Article Link: http://exchangepress.com/article/religious-organizations-taking-proactive-role-in-child-care-trends-in-church-housed-child-care/5013318/
In the early 1980s, the National Council of Churches sponsored a pioneering study on the provision of child care by religious organizations in the United States. The authors of the final report, Eileen Lindner, Mary Mattis, and June Rogers, concluded that "church-housed child care . . . is generally robust and full-functioning." However, they cautioned, "Our evidence suggests that child care in the churches requires more intentionality on the part of national church agencies if the quantity and quality of care offered is to continue and increase" (Lindner, 1983).Two decades later, the current evidence suggests that their message hit home. We have identified four key trends among centers with religious connections. All of these trends to some degree reflect a tendency for religious organizations at the national and local levels to get more actively involved in the provision of child care services.
Another outgrowth of the report that is promoting the development of the sector is the increasing influence of the Ecumenical Child Care Network. An immediate step the National Council of Churches took upon completion of the study was to convert its Child Advocacy Working Group into a permanent Ecumenical Child Care Network (ECCN). The purposes of this new NCC ...