Metro’s out-of-school care dilemma
Some parents want provincial regulations on amount of floor space adjusted to relieve wait-lists
FIVE THINGS
The back-to-school season means that some parents will be scrambling for school-based supervision so they can get to work on time — that is, before classes start at 9 a.m. and after the 3 p.m. bell.
The new B.C. government is proposing a $10-a-day child care program that would bring in other levels of government and be a wider effort to access land and buildings in order to boost available spaces.
But in the meantime, some parents wonder if provincial regulations on the amount of floor space needed per child can be adjusted to relieve wait-lists as rising real estate costs make alternative options increasingly expensive.
Here are five things to know:
1 Demand is high in some cities, including Vancouver
Wait-lists fluctuate, but some are in the high-double digits. The City of Vancouver, for example, estimates its total shortfall of out-of-school care spaces at 9,400 and says that in some neighbourhoods, the “estimated per cent of need for school age care met” ranges from as low as seven per cent in Sunset to 33 per cent in Riley Park. Across the city, only 33 per cent of estimated need for school-age care is met. Between 2011 and 2016, the City of Vancouver eked out 442 new spaces for out-of-school care by making minor changes to multi-purpose rooms such as shifting the layout of equipment or adding a sink and toilet, says director of social planning Mary-Clare Zak. This September, it adds another 24 for a total of 466, but the increases are a drop in the bucket.
2 Additional pressures
There have been additional pressures this year as some out-ofschool programs across the province lost spaces they had been renting because the schools needed them back in order to fulfil smaller class-size requirements as a result of last year’s Supreme Court of Canada ruling. In total, some 174 child care spaces will be lost across the province in September due to this, according to the Ministry of Education. The Vancouver school board says it’s not losing any child care spots this September at its schools. However, according to the ministry, the four districts reporting space pressures are Vancouver, Maple Ridge-Pitt Meadows, Coquitlam and Greater Victoria.
3 Counting square feet
The B.C. Ministry of Health requires there must be three metres/square (or 32 square feet) of indoor floor space for each child in an out-of-school program and six metres/ square of outdoor play area. For every 15 kids, there must be one bathroom and one wash basin. Parents wonder if school facilities are being maximized during before and after class periods. They ask if adjusting these provincial requirements could help to relieve waitlists for out-of-school care. Emily Mlieczko, executive director at Early Childhood Educators of B.C., says she understands parents want solutions, but says “B.C. is in a child care crisis and this discussion on reducing floor-space requirements to fit in more kids is an indicator of that.”
4 Different environments
Michael Starchuk, managing director of Tomorrow’s Topkids Child Care Society, which operates eight out-of-school care programs in Vancouver and Richmond, all based at elementary schools, says it’s hard to just assume that the ratio of floor space to number of children during a school day can be imposed on an out-of-school setting because the environment is much more active. “There is artwork. You have a carpet full of Lego. There are children of more varying ages. And the setting is not as structured,” he says.
5 Rising real estate costs
If parents can’t access school-based care spots, they can turn to others that operate nearby, but the cost of these is going up as land values rise rapidly and have an impact on rents. Vancouver parent Nancy Cameron says she knows of a “day-care program run out of a church where the rent increased by $18,000 in a year to reflect changes to market rents.”