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Opportunity Abounds
March 17, 2009
Imagination is more important than knowledge. Knowledge is limited. Imagination encircles the world.
-Albert Einstein
-Albert Einstein
"Hard times are just that — hard. For most, sticking their head in the sand and ‘waiting this thing out’ is a plan of survival. For others, keeping your head up with eyes wide open for opportunities is a chance to succeed abundantly. Here are a few opportunities, which might be available:
- Staff is on board with a full understanding of the financial demands and current economic reality of the school/center.
- All staff is committed to absolute excellent service, school/center cleanliness, and frugality.
- All staff is involved in marketing of the school/center on a daily basis — both internally and externally.
- All operational procedures are analyzed for greater efficiency with marketing activities tracked daily.
- Vendor contracts are reviewed for possible reductions or renegotiation, including landlords.
- Vendors are on board with increased quality, especially janitorial.
- Parent communication is increased through personal contact and Internet communication.
- The program is interviewing for higher-quality staff.
- You offer ‘enhancement’ part-time schedules for parents losing jobs.
- As director/owner, daily marketing is your number one priority.
- You increase the number of ancillary services offered to help families (i.e., morning coffee, ‘free’ parent’s night out, etc.)
- You increase weekend events at the school/center such as organizing a job fair for parents.
- You become politically active at the local level.
- You increase your school/center’s profile through community activities with staff participation.
- You personally attend various community groups as the ‘expert’ in early care and education.
- You commit to being a little bit better in everything you do instead of being the best in one thing.
- You leverage additional benefits from existing vendors.
- You increase the range of services you offer to families, where possible.
In ExchangeEveryDay on March 5 we announced the $10,000 "Exchange Stimulus Package". Exchange and our advertising partners, Community Playthings, Teaching Strategies, Inc., and Kaplan Early Learning Company invite you to share your ideas on the steps your program can take, big and little, to start reversing the downturn — one family, one neighborhood at a time. In your next staff meeting, hold a brainstorming session on what you can do to support each other, to help families weather the storm, and to assist small businesses in your community to start growing. We will award the 10 organizations contributing the most creative ideas with $1,000 gift certificates. Then tell us about your best "Make Change Happen" idea on our web site by March 20, 2009.
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ExchangeEveryDay is the official electronic newsletter for Exchange Press. It is delivered five days a week containing news stories, success stories, solutions, trend reports, and much more.
Put a sink where it’s needed most
In the classroom, or on the playground, it’s portable, self contained, and very affordable. Plumbing is NOT required. Have hot & cold running water when you need it where you need it. Ideal for hand washing with young children
In the classroom, or on the playground, it’s portable, self contained, and very affordable. Plumbing is NOT required. Have hot & cold running water when you need it where you need it. Ideal for hand washing with young children
Comments (1)
Displaying 1 CommentWheelock College
Lincoln, MA, United States
These positive ideas are great for
our field in these bad times. I would add one more: that all our teachers will become more empathetic with the parents of the children, as more families lose the jobs that have enabled them to keep their families out of poverty. I was once part of a study on how "family friendly" a group of centers were, about six of so years ago. We found that the directors were indeed family friendly but the teachers far less so. They felt in some cases morally superior to parents. I wondered whether it was because teachers are young, and some of them have not yet fully succeeded in overthrowing their own internal parent. Not on a survey but in conversation, we could hear "WE came to the meeting; THEY didn't come. WE care about these children; THEY don't care the way we do." The image of the parent, especially of the mother, seemed to be a militant feminist attacking the glass ceiling. In real life, many of the families in our programs are working in order to keep their families out of poverty. The majority of the families at the median income are at that income level only because both parents are working. They would be poor otherwise. They are not subsidized
by our public policy because they are not poor. They are working at least 1 and 1/2 jobs per family and up to 3 or even more combined jobs.
Our government wants to help children, but not parents, and we want to help children on the condition that they be poor and stay poor. I would like to think that the
economic recession or depression we are in might result in a different
set of attitudes at the level of serving children and also at the public policy level. Many families will be losing some of the jobs which enabled them to rescue their families from poverty. We need to help them access tax relief and subsidy for child care, and also to access other services that should be connected. As they increasingly lose some of their jobs, we need to support families eking out an existence by combining part-time and low income jobs. We are one of the few services that views children and their families as competent, while also helping families with problems of various sorts. We need a society that offers help in welcoming places, located where parents can get to, by friendly people, without demeaning processes and relationships, without undue red tape, in languages they can understand.
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