Reading Katherine Mangan anticipation of Fall’s Looming Child-Care Crisis. It comes with some suggestions:
Amy Armenia, chair of the sociology department at Rollins College in Winter Park, Fla., has been studying ways colleges can help alleviate child-care crises this fall. Programs in women’s and gender studies have also been collecting models of promising ideas, most of which have yet to be put into practice. Among the suggestions Armenia and two psychology faculty members compiled:
Put nonessential service obligations, like curriculum reform, on hold.
Evaluate teaching loads and enrollments to be sure that early-career academics, who are more likely to have young children, aren’t overly burdened with large courses.
Allow flexibility for asynchronous teaching, work from home, and nonstandard work times.
Help employees help each other by setting up banks for unused sick leave or coordinating efforts to share part-time nannies and tutors.
Create lists of employees without current care-giving responsibilities who are willing to spend an hour or two a week virtually reading books or teaching math lessons.