As Jefferson City Public Schools and the community prepare to decide whether or how to adjust start times for the 2019-20 school year, one of the main local after-school child care providers anticipates challenges if older students leave school an hour later than their younger siblings.
JCPS is considering how to better synchronize all of its school start times to have all elementary buildings start at one time and all secondary buildings at another, one hour apart. District officials have said the change would save up to approximately $500,000 annually in bus transportation costs, and might help alleviate some existing busing headaches and new route challenges presented by having to accommodate Capital City High School.
The school district has scheduled two upcoming town hall meetings for the community to discuss proposed start time changes: 6 p.m. Tuesday, Jan. 29, at Lewis & Clark Middle School; and 5 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 31, at Thomas Jefferson Middle School.
One option would be to have all elementary students start school an hour earlier than middle and high school students and have secondary students start closer to 9 a.m., to take advantage of what research shows - older students do better in school with later start times.
School start times in the district are currently scattered between 7:50-9 a.m., though the middle and high school buildings tend to start earlier at 7:50 or 8 a.m.
"As we've looked at this in the past, this is the biggest thing we've heard, is that - and it is a real issue for our families - is that currently with all of our secondary students getting out first, and our elementary students getting out second, the older children are home as the elementary students get off the bus, so that is the child care for our families. People rely on that, and if we make this change, that goes away and people are going to have to figure out what to do with their elementary students at the end of the day," JCPS' chief financial and operating officer Jason Hoffman said Friday at the district's monthly morning community coffee with Superintendent Larry Linthacum, which the News Tribune watched online.
"I do think there's going to be an increase in demand for after-school care" if the school district makes a change to have older siblings leave school later, Jessica Kever said Friday. Kever is the Jefferson City Area YMCA's director of child care services for its Y-Care program.
She said more than 400 students use Y-Care, which is available at every JCPS elementary school except East and Callaway Hills.
The state-licensed program is open to students in grades K-5 and offers opportunities including physical education and an afternoon snack. The cost is a $30 non-refundable registration fee due at the time of enrollment and a monthly fee which varies between $125 and $180, depending on whether a child is served through both morning and afternoon care and whether a parent is a YMCA member. Financial assistance for qualifying families is available.
Belair, Cedar Hill, Lawson, Thorpe Gordon and West elementary schools offer morning and afternoon Y-Care on site; Moreau Heights and North elementary schools only offer afternoon care on site. The YMCA transports students for afternoon care from Pioneer Trail and South elementary schools to the Knowles YMCA.
"We are full at most of our schools," Kever said, adding the length of wait lists depends on individual schools and whether parents want their child in the morning or afternoon programs.
Kever also said elementary schools that let out closer to 3 p.m. tend to be most full, because parents can't typically get out of work that early.
YMCA members are given priority on waiting lists for Y-Care. After early enrollment closes, registrations are taken on a first-come, first-serve basis - regardless of membership - and parents must re-enroll their child every year.
Kever said Y-Care would likely eliminate its morning programs and expand its license for afternoon programs if JCPS changed its start times in a way that would likely increase demand for after-school child care. She said enrollment for all Jefferson City programs is currently capped at 60.
She said license expansion is not a complicated process - just requiring paperwork and the purchase of extra supplies, and the Blair Oaks Elementary School program has expanded to 80 children - but "it's really a staffing issue for us," she said of challenges that expansion could present. "It's (about) finding the leadership."
Kever said one of the reasons Y-Care tries not to expand is because each school site is required to have a director - basically someone with a four-year college degree or a minimum level of experience.
The Missouri Department of Health and Human Services requires a licensed child care center with a capacity of between 21-60 children must have a director with 60 college semester hours - including 12 in child-related courses - or 24 months of experience and 12 college semester hours in child-related courses.
A site capacity of 61-99 children bumps those requirements up to 90 college hours, with 18 of them related to children, or 36 months of experience and 18 child-related course hours. Caring for 100 or more children at a site requires a director with even more college hours or experience, though six of the college hours may include courses in business or management.
Child care centers that supervise children 5 years old and older are also required to have one caregiver present for every 16 children - at every minute the center is in operation, Kever added.
"We rely heavily on college students" for staff, she said, especially students majoring in education. "As far as assistants that are there, we would be open to having volunteers," but she said it can get difficult to find enough people to work part time and be part of a consistent workforce.
Her other concern about a possible change in school start times that would have secondary students leave school later is that Y-Care currently has six high school students working. High school students must be 18 years old to be eligible to work at Y-Care, so she said they typically join the second semester of their senior year.
She said child care centers are also required to have 35 square feet of space for every child being cared for.
More information about Y-Care is available at www.jcymca.org/?page_id=395.
The News Tribune also contacted the Boys & Girls Club of Jefferson City for this story on Friday, but was unable to speak with someone about that program's ability to expand. The Boys & Girls Club serves approximately 230 students at its main building, and an additional 180 students in after-school programs at Callaway Hills and Pioneer Trail elementary schools and Thomas Jefferson and Lewis & Clark middle schools.
Boys & Girls Club enrollment is open to children ages 5-18, in grades K-12. The membership fee is $25 a semester, and the maximum membership fee for a family of three or more children is $50 a semester. A minimum of the first month's membership fee must be submitted with an application.
Children eligible for free or reduced-price lunch at school have full scholarships available to them at the Boys & Girls Club during the school year and partial scholarships during summer camp.
More information is available at bgcjc.com/home.
JCPS communications staff said Friday the district does not keep track of how many students rely on older siblings for after-school care.
Mallory McGowin, JCPS communications and marketing specialist, said the district counts how many students attend Y-Care or the Boys & Girls Club, and how many ride buses or cars - adding the count of car-riders includes students who are picked up and transported by their day cares.
Ryan Burns, JCPS director of communications, said Friday district leaders had recently met with the staff at Jefferson City Academic Center, Nichols Career Center and Belair. Burns added the feedback Friday from Belair staff - which currently has a 9 a.m. start time - about a possible earlier start time was overwhelmingly positive.
Hoffman said Friday Nichols' 8 a.m. start time would probably not change at least for next school year because students sent from area schools are served in the mornings, and Jefferson City and Capital City high school students could attend in the afternoon and leave an hour earlier. "We'd give it a try and see if it works - seems like it would work," he said.
Hoffman added a voluntary "zero hour" could be offered for high school students - "there wouldn't be transportation, but if there are students who really need to be gone earlier, they can't stay until 4 o'clock in the afternoon for some reason, they could take a zero-hour course and leave an hour early. We also have work-study programs at the high school level."