By Kayla Hounsell
Parents may be struggling to find space for their kids now, but there’s hope for an easier time next year, says a City of Ottawa childcare manager.
The provincially funded Best Start program aims to put childcare centres in elementary schools, allowing parents to keep kindergarten students in schools all day.
The Best Start program, announced over the summer, is Ontario’s response to the federal call for a national childcare system. Over the next three years, it will channel $50 million into Ottawa’s childcare system, adding 1,100 licensed full-fee and subsidized childcare spaces for children aged four to five.
Childcare space in elementary schools helps children adjust to school life by providing full-day continuous care, say program enthusiasts.
The children “show up at childcare at 7:30, then they go off to kindergarten, and they come back and they’ve got a whole different set of staff,” says Jane Joy, manager of children’s services for the City of Ottawa. “The vision is to look at a seamless day.”
Shelley Langlois, principal of Elgin Street Public School, says the program would be a boon to working parents.
“This program would help provide a nice transition,” she says. “Half-day programs are a challenge for parents.”
The Elgin Street elementary school doesn’t have a childcare centre, and Langlois says there probably is not room for one.
“Do I think it’s a wonderful thing for my students? Absolutely. Do I think we have the physical space available? Not without modification,” she says.
Joan Spice says that could change. All schools could have space for childcare.
“Until 1995, when the Progressive Conservative party came in, you couldn’t put up a school without a space for a day-care centre,” says the public board trustee for Somerset.
The program is a great idea, she says, and where schools have space they certainly should have childcare centres.
Joy says that the program will deal with the space already available first. If there’s a demand, it will create new space with remaining funds.
Many of the project details are still up for discussion.
The city has hired Success By 6, a community partnership dedicated to increasing awareness of and investment in early child development. On behalf of the city, the group will submit the plan determining the specifics of the program to the province by the end of October.