School board eyes empty classrooms for childcare
Vancouver Courier
Cheryl Rossi
January 16, 2009

Good news appears to be on the horizon for parents seeking out-of-school care for their children.

COPE trustee Allan Wong, chair of the school board's planning and facilities committee, believes the new board at its next meeting Jan. 19 will change policy preventing empty classrooms from being used for out-of-school care.

For parents--including a Selkirk elementary school mother who switched from full-time to part-time work, and parents who brought their children's grandparents to Canada from Europe because they couldn't find out-of-school care--the prospect means relief.

"There are many empty classrooms available throughout Vancouver, so having this policy that prevented the use of those classrooms for a demonstrated need where there are long wait lists... and having a policy that absolutely forbid it was really not good a thing," said Robin Macqueen, who has a son in Grade 1 French immersion at Selkirk elementary. The Kensington-Cedar Cottage-area Selkirk, he added, is not the only school with long waiting lists for out-of-school care. Macqueen's son Jared got a spot in after-school care in mid-December. Macqueen, chair of the physics department at Langara College, had changed his work schedule so he could pick up his son at 3 p.m. and teach another course at night. Last year, his son's two hours of kindergarten switched from morning to afternoon halfway through the year. Unable to get Jared into out-of-school care, Macqueen and his wife hired au pairs from Mexico and France.

Cedar Cottage Neighbourhood House runs an out-of-school care program licensed for 45 children at Selkirk and programs at a handful of other schools. In December, its waiting list at Selkirk included more than 50 children. Macqueen and another parent, Ronda Field, spoke at the school board's planning and facilities committee Jan. 6. They said the director of Cedar Cottage told them the only reason for Selkirk's waiting list was the lack of access to classroom space at Selkirk in which to operate a childcare.

School board policy states it's "inappropriate" to use classroom space for childcare because determining available classroom space is difficult from year to year and childcare programs have a difficult time finding alternative accommodation….

He and Field noted that school districts in North Vancouver, Kelowna and Victoria allow out-of-school care programs in their classrooms…

Further uncertainty exists because the Ministry of Education is still exploring whether it will provide all-day kindergarten for children from three to five years old, as mentioned in last year's legislative throne speech.

"OK, fine, they don't know how much space they're going to need in the future, but in the meantime, parents are making major sacrifices because we don't have childcare," Macqueen said…