New Anchorage school start times have families wondering where they’ll find child care

Gruening Middle School band teacher Phillip Walters has been teaching for nearly 20 years. But as he prepares to go back to the classroom, this year feels different: He has no idea who’s going to watch his two young boys after school. They’ll be out at 2:30 p.m., but he won’t get home until 4:30 p.m.

“We’re going to kind of fly by the seat of our pants,” Walters said. “I kind of feel like a lot of people are going to be in that situation where they don’t really know what this is going to look like until it starts happening, and then they’re just going to have to figure something out.”

The Anchorage School District will start classes Aug. 15 with very different start times for elementary, middle and high school. The move is one of three major changes coming to the district this fall intended to increase graduation rates for older students. But child care experts say the sector is already facing a crisis and worry the new schedules will make it even more difficult for families to find care for young children.

The Walters’ oldest son has been on a waitlist for nearby child care for five years. Relatives visiting from out of town can help the family out for a few weeks. After that, Walters and his wife will likely ask friends and neighbors for help watching their children. And if that doesn’t work, Walters said, they may have to consider something more drastic.

“When this came up, Jamie and I talked about it and the possibility of her having to quit her job or reduce her hours is very real if we can’t find a consistent friend or a relative that can watch the boys,” Walters said.

The Walters family is not alone.

In a survey of nearly 1,000 Alaska parents last year, one in four people said they had reduced work hours, quit or changed their job to care for their children over the last four years.

When the Anchorage School Board voted to change start times, they based their decision on research that shows when older students start later, they get more sleep, get better grades and have fewer car crashes. Most board members voted in favor of the change, but the vote to postpone it until the start of this school year was split. Dora Wilson was among the board members who voted to postpone the start times change last May.

“I think our staff, our community, our programs, our families, our community partners deserve the time to prepare for this change,” Wilson said during a school board meeting in May of 2023.

Despite delaying the change for a year, there’s no sign child care is any easier to secure in Anchorage.

Anchorage had more than 300 licensed child care facilities as recently as 2015, but that figure dipped below 200 last fall, according Stephanie Berglund, the CEO of thread, a nonprofit that works to improve access to childcare. Berglund said overall there are about 10,000 more children in Anchorage that need supervision than there are slots in child care facilities.

“For families, we know the demand is there, the demand is actually increasing, but the supply is not at the pace that we need to to support families who need it,” Berglund said.

A 2021 report from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation estimated that the child care shortage costs the Alaska economy $165 million each year. There are two working groups studying solutions. Local child care providers in Anchorage have been meeting with school district staff to discuss transportation, nutrition, and the potential for new child care programs around the district. Gov. Mike Dunleavy commissioned his own task force to study the problem last spring. A direct result of the governor’s task force is Senate Bill 189, which passed this session and allows more families to qualify for state child care assistance.

But assistance doesn’t help if there aren’t enough spots for families. Mel Hooper is the CEO of Camp Fire Alaska, the state’s largest school-aged child care provider. She said they’ve had to close more than a dozen facilities since the pandemic because it’s so hard to hire employees and cover operating costs.

“The child care sector is not stable,” Hooper said. “There’s been a lot of investment into it, but we continue to need to stabilize. And so I think the important thing here is there’s not one solution that’s going to stabilize the industry, it’s continuous invested time and resources that will stabilize our industry.”

Some help is on the way in the form of a $7.5 million subsidy included in the state budget this year to boost pay for child care employees. But high school students, who had accounted for more than a third of the workforce at Camp Fire, will be in class during the organization’s after care programs.

Emily Joyce said she previously relied on high schoolers to babysit, who are no longer an option. She’s also a teacher and has 5- and 7-year-old daughters who need afternoon child care. Joyce is thankful her mother can help but said there is no backup plan.

”If grandma is unavailable in an emergency situation, she’s sick, whatever the case may be, that’s where my panic starts to set in,” Joyce said.

Joyce said she typically gets excited for the start of school, but this year she feels anxious. Providers and district staff are asking parents to explore available options now and not wait until school starts to try and find a solution.

The Alaska Afterschool Network has a statewide map of after-school programs on their website, and thread provides free child care referrals at 800-278-3723 or on their website.