Student-parent Aimee Ross-Kilroy never really thought about day care when she was getting ready to have her baby. Not only did she believe it wouldn’t be available, but if it was, she thought the cost would be too expensive.
When she discovered the EMU Child Care and Development Centers, however, she found herself pleasantly surprised.
CCDC provides affordable day care for student-parents, as well as those from the larger community, through seven separate centers located around Eugene.
“For me, it’s been great … They’re really caring when I drop [my daughter] off. She’s happy to be there; she doesn’t want to leave,” said Ross-Kilroy, a graduate English student at the University. “I’m finishing up my dissertation. I don’t think I’d be able to if we didn’t have affordable day care.”
Providing student-parents with low-cost child care while attempting to maintain the quality atmosphere Ross-Kilroy described, however, has taken its toll on CCDC. According to the center’s budget summary for the 1999-2000 school year, CCDC is looking at a deficit of between $18,000 to nearly $30,000. That number, out of a budget totaling $746,633 for the year, will not be absolutely determined until after the figures from May and June have come in.
It is not unusual for CCDC’s income to vary a little bit each year. The numbers fluctuate a percentage point or two so that some years it turns a profit while other years it loses money.
Overall, CCDC is not in debt. This year’s hole, however, is a bit larger than a percentage point or two and will range from 2.5 percent to 4.5 percent of its budget, CCDC Coordinator Dennis Reynolds said.
There are many reasons, he added, that go into explaining why this year the points are slightly higher than usual. The CCDC receives roughly one-third of its budget money from the student incidental fee; it is responsible for raising the other two-thirds on its own.
“Our goal — and it’s what we’re budgeted to do — is just to break even each year,” Reynolds said.
The biggest drainage point this year was when CCDC decided to open more centers during the 1999 summer months. Money is generally lost during the summer, Reynolds said, and that applies to all EMU programs. But this past summer, CCDC lost more than was anticipated.
In response to parent requests, CCDC opened more than the five programs it traditionally keeps open. The problem was the additional programs weren’t utilized enough to break even, Reynolds said. As a result, CCDC started the fall looking at a significant summer hole that it has since been unable to climb out of.
Another reason CCDC can’t claw out of their hole is that there are considerably fewer parents enrolling their children in full-time day care. In the past, about 50 percent enrolled were full-time, but it is now down to about 20 percent.
This is due in part, Reynolds said, to the fact that the centers offer great flexibility to parents. Instead of forcing full-time care, or having just morning or afternoon care, the centers operate on block schedules. This means that there are blocks of time, such as 8 a.m. to noon or 12:30 p.m. to 5 p.m., that parents can choose from.
This freedom, however, means that sometimes classrooms are full and sometimes they are nearly empty.
“The reality in terms of how you folks live your lives as students, it’s not an eight to five existence,” Reynolds said. “It’s not a very cost-effective way for us to run a child-care program, but it helps student-parents.”
In addition, with just slightly fewer children enrolled, income dips dramatically, Reynolds said. Last year, there were 165 kids enrolled in CCDC programs; this year, there are 153.
Finally, another drain this year has been a change in the administration of the child-care subsidy program. In previous years, the CCDC ran the program through its office, for which it received a $16,314 subsidy. Halfway through the year, the ASUO Executive decided to move the operations to its own office, which meant CCDC only received half of that amount.
Former ASUO President Wylie Chen said moving the program was done to bring student-parents into the executive office so they could utilize the resources the ASUO provides.
To try to climb out of the hole, CCDC is attempting to better monitor its expenses. Payroll, which constitutes $630,036 of the $746,633 budget, is fixed because of union contracts, Reynolds said. The only thing left to do with that is tighten schedules, which means not only fewer hours for all workers but also hiring fewer work-study students.
“We tightened staff, we reduced costs, but we haven’t been able to tighten enough to get out of the summer hole,” Reynolds said.
CCDC will be opening fewer centers during the summer to try and combat the deficit. It will also be opening a site that runs only part-time. Finally, child care rates will be slightly increased. The rate for student parents will be 2 percent more than it is this year. The rate for community members, who can take the spots not filled by student-parent children in the programs, will increase 5 percent.
There’s not a whole lot of room to maneuver when it comes to running the CCDC, Reynolds said. The programs need to maintain a state-mandated ratio of children to teachers, which is one adult for every 10 preschoolers and one adult for every four toddlers. Currently, CCDC maintains an even smaller ratio: one adult for every six preschoolers and one adult for every three toddlers.
Trying to keep child care affordable to student-parents creates a difficult situation, Reynolds said, and compromises are made wherever they can be.
“Give me endless funding, and I can create great programs for kids,” Reynolds said.