SALISBURY, Md. - A childcare crunch: that's what many daycare centers are predicting this fall with the uncertainty of whether kids will be back in the classroom.
Schools in Maryland have not yet made concrete plans for reopening this fall. However, one thing remains certain. Working parents will need a little extra help if their children cannot get back into the classroom full time.
"Most of my parents have all worked and some of them have even worked from home and are in such need of their children having been here because they can't get done if the little ones are running around at home," Sherrill Williams, owner of Campus Corner, says.
Some child care centers are trying to plan ahead for what could be an unpredictable school year. Williams says they are making plans to continue helping their children with their school work while they're at the center and will make adjustments as needed. She says, however, that they can only have a certain number of kids per teacher in the room, given COVID-19 precautions. If students are only allowed back part time, more parents will be looking for help.
"I do think there's going to be a large need for childcare," Williams say. "I don't know that we're all going to be able to meet it because you can only mess with ratios so much. And, I'm concerned because I do think there's going to be a lot of centers and home centers that don't reopen."
There's a financial concern for some centers that will also have to make adjustments.
"I'm definitely giving discounts for people who were planning on going off for school," Shari Parsons, owner of Little People Day Care, says. "Now, they're kind of having to intertwine different days of the week so that kind of hurts a little bit financially because we're trying to you know keep up with the parents needs rather than just our normal set schedules and prices."
Maryland's Department of Education has a working document, listing all the different ways school can safely reopen this fall. But again, there is no set plan for what the fall will look like.
