Urban Institute: 21st CCLC among 8 policy strategies for school-age child care

The Urban Institute recently released a working paper entitled, “Meeting the School-Age Child Care Needs of Working Parents Facing COVID-19 Distance Learning,” that addresses major challenges that both families and afterschool and childcare providers are currently facing, and lays out a range of policy strategies to address these obstacles. Authors Gina Adams and Margaret Todd discuss how, as more schools and school districts are switching to distance learning or partial distancing learning this coming school year, working parents will likely require more hours of child care; which can be cost-prohibitive, especially for low-income and vulnerable families. During these unprecedented times, parents need to rely on afterschool and childcare providers. However, the constraints put on afterschool programs and other child care settings—including closures, loss of facilities, increased costs due to health and safety requirements, and limitations on group sizes—make it difficult to meet demand.

In response, the paper outlines policy strategies in eight areas that policymakers and stakeholders should keep in mind as they move forward in addressing the challenges and aftermath of COVID-19: cross-system coordination and collaboration, funding, child care subsidies, 21^st Century Community Learning Centers, child care licensing, grants, training and technical assistance, and the Child and Adult Care Food Program. The goals of these strategies are to help ensure that school-age children can safely engage in distance learning; parents can work without worrying about their children; programs are responsive to changing learning plans; and children, families, and caregivers’ physical, emotional, and social health and wellbeing is cared for. Some of the strategies outlined include:

• Collaboration between sectors (childcare and afterschool providers, schools/education agencies, childcare licensing, childcare subsidy system, and the public health system) to best meet families’ needs and minimize gaps and overlaps in services
• Increased and immediate/flexible funding in areas such as education, social services/childcare, and potentially public health funding streams
• Significant increases in funding for the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF), the primary source of child care funding that helps low-income parents pay for childcare, to accommodate for the increased needs during this time
• Grants to directly support parents, especially those most vulnerable, caregivers or afterschool programs, or any entity working to support parents or caregivers
• Adjusted childcare licensing policies to reflect the current demand, such as assessing guidance around group size and enabling programs to be able to respond quickly to changing needs
• Increased funding to support training for afterschool and childcare providers to help meet school-age children’s needs, including training in areas such as supporting social and emotional health for children, staff, and caregivers
• Changes to waiver restrictions so that programs can continue to provide meals and meet children’s nutrition needs in the upcoming school year

The paper also outlines policy recommendations and strategies for 21^st Century Community Learning Centers (21^st CCLC), provided by the Afterschool Alliance, to help support school-age children and working families. As we have seen, 21^st CCLC and afterschool programs have played an important role in addressing the many challenges families have faced during the pandemic. The paper suggests that 21^st CCLC funding should be expanded to address the increased need for afterschool programming during this time and help ensure programs have the necessary resources to support students when schools do reopen. 21^st CCLC should also allow temporary flexibility for programs to operate virtually and in person; expand resources to support staff and provide professional development around trauma informed care; address program’s needs in finding new facilities to operate in; and ensure programs have the necessary technology to serve students. Finally, 21^st CCLC should support continued funding for afterschool and summer learning programs to ensure proper safety measures can be taken.

While a majority of the policy recommendations focus on child care and afterschool policies, the paper also lists actions that can be taken by education agencies, nutrition agencies, and other services. Overall, these are strategies that the federal government, states, localities, childcare stakeholders, and schools can take to support working parents and their school-age children.

Ensuring working parents have access to a safe and supervised space for their school-age children to engage in distance learning is a critical issue as schools start back up this fall. Without proper childcare options, parents and children, afterschool and childcare providers, employers, and the overall economy will likely face negative outcomes. With these policy suggestions, afterschool and childcare providers can help ensure that parents can go back to work without worrying about their children, and children are supported as they engage in this new age of distance learning.

To read the full range of policy suggestions, visit the Urban Institute’s page on the new report.