New Haveners raised their voices for early childcare education funding on Wednesday.
That was thanks to the over 300 early childhood educators and community members who gathered on the New Haven Green for the third annual Morning Without Child Care at 8 a.m. The daylong event was organized by Child Care for Connecticut’s Future, a statewide coalition of organizations, providers, parents and advocates working to achieve long-term investment in Connecticut’s early learning system.
The protest on the New Haven Green was one of eleven happening throughout the state on April 10 with the intent of raising awareness and demanding attention from state legislators. The goal of the events is to highlight the essential nature of early childhood education by rendering childcare unavailable for the morning, thus forcing the state to recognize the need to better support the industry.
“This rally is so important because childcare is so important,” said Cindy Snow, an early childcare educator working at Alphabet Academy. “Without proper funding, us teachers don’t get paid adequately to take care of the kids, and parents without childcare can’t work.”
Aundrea Tabbs-Smith, an organizer of the rally and the Friends Center for Children’s Emotional Well-being Coordinator, opened the protest by thanking the crowd for gathering in front of New Haven’s City Hall, the “home of legislation.”
She said that the placement was intentional, for early childcare educators could not reverse the current situation alone. Organizers reiterated that the childcare worker’s “poverty-level wages” require immediate state attention, appealing directly to Connecticut Governor Ned Lamont to “invest and save the industry.”
Despite years of advocacy and activism, the early childcare sector received no additional fiscal funding this year, according to Allyx Schiavone, the Executive Director of Friends Center for Children.
In February, Gov. Ned Lamont proposed redirecting more than $39 million from charter, magnet and technical schools to pay for a five-year plan restructuring of childcare in the state, developed by a “Blue Ribbon Panel” of experts and stakeholders ordered by Lamont last year. The proposal provoked condemnation from advocates who described it as an unnecessary cut to funding for schools.
Schiavone said that the current early education system fails because it is “based on the premise of a free market system,” and because of this, providers can typically charge consumers the total cost of producing a good or service.
She added that this free market system is not present in the early education sector because the cost of running a quality childcare system far exceeds what local families can afford. As such, Schiavone said, the wages of early childhood educators are significantly cut to offset the difference between what it costs to run a facility and what the community can pay.
“Families can’t afford to pay, and teachers can’t afford to stay,” Schiavone said at the rally. “We cannot fix a societal problem on the backs of the 98 percent female, disproportionately women of color, workforce.”
Thus, Schiavone summarizes the two major themes of the rally — families pay too much and workers earn too little — both of which require governmental subsidization.
Currently, according to the Friends Center for Children, Connecticut families spend approximately 20 percent of their household income on child care. Furthermore, due to low wages, one in seven teaching positions are unfilled in the state. The total 4,000 open childcare positions means that there are about 40,000 fewer spots for children.
“If we invest now, teachers won’t make poverty wages, and thus they won’t leave for higher-paying professions,” Schiavone said. “Then classrooms won’t close, parents will be able to readily access childcare and our economy will benefit from the full workforce.”
Demonstrators at the protest echoed Schiavone’s sentiments, describing their experiences with early childhood work in New Haven.
Anne Olcott, an early childhood educator who’s worked at Westville Community Nursery School for over 20 years, shared her frustration in an interview with the News.
“I’ve been around this industry since 1988 and these are the same issues people were trying to address then about fair wages and the cost of childcare,” Olcott said. “That’s a long time to be talking about the same thing.”
Simone Marong, an early childhood educator with 12 years of experience at Alphabet Academy, shared that she and her colleagues shouldn’t be forced to choose between the job they love and the ability to feed their families.
New Haven Mayor Justin Elicker also attended the rally and gave a short speech to those in attendance.
“The research is clear, this is one of the best investments in the future of every child, and let me be clear, it is one of the best ways we can address poverty,” Elicker said. “If we invest in our young people at a very early age, it changes the trajectory of their lives — they are less likely to go to prison, more likely to own a home and more likely to have a long term job.”
After speaking of his own children and the “wonderful” care they receive at Leila Day Nursery, Elicker urged the audience to “keep protesting, we got this.”
The original date for the third annual “Morning Without Child Care” was April 3; however, the event was postponed due to inclement weather.
Contact Brooklyn Brauner at brooklyn.brauner@yale.edu.