and even if we could\'ve, that program is a short day, seemingly designed for a stay-at-home parent to have a few hours off for other responsibilities. In my case, a large protion of my salary now goes to a private pre-school...and from what I hear, we were lucky to get the spots for our girls that we did. An onsite program with spots available seems much-needed for families who work full-time. The existng program sounds great, but in order to make use of it I will have to shuttle the kids back to the Gladish center at 11:30...in the middle of my work day. The savings is significant and I know a lot of people do this, but this way of doing things doesn\'t seem to be in WSU\'s best interest.
At the very least, there should be designated point-people to help parents sort out their options...no one in my dept has young children so I had to dig around and find out a lot for myself. | |
| From: Gretal Leibnitz | Posted on: 2006-04-14 |
| I am both a graduate and employee of WSU. As a Ph.D. graduate student I deliberately chose not to get married or have a family while a student. I watched many of my peers come into the program I was in, married and physically healthy but by the end of the program, if they finished the program, too many of my colleagues were divorced and at least 20 lbs heavier. The irony was I completed my Ph.D. in Psychology...
After graduation I was employed at WSU. I married and had two children. Given my knowledge of the childcare crisis, I put both my children on the WSU Childcare Center waiting list as soon as I knew I was pregnant. Neither child was accepted for WSU Daycare until each was over 18 months olds (it took us over TWO years to actually obtain access to WSU childcare.) Thinking outside the box was the only thing that saved us. With airplane specials, it was acutally cheaper to fly my parents in weekly for the first several months of each childs life than it was for full-time baby care (which wasn\'t available anyway...)My husband, who had/has a part-time position, carried the brunt of our childcare responsibilities. Now my children are 6 and 3, one in 1st grade and one in daycare, and we are beginning to face another problem of afterschool care. Ultimately, I am not quite sure how we have evolved such an anti-family culture, but quality childcare for all ages of child shouldn\'t be this hard (Oh the angst of leaving one\'s new baby with another, and even more angst with the difficulty of finding care.) Some of us are lucky in having partners available to provide the majority of care, and family available to support during those early childcare years...but the concern doesn\'t end when the baby goes to elementary school... | |
| From: Courtney P. Benjamin | Posted on: 2006-04-13 |
| I am a current graduate student in Communication with an emphasis in Media Effects. I will be gracing this world with my first born son this August! While this is a blessing, the lack of childcare in Pullman has been such an issue that I am taking the fall semester off so that I can take care of him. Had I had more of a choice (for instance, not having to put my name on a waiting list knowing that my request would not be granted) my decision to further my education with a second master\'s degree or PhD may have come to fruition. I am happy with my decision, however it would\'ve been nice to have felt less pressure to leave school knowing that my infant son had proper care. I fully support the petition! | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-04-12 |
| I am a first year PhD student. My husband has had to forego his own business as a result of a profound lack of quality childcare for our toddler. As a result, our family of 6 (we have 3 children in Pullman schools) is dependent entirely on my graduate fellowship, scholarship and financial aid to make ends meet. As you may have guessed, that doesn\'t cut it, so we are now on food and medical assistance for our children. When I was recruited, WSU was in competition for my acceptance with a lucrative PhD fellowship position I was offered at UC-Davis, (which has numerous options for families on and off campus). I made the decision to come here because of the quality of faculty in my area of specialization, the quality of graduate students in my area, and the promise of community-based support. In comparison to UC-Davis, the cost of living here seemed more do-able than Davis (sure!) or Sacramento (not even!). However, given the amount of income we\'ve lost due to the LACK of childcare options here in Pullman, and particularly on the WSU campus (!!!!), now the numbers are not adding up. What does add up is that the debts my husband and I incur here in Pullman are not only economical, but social as well. This lack of vision, planning and insight at a \"World Class University\" is an in-justice and speaks more to a wider sphere of making invisible the needs of women, people of color, parents, and children at WSU, and in the \'community\' of Pullman. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-04-12 |
| I am a first year PhD student. My husband has had to forego his own business as a result of a profound lack of quality childcare for our toddler. As a result, our family of 6 (we have 3 children in Pullman schools) is dependent entirely on my graduate fellowship, scholarship and financial aid to make ends meet. As you may have guessed, that doesn\'t cut it, so we are now on food and medical assistance for our children. When I was recruited, WSU was in competition for my acceptance with a lucrative PhD fellowship position I was offered at UC-Davis, (which has numerous options for families on and off campus). I made the decision to come here because of the quality of faculty in my area of specialization, the quality of graduate students in my area, and the promise of community-based support. In comparison to UC-Davis, the cost of living here seemed more do-able than Davis (sure!) or Sacramento (not even!). However, given the amount of income we\'ve lost due to the LACK of childcare options here in Pullman, and particularly on the WSU campus (!!!!), now the numbers are not adding up. What does add up is that the debts my husband and I incur here in Pullman are not only economical, but social as well. This lack of vision, planning and insight at a \"World Class University\" is an in-justice and speaks more to a wider sphere of making invisible the needs of women, people of color, parents, and children at WSU, and in the \'community\' of Pullman. | |
| From: Lorena O\'English | Posted on: 2006-04-12 |
| I don\'t have children but this issue affects me just as much as it affects my colleagues at WSU who are struggling with the lack of good childcare options in Pullman. Recruitment, retention, quality of worklife and quality of life (for faculty, staff and students) are all part of this issue. This is not just an issue for parents of small children - it is a all-WSU campus and community issue! | |
| From: Lorena O\'English | Posted on: 2006-04-12 |
| I don\'t have children but this issue affects me just as much as it affects my colleagues at WSU who are struggling with the lack of good childcare options in Pullman. Recruitment, retention, quality of worklife and quality of life (for faculty, staff and students) are all part of this issue. This is not just an issue for parents of small children - it is a all-WSU campus and community issue! | |
| From: Jill Griffin | Posted on: 2006-04-12 |
| The current demand for infant and toddler care by the Faculty, Staff and Students of WSU dramatically exceeds the availability of the superb WSU Childcare Center, but even more astoundingly the childcare facilities of the communities of both Moscow and Pullman at large. Although my son is beyond the years requiring childcare, I do vividly recall the stresses and implications associated with concerns regarding quality childcare, and the consistent availability of that childcare. I was extremely fortunate in being able to arrange excellent care for my son purely by luck and the loving kindness of one elderly woman who chose to avail herself to me. However, I have known and currently know many new parents whose childcare stresses affect their ability to be productive employees, their perception of WSU as an institution that cares about it\'s employees, and their overall health.
As a member of the WSU community and an employee of WSU I believe we have a responsibility to our community and employees to provide the best institutional arrangements that will support the work/family balance of all our employees. If we are going to increase the levels of trust and respect as outlined in our strategic plan then we must put into place institutional level changes that acknowledge the wholeness of our employees at WSU. Employees are whole persons whose working lives are affected by the needs of their families regardless of the archaic notion that these two arenas are separate. Acknowledgement of our concern for the welfare of our employees and their concern for their family’s, increases trust and respect within and toward the institution itself. If you need hard proof, take the time to listen to the mentor of the year awards offered each Spring and the discussions about how these mentors respect the whole lives of those they mentor and how this is a major component of their ability to achieve greatness. As an institution we can help all our employees achieve their personal best, have the most productive and best employee experiences, and decrease the challenges to work/family balances by insisting on an institutional solution to the current problem in securing adequate early childhood education and care. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-04-07 |
| I got on the waiting list at the WSU Children\'s Center and other child care facilities in town immediately after accepting a job offer at WSU. We arrived in town on lots of waiting lists, but with no childcare. I found our current situation purely by accident. I ran into a woman on the street with two kids and stopped to talk to her. She was taking her kids to an in-home daycare. I was desparate and followed her. Fortunately for us, this daycare provider squeezed us in and it has turned out to be very good situation. 18 months after I got on the waiting list, the WSU Children\'s Center contacted me to say they had an opening -- much too late to be of any use. Dealing with the stress and time demands associated with having no childcare and no forseeable likelihood of childcare is not a good way to start a new job in a new town. | |
| From: Melynda Huskey | Posted on: 2006-04-07 |
| Worrying about childcare is one of the most debilitating experiences a parent can have. Several times during my kids\' early years we had daycare arrangements fall through, and I still remember the nagging worry of it, like a toothache. Infant care is the biggest concern, of course. The transition back to work is a difficult one at best, and wondering all day about the baby adds another layer of distraction. Our current childcare facility is a superb one, and I have a great deal of respect and admiration for the employees there--but it\'s just not enough. We need the same quality of care extended to faculty and staff. | |
| From: Tina Anctil | Posted on: 2006-04-06 |
| My husband (Eric Anctil) and are both assistant professors in Educational Leadership and Counseling Psychology and have two sons ages 3 years and 3 months. We placed our oldest child on the WSU Children\'s Center waiting list when he was 2 months old, following our on campus interviews. It took over two years for him to be offered a space and by then we had (fortunately) secured a nanny. When we moved to Pullman to begin our first jobs in academia we were also new parents and found the process of securing quality childcare in a new community to be incredibly stressful. By chance, we found an opening at the U of I Children\'s Center for that first and have subsequently hired a nanny (which we share with another faculty family). However, if we could have secured on-campus quality child care from the beginning, it would have made our transition to Pullman much smoother. Also, the nanny isn\'t cheap but we try not to think about that because we are just grateful that our kids are well taken care of while we work toward tenure.
If WSU wants to secure faculty with families, they have to begin to address the shortage of child care on campus. I agree with others who have stated this is a critical recruitment and retention tool. | |
| From: Shelley Chambers | Posted on: 2006-04-03 |
| It would be hard to name something that was more important to me as a young, working mother than the quality of my children’s daycare. Someone to cuddle my baby, let the toddler go through the pots and pans and coax the preschooler to play dress-up or build forts instead of watch TV. With three children I had a lot invested in daycare, so to speak. And it wasn’t always pretty. There was the phone call reporting that Ben had fallen off the table in his walker…off the table? And there was Judy who yelled every communication she had with my children. My children may never forgive me for Judy, never mind that I checked her references or sacked her after two weeks.
My own personal daycare wars, as I called those years of struggle, are over. But for hundreds of parents they are only beginning. We have an opportunity at Washington State University to change that. President Rawlins has indicated a willingness to consider building an early childhood education and care center to serve children of faculty and staff on campus. Please join with us to support a quality center, easily accessible to parents during the day, intended to serve children of faculty and staff. Write a letter, call your Dean, sign our petition at http://www.wsu.edu/~moonlee/childcare/. This is Washington State University’s most precious cause! | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-03-31 |
| My husband and I both work at WSU. We are older parents with a teenage daughter and another adult daughter off on her own. Still, since arriving in Pullman in 2001, I have been dismayed at the lack of quality childcare available in the area. As a former community college instructor in child development and a certified trainer for the WestEd Program for Infant/Toddler Caregivers, I see WSU as poised to offer exceptional childcare opportunities for faculty and staff and to serve as a training site/lab school for students who will go into the field of Human Development/Child Development or Education. WSU should find a way to establish a childcare center that will comfortably meet the needs of the WSU community as well as provide lab school opportunities for students. | |
| From: Mat Taylor | Posted on: 2006-03-31 |
| My wife and I starting planning for child care right when we knew we were expecting. We had been warned that WSU had a long waiting list. Seven months later we still didn\'t have a spot, so our newborn had to be shipped back and forth to Moscow... U of I had plenty of room.
There MUST be affordable infant care in Pullman. It makes sense to have it serving the campus. Adequate daycare facilities would truly be world class. | |
| From: Karen Weathermon | Posted on: 2006-03-31 |
| My experience was unusual at WSU, and not officially sanctioned. When I returned to work (half-time) six weeks after the birth of my son, I was invited to bring him with me for the first five months. I was the third woman in my office to bring an infant to work for the first several months; in all cases, the babies trundled around with us, generally in front packs, and slept a great deal of the time. They came to meetings, lectures, and other events with us. Because I was working half-time, I was able to plan my time on campus for times when my son generally was sleeping anyway, and he did so in a car seat by my desk if not in his front pack. The head of my particular office, a man with four children of his own, made it clear that our children were welcome as long as we could make the situation work. I am extremely grateful that I had the opportunity both to continue my employment and spend those months with my child. It was good for me, good for my child, good for the students who occasionally interacted with him, and, I think we could argue, good for the university. This wouldn\'t work with all babies and with all units, obviously, but I wonder if there isn\'t more room for flexibility in other units as well. | |
| From: Dawn Shinew | Posted on: 2006-03-31 |
| My husband (Rick Busselle) and I are both faculty members at WSU. We have been very fortunate that we were able to get both of our children into the WSU Children\'s Center. However, we recognize that it was just lucky timing on our part, since we know many, many people who have not been able to find quality, affordable childcare.
Knowing that our children are in a safe, happy, secure, and stimulating environment allows us to do our work. When we have considered opportunties that involve moving away from Pullman, the Children\'s Center and its wonderful teachers have been a huge incentive in staying. Early childhood education and care could be a powerful recruitment and retention tool for faculty members. Instead, it seems that many talented professionals feel frustrated by the lack of institutional support in helping them on this important issue. | |
| From: | Posted on: 2006-03-30 |
| While WSU policy states children are not to be allowed in the workplace, different supervisors interpret this policy differently creating an unfair situation for some. I am a FT AP employee who does not work regular hours, or in a typcial office environment. I am a leader in my department, one that really cannot be \"out\" for extended periods of time.
During my maternity leave with my second child, I was allowed to return to work for 10-15 hours per week once my child was approximatley 3 weeks old, with my child present. I attended key or critical meetings, and made arrangments with students with whom I work to meet them at convienent times/locations. This worked well for everyone. I was still able to complete core portions of my job and those with whom I work were still in the loop. During the maternity leave of my third child, the policy was interpreted (by my supervisors and HRS) to state that I could not even meet my staff for lunch at a local resturant if my child was present, because the resturant would become my \"workplace\", and therefore, the child could not be present! My spouse and I then had to juggle, coordinate, and rearrange both of our schedules in order to manage my need of 10-15 hours per week of meetings without a nursing baby in tow. We worked it out, but this experience left me feeling that WSU is NOT family friendly at all! Especially considering I am an employee willing to return to work early after a baby is born in order to serve my department and my students. This was a long story...but I share it to call attention to the lack of consistency on campus, even for one employee. During my leave(s), and since, I have on many occasions heard of, or seen, children in the workplace with one of their parents, rather than in a child care setting. | |
| From: Sue Clark | Posted on: 2006-03-30 |
| I am Chair of the Chemistry Department, which is a very senior department. We are planning for a significant number of new hires of young faculty for the next five years. All young faculty who have small children face the same problem when considering coming to Pullman for their careers - the scarcity of child care, especially for infants. This is a major barrier to hiring both women and men into the sciences. The individuals we make offers of faculty positions to typically receive more than one offer of employment (so we know that we are identifying top notch prospective faculty in our searches). However, even if we offer competitive salaries and start-up resources, that won\'t matter if Pullman does not offer the infrastructure to allow work-life balance, which includes exceptional child care for young children of all ages. These young faculty members will decline our offer and accept those opportunities in communities that provide stability for their families instead. WSU needs to take the lead in addressing this problem for the Pullman community. | |
| From: Michelle Arganbright | Posted on: 2006-03-30 |
| I\'m a married grad student, and with our first child, we couldn\'t get infant care anywhere in Pullman for 1 year, and after 1 year, we got into a center in town (a center that I was highly unimpressed with, by the way). After 6 more months, when Emily was a year and a half, we got into the WSU Children\'s Center. Then, when we had our second child, Evan, despite the fact that people who already have children at the WSU Children\'s Center are supposed to have \"priority listing,\" it still took a year to get him in. So, in both cases, the \"infant care\" was not even a possiblity... it wasn\'t until they hit early toddlerhood that they were able to get in. Evan got in just barely. Overall, I\'m very pleased with the WSU Children\'s center. Of course, half of my monthly income goes to fulltime childcare for my two kids...and that\'s with the \"student discount\" of about $200/month, which I\'m very thankful for. But, I guess that\'s the price that I need to pay as a grad student in order to make for a brighter future in the long run. What\'s really unfortunate is that during summers, parents used to sign up on a week-by-week basis, but now it\'s an \"all or nothing\" deal. My $8/hr summer jobs just can\'t cover this. Nothing against the Children\'s Center itself, like I said, I really like it and my children really like it. I\'m also very thankful for their Evening Care program, which I use one night per week for both of my children. | |
| From: Chuck Pezeshki | Posted on: 2006-03-30 |
| As a man with initially a stay-at-home wife, I had little to worry about with childcare. But when my wife decided to go back to school, we had a difficult time finding adequate after-school and day care that fulfilled our educational goals for our children. We were some of the lucky ones, and landed a spot at CCCC.
As Chair of the Faculty Senate, I work and depend on many fine faculty members that are not as fortunate as I am with career enhancement. THey have constant problems finding early childhood education and care-- if they can find it at all-- that meets their standards, including infant and toddler care. As Chair of the Early Childhood Education and Care Committee, I am resolved to working with my fellow faculty members and staff to move our community to the point of solving this problem. I see the stress and loss of individual potential that happens when both mothers and fathers are worried about their kids-- of nursing mothers that can\'t nurse, and women that sometimes put off having children altogether because of the lack of infant care. We pride ourselves on being a tightly-knit community in Pullman. That means we stand by each other, and work toward the benefit of each other\'s welfare. Early childhood education and care is an important piece of a healthy community. | |
| From: Cassandra N. Nichols | Posted on: 2006-03-30 |
| We live in Moscow. We used the career services at the University of Idaho to find, first a nanny and now a stay-at-home mother who cares for our child in her home (we have a 15 month old. The provider has a 19 month old. She does not care for any other children). If I lived in Pullman I would have posted for a nanny at the WSU Job Services. We requested an advanced student in early childhood education. What we got instead was a former preschool teacher who wanted to stay at home with her child (!!). My only concern with not having our son at a day care center (we\'ve been on the list for over a year) is that if our provider is ill or moves, we are really stuck! My second concern is a financial one. While we pay the same amount of money as we would for a day care center (with the benefit of our son having more individualized attention) we are unable to access the tax credit for child care.
I hope this helps others! | |
| From: Aurora Clark | Posted on: 2006-03-30 |
| As an incoming junior faculty member I needed infant and toddler childcare in Pullman. I got on several waiting lists for childcare a full 9 months prior to my arrival in Pullman. In spite of this, there were no vacancies available when I arrived and it was only through the intervention of the chair of my department that I was able to secure adequate childcare servies prior to my start date. While I have been very happy with the support of the university for female faculty, I think that childcare is an issue in which WSU is severly lagging behind other institutions and that fact is detrimental to our recruitment of talented young faculty (both male and female). | |
| From: Lihong Zhu | Posted on: 2006-03-29 |
| When I had my daughter four years ago, we called several daycare centers and were told there was no vacancy. Instead, they put my daughter on long waiting lists. I was lucky to have my parents take care of my daughter instead so that I could return to work. I wish other young mothers would not have the same problem finding a day care for her daughter or son. | |
| From: Jennifer Bohm | Posted on: 2006-03-29 |
| I have two childern ages one and three.
I added my name to the waiting list at the WSU childcare center when I was 4 months pregnant with my first child and a spot did not open up until he was one year old. At that point I didn\'t move him because I was planning on having another child and could not afford the price of two children through the center. I was lucky to find a wonderful daycare provider through the referral service when he was 6 weeks old, but I only had two choices. I was also lucky that I have very supportive supervisors that allowed me to pump since I couldn\'t get to the daycare at lunch to breastfeed since it was off campus and I did not have the car during the day. After having my second child, my daycare provider moved her daycare from her home to another building and raised the cost to pay for it. My husband was paid by the hour in a seasonal position and during the slow months did not bring much money home after the daycare was paid for. Along with the hassle of the commute we have since we don\'t live in Pullman, we decided that he would be better off staying home with the children. Although he is enjoying his time at home with the kids, we didn\'t feel we had much of a choice. On a more positive note, there are lots of great programs available for the children in the communtity. The Palouse Discovery Science Center, the libraries have story times, and Beasley Coliseum has the children\'s series just to name a few. | |
| From: Jane LaRiviere | Posted on: 2006-03-29 |
| I\'m a single parent and a coach in the athletic department. Due to the nature of my job there are several times during the year when I must work until 6:30-7:00pm. All of the child care services in the Pullman community close at 5:30pm. The WSU Child Care center is the only facility that offers extended care. I have been on the WSU centers waiting list for 1.5 years and unfortuatly no one can tell me when or if there will be a space for my daughter. | |
| From: Elayne Crain | Posted on: 2006-03-29 |
| As a pregant WSU employee in a family of two earners, I worry about being able to return to work full-time without child care support, particularly for infants. After all the positive discussions this month about women\'s issues, it seems that this would be one of the biggest. Every working woman who has a child needs day care support at some time or another. The fact that there are only three infant spots at a time seems to indicate that WSU feels, at least on some level, that female employees are expendable for at least a year, or if not, should not have children. I know that\'s not the actual mood of the campus, so it seems silly to have resources indicate this message. | |
| From: anonymous | Posted on: 2006-03-27 |
| just a comment and praise for the Washington STARS system through the child care resource and referral office - i found a really amazing and fabulous and caring child care provider through them for my daughter for the first year of her life - it was a small, in-home child care setting and i was thrilled to have my daughter there. although there are very few infant openings in our area child care centers, being a parent means being flexible and finding things that work. even though your first choice might be to have your child on campus where you work, you may need to find alternate child care until one of those openings becomes available. and keep in mind that you might find yourself pleasantly surprised at the quality of care that is out there. of course you need to do your research and make sure you find a provider who can give your child the best possible care. | |
| From: Jason Drake | Posted on: 2006-03-27 |
| We struggled for months trying to get infant care in Pullman. There is such a shortage. | |
| From: Webmaster | Posted on: 2006-03-21 |
| This web site is now up--please feel free to add commentaries! | |