starryfish, we are paying full price. The teachers still need to be paid. Unless you (general you) are yourself losing income from this situation I implore you to do the same. Daycare workers make very little and financially vulnerable as it is.
I am sympathetic to the daycare teachers, but a business owner should carry business disruption insurance to cover salaries during this time. They shouldn’t rely on families who are receiving reduced income to cover.
Post by farmvillelover on Mar 18, 2020 19:23:04 GMT -5
This was an easy decision for us for our 4 y/o in daycare - we took him out. His class of about 27 has 6 physicians and 5 nurses as parents (I'm a classroom mom so I know). I am grateful for their service and work. But for their kids and my own, I feel the less exposure those kids get to mine (since I'm sometimes going to the office) and vice versa given the contact those parents have with patients and hospital, the better.
They sent an email that they are waiving their 30 day cancelation fee policy and I canceled. We prepay for the month so I don't expect a refund for the remainder of March. They haven't indicated anything about teacher pay.
starryfish, we are paying full price. The teachers still need to be paid. Unless you (general you) are yourself losing income from this situation I implore you to do the same. Daycare workers make very little and financially vulnerable as it is.
I am sympathetic to the daycare teachers, but a business owner should care business disruption insurance to cover salaries during this time. They shouldn’t rely on families who are receiving reduced income to cover.
Ok... But if they don't or if it excludes pandemic, what, the teachers are SOL? The teachers are not the ones who should have bought insurance. Scm specifically said if you are not losing income from this situation to keep paying.
The teachers are paid so little and most live paycheck to paycheck. Obviously not everyone is in the position to keep paying for childcare they can't use, I get it. But I know there are plenty of people on this board who are not in such dire straits.
I get it, I'm worried too. We have lost a lot of money with the market downturn and although our jobs seem stable, there is no guarantee. But big picture, I know we can pay our bills and I do feel like it's morally wrong to abandon these women. These are extraordinary circumstances. Maybe paying tuition is not the answer, but please do what you can to help.
Honestly I would be surprised if a struggling business used tuition money to pay their teachers, rather than just lay them off and use the money for other business expenses.
My kids attend a private Montessori (toddler room and kindergarten, since our public school is only 1/2 day and we needed full) and I’m not sure what will happen. We prepaid K tuition for a discount, but not for the toddler. Haven’t heard anything yet.
We pulled our kids, 4 and 5 months. Yeah, I’m not being as productive as normal and DD is watching too much tv, but it’s important to minimize exposure.
Are we expecting to keep our kids home with us and continuing to pay daycare while WFH full time until...when? A couple weeks - a month? Until June? July? August?
We haven't sent our kids since last Friday and daycare is still open. I can certainly afford to keep paying for a month of daycare and struggle through being less productive at work. But that doesn't really seem like a reasonable plan if we are talking 3+ months and I still want to have a job and my sanity at the end of this.
Our daycare is currently still open, having instituted pretty strict dropoff procedures. They sent out a survey asking if parents were first responders or in healthcare - their communications were basically that they're staying open because some parents have essential jobs.
starryfish, we are paying full price. The teachers still need to be paid. Unless you (general you) are yourself losing income from this situation I implore you to do the same. Daycare workers make very little and financially vulnerable as it is.
I am sympathetic to the daycare teachers, but a business owner should care business disruption insurance to cover salaries during this time. They shouldn’t rely on families who are receiving reduced income to cover.
This is a really good point. Our daycare is a “larger” business and you’re totally right. I do wonder if insurance will cover a pandemic though. Regardless, our teachers are paid at the moment so I will gladly accept my 50% credit back for March.
I am sympathetic to the daycare teachers, but a business owner should care business disruption insurance to cover salaries during this time. They shouldn’t rely on families who are receiving reduced income to cover.
Ok... But if they don't or if it excludes pandemic, what, the teachers are SOL? The teachers are not the ones who should have bought insurance. Scm specifically said if you are not losing income from this situation to keep paying.
The teachers are paid so little and most live paycheck to paycheck. Obviously not everyone is in the position to keep paying for childcare they can't use, I get it. But I know there are plenty of people on this board who are not in such dire straits.
I get it, I'm worried too. We have lost a lot of money with the market downturn and although our jobs seem stable, there is no guarantee. But big picture, I know we can pay our bills and I do feel like it's morally wrong to abandon these women. These are extraordinary circumstances. Maybe paying tuition is not the answer, but please do what you can to help.
Even if you aren’t losing income, you may be preparing to lose income or paying for alternate care. I feel like there’s a high likelihood of aid packages for workers who are laid off and business relief, but there’s a pretty low likelihood of aid for families who kept giving money to a business who may or may not pay their teachers. There are going to be some, if not many, families who can’t keep paying. We do need a systematic way to address the problem and make sure businesses aren’t lost and teachers are paid, but it can’t be on individual families to make that happen.
Post by minniemouse on Mar 19, 2020 7:15:05 GMT -5
My kids are school age- thankfully- so this is hypothetical. I have mixed feelings on continuing to pay. We went to a large center, so I would likely just withdraw. If it was a small in home center it would be a harder decision.
My kids are school age- thankfully- so this is hypothetical. I have mixed feelings on continuing to pay. We went to a large center, so I would likely just withdraw. If it was a small in home center it would be a harder decision.
Right now we are debating about giving notice. Our school requires 30-day notice. We only started there on Feb 6, and my son has attended 15 school days due to illness and winter break closure. So far we’ve paid over $3500 for 4 weeks of school. We are scheduled to move 30 min away from the school at the end of April. We had planned to do 4 weeks of 1-hr round trip drives for drop off and pick up to finish out the year, but if he hasn’t been in school for 6 weeks I think it will be more disruptive to our routine to go back for 4 weeks than just have our summer nanny start who is already back from college (assuming we are done social distancing and can hire her).
Post by gerberdaisy on Mar 19, 2020 7:56:28 GMT -5
We took DS out of daycare Tuesday and don't plan on having him return until DD goes back to school. Monday was my last day going into the office and H is working from home, so we are isolating and staying home. Not judging others decision, but seems selfish to send our kids and not do our part in isolation, when we are already working at home. Means work is much more difficult and requires waking up early, working at night, but so be it.
Luckily both DD's before/aftercare and daycare have already said they would not charge us for time we spend away. For daycare, it was a company-wide email (part of a nationwide daycare) and we've already seen the credit on our account. I had fully expected to continue paying, so that's a nice surprise.
We pay $1,800 a month and although a few people have asked our director about fees she has yet to respond. We were going to withdraw starting in May anyway as that was when we intended to start maternity leave.
I definitely understand wanting the workers to get paid and wouldnt mind a reduction in our fees and the rest covering the salaries of the staff. But our centre is a profit centre, and the centres expenses while being closed are going to drastically go down (reduction of hydro usage, water, supplies, not paying for food, etc) but I doubt we are going to see any return and will have to continue paying full fees to secure a spot. Since she collected first and last as a deposit we at least dont have to pay another monthly payment but will likely lose our last month deposit and have not used a single day of care in April (as things are going). I dont like it, it is a lot of money. I am having to WFM with a toddler while H is out working (thankfully not coming in contact with any people as of yet) so that we are able to continue paying our bills - such as our expensive daycare bill, without having to dip into savings/efunds in the future when he should be social distancing at home. Who knows how long this will go on for. H too is a small business owner so I do understand the worries of the daycare centre but at the same thing, it is a cost of running a business and are parents expected to continue paying for childcare for an unknown amount of time that could very well go onto be months? These businesses are likely to see some sort of incentive from the government, the daycare workers can claim EI but the parents are not going to see reimbursement for the monthly costs for a service they never used.
Well MA is officially closing all daycares starting Monday. I'm curious how this is going to play out. I definitely see both sides of the tuition debate. I care for our teachers and want them to be paid. However, if this goes on longterm, 1) I'm guessing the center will lay them off so they can collect unemployment and 2) I can't keep paying $2K a month for no care. DD1 is starting K in the fall anyway. I was already considering pulling her and re-enrolling if this ends sooner than I'm thinking it will.
Susie, would you mind sharing that list of links the other daycare center sent you? I'm struggling to keep my kids entertained (4 and 18 mos) and I'd appreciate any ideas.
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I'm also trying Cosmic Kids yoga on youtube today with DD (4), it was rec'ed to me in a group chat with some moms from my daycare. It's rainy, so I needed some kind of indoor movement activity.
Well MA is officially closing all daycares starting Monday. I'm curious how this is going to play out. I definitely see both sides of the tuition debate. I care for our teachers and want them to be paid. However, if this goes on longterm, 1) I'm guessing the center will lay them off so they can collect unemployment and 2) I can't keep paying $2K a month for no care. DD1 is starting K in the fall anyway. I was already considering pulling her and re-enrolling if this ends sooner than I'm thinking it will.
Susie , would you mind sharing that list of links the other daycare center sent you? I'm struggling to keep my kids entertained (4 and 18 mos) and I'd appreciate any ideas.
We aren't quite there yet in Florida, but I'm wondering what the discussion is about what essential employees should do. Doctors, nurses and first responders too, but also the grocery store employees, garbagemen and water treatment workers, etc. Is it basically just the wild west to figure out care? I see a lot of scrambling going on and families trying to childcare swap and whatnot -- without stringent daycare cleanliness guidelines. Seems like a recipe for disaster. I guess in a perfect world there'd be some kind of federal plan in place for an emergency like this with a few centralized locations open for people who REALLY have to be at work.
starryfish , we are paying full price. The teachers still need to be paid. Unless you (general you) are yourself losing income from this situation I implore you to do the same. Daycare workers make very little and financially vulnerable as it is.
I am sympathetic to the daycare teachers, but a business owner should carry business disruption insurance to cover salaries during this time. They shouldn’t rely on families who are receiving reduced income to cover.
I'm on the board of our preschool and we had an already scheduled meeting this Monday that ended up being a coronavirus planning meeting. Apparently our center (a small non-profit) has the right insurance for this pandemic, but it also requires that three specific things are all in place in order to collect. One of which was having a diagnosed case at your center. So unfortunately, they can't collect on their policy UNTIL someone is actually infected. It also requires that they be mandated to close by some governing body, and I can't remember the third. We also did the work to determine how long they could stay afloat on bare bones expenses, including all of their current teacher's full salaries (without any income coming in).
All that to say, when I talked to all of the staff between last night and this morning, they are all wanting to stay open until they're told not to. The ONLY thing they don't like, is that they know they have some parents who are no longer working (in any capacity, at home or away from the home), but are still sending their kids. They are thinking of trying to find some kind of temporary policy change to deal with that, so they can limit the number of kids they do have to the parents who are still working.
Our neighboring state just limited daycares to a max of 50 kids total and 10 staff. Our total center is only 8 staff and less than 50 kids on a normal basis (even less so right now with people keeping kids home), so even if MN adopted the same restrictions they would stay open.
Post by ellipses84 on Mar 19, 2020 11:30:40 GMT -5
Our daycare is being asked to stay open by the state, but with less than 50 kids and classrooms of less than 10. They take each kids’ temperature at the door each day. We aren’t sending DS2 right now because DH isn’t working, and I’m working from home, but we may have to send him again next week.
Well MA is officially closing all daycares starting Monday. I'm curious how this is going to play out. I definitely see both sides of the tuition debate. I care for our teachers and want them to be paid. However, if this goes on longterm, 1) I'm guessing the center will lay them off so they can collect unemployment and 2) I can't keep paying $2K a month for no care. DD1 is starting K in the fall anyway. I was already considering pulling her and re-enrolling if this ends sooner than I'm thinking it will.
Susie, would you mind sharing that list of links the other daycare center sent you? I'm struggling to keep my kids entertained (4 and 18 mos) and I'd appreciate any ideas.
Before the mandatory closing was issued, our center sent an email allowing us to temporarily dis-enroll for the time that the public schools are currently closed without losing our spot. We were keeping her home anyway so we took advantage of that, and we’ll see what’s happening in 3 weeks.
We aren’t currently losing income, but are definitely mindful of layoffs. DH and my jobs are not secure with a global hit to the economy.
Our daycare will close Monday and they haven’t told us if we will still owe tuition. My office is still open and I have to go in next week. If we still owe $500/week to daycare and need to pay a nanny a minimum of $15/hour for 8 hours a day for 4 days a week, we will be paying close to $1,000 a week in childcare until this ends.
starryfish, we are paying full price. The teachers still need to be paid. Unless you (general you) are yourself losing income from this situation I implore you to do the same. Daycare workers make very little and financially vulnerable as it is.
I am sympathetic to the daycare teachers, but a business owner should carry business disruption insurance to cover salaries during this time. They shouldn’t rely on families who are receiving reduced income to cover.
In my industry, business interruption insurance has already started denying claims because the vast majority of policies have an exclusion for “pandemics” or “closure due to virus.” My policy has the latter. I don’t know what the policies of other industries say. Our trade organization is trying to lobby Congress to make the insurances amend their exclusions due to circumstances. Apparently Congress has done it before for other localized natural disasters so who knows.
Both of the daycares my kids attend are still open. The moms where I live already think I’m the worst because I’m sending my kids and defending that daycares should stay open so essential workers can still send their kids and have one less thing to worry about. This isn’t Chuck E Cheese. It’s a highly regulated industry providing a very valuable service for the parents of a vulnerable young population.
Post by chocolatepie on Mar 19, 2020 21:02:16 GMT -5
I oversee a daycare at a non-profit. We do not qualify for unemployment, so my teachers are screwed if we close, and our insurance policy does not cover pandemics. We do not have enough $$ to pay them for weeks on end without tuition.
Our licensing board asked centers to stay open, if possible, due to the amount of demand. We are working under heightened policies and have given staff an out if they'd rather not work. So far, they all want to be there. In addition, we are extending care to older siblings of current families. We have a LOT of healthcare employees who use our program.
That said - many of our families are not currently coming, and we are a small program anyways, so it was easy to adapt to even smaller groups. It's clearly meeting a need in our community for now.
On the flipside... I use a homebased program for my 5 month old (our program doesn't take infants) and he went all this week but I decided to pull him for now and continue to pay her. I don't know if the other parents are taking the same precautions we are, or even where they work, and it just became overwhelming to me. In a home environment, the strict sanitation steps we are taking in a center were not happening + she has a family coming in and out of the house. My job is extremely flexible and right now, I can work around an infant. DH could not do this so we're just lucky.
My DH doesn't love that we're paying her for nothing but for now, we can afford the financial hit and we want to maintain the relationship and spot with her.
We are likely going on shelter in place rules this weekend so our kids are probably done with daycare for now. It is an in home, so I will 100% keep paying her full price until we return so she can pay her bills and eat. We are so fortunate to have two paying jobs right now and I want to do what I can to keep those who rely on us afloat.
My son goes to a preschool (ages 2 through K). They announced the closure until May 1 to follow K-12 area schools. They will be providing daily lesson plans to parents, will pay all their teachers and staff, and will not charge tuition for the month of April. I am very impressed at how they are handling it.
We just pulled my kid last week (although paid for last week and this week already), and I emailed them today to let them know we giving up our enrollment placeholder so we don't have to pay anymore. We'll put down a deposit to "hold" a spot in the Toddler room come May once he turns one.
My husband and I have both been reduced to 4 day work weeks (we work in hospitality) and I wouldn't be surprised if one or the both of us end up furloughed altogether. We'll make do for the 3-days a week (his parents have quarantined themselves for two weeks now so they can come help us).
I'm in Tampa and 95% sure we are about to go under a shelter-in-place order as well so I imagine they'll close by Tuesday anyway.
Post by awkwardpenguin on Mar 22, 2020 17:43:24 GMT -5
Our daycare has been closed since 3/17 and will remain closed through at least 4/21. Daycare has asked us to pay 70% of tuition for the duration of the closure so they can keep paying staff. We’ve already paid full March tuition. I don’t know what insurance they have but it seems like a lot to ask of families. Ultimately they are a business and none of us know how long this will last.
My dd goes to preschool for 2.5 hours 4 days a week. We received a email that full April tuition is due on the it is needed for the small business to stay afloat. I was kind of thrown off that they asked for full payment ($540) but I realized that my dh is still receiving a paycheck so we can do a bit to help keep the local economy going. I was expecting maybe half payment since they are posting a few ideas on Facebook a week.
My daycare officially closed, but they emailed us asking to keep paying so they can reopen with full staff when things settle. I REALLY don’t want to have to do a daycare search again when it took so long for us to find a daycare that we loved. If my kids can start again at the same school with the same teachers, it will make transition easier. Plus lord knows after so long home, my boss would not be amused if I had to continue to wfh until we secured a spot somewhere new.
I pulled my daughter (4) from daycare when my son’s (K) school closed. I’m fortunate my husband & I are both working from home & my mom lives with us. My decision also reduces the number of children at the center. The daycare is <5 miles from the academic medical center so it’s staying open as an option for staff at the hospitals. I’ll reach out to the director closer to the end of the month to inquire how I can pay as I normally write a check.
Post by lovelyshoes on Mar 23, 2020 9:36:06 GMT -5
My daycare is open only to essential parents and asked us to pay part time rate which was billed today and is over 70% of the cost which just increased a month ago. My h was laid off last week. I don’t know how if I will be able to pay this considering that we have an older child in school and it doesn’t look like schools will reopen any time soon and my h might be home indefinitely and in all reality my job may do the same. This stinks so much, but I can’t pay over a k each month to keep a business afloat when we’re already down one income.