Summer, After School, and Beyond: Building a Child Care System That Meets Everyone’s Needs 

By Shoshana Hershkowitz, Campaign Manager for the Empire State Campaign for Child Care

As fall arrives in New York State, many families are transitioning from a summer of patched-together child care for school-aged kids to figuring out before- and after-school care. Without a supportive child care system, parents are left to navigate the logistics, stress, and finances on their own. 

Summer is supposed to be a laid back, relaxing time of year, but for too many working families, it is a time where the stress of finding child care looms large. We talk a great deal about the expense of child care from birth to five years old, but any parent will tell you that that’s far from the end of the child care struggle. 

For many working parents, summer means weaving together eight weeks of camp programs, relatives, and using vacation time to fill the need of caring for younger school aged children. This requires months of advance planning to align schedules, with many summer programs filling by February. It requires parents to pay deposits to secure a space for their child in care. It often means hiring a babysitter to fill the gap between half-day camp programs and full-day jobs. All of this occurs as parents are navigating work, their children’s school schedules and activities, and all of the curve balls that life throws. 

The stress doesn’t just take an emotional toll — the financial cost of summer care looms large in family expenses. A recent article from Motherly sums it up: “Parents need a system that fully supports child care as a core part of family life—especially in the summer months. That includes public investment in summer programming, employer flexibility, and school calendars and community options designed for the actual lives we live—not the ones we were expected to live in 1955.” 

As a working parent, summer means stitching together programs for my own children. It’s leaving work midday to pick up one child, taking a meeting in the car en route to pick up the other, and logging back on after work hours to finish what was interrupted. This isn’t a unique experience – our recent Empire State Campaign for Child Care podcast episode shares the stories of three working New York parents and their struggles for summer care for their children – including one parent who realized it’s more affordable to send their child abroad for the summer than keep them in camps in New York State.

As a new school year begins, the challenges of care continue for parents of school age children. Whether it’s finding before school or after school care, or evening care for parents working nontraditional hours, the need for year-round, high quality, affordable, and accessible care persists for many New Yorkers.  

At the Empire State Campaign for Child Care, we are focused on building a statewide system that delivers the care children and families need- year-round. A supportive child care system would ease the logistical and financial burden on parents and providers. We’re determined to ensure that the educators caring for our children are adequately compensated, so that they can afford to care for themselves and their families. We believe that a child care system that works for children, families, and caregivers benefits all of us, and makes for a stronger New York State. That’s what we’re fighting for- year-round. 

Join the movement for statewide universal child care at EmpireStateChildCare.org/Take-Action.