Four teachers at the Dartmouth College Child Care Center have been given the pseudonyms Amanda, Grace, Olivia and Sophia. They each have been granted anonymity so they may speak candidly about their experiences.
On Aug. 26, Latin American, Latino and Caribbean studies professor Marcela di Blasi sent a petition to several senior administrators expressing “great concern” that the College may have “solicited and received proposals” to transfer operations of the Dartmouth College Child Care Center from the College to a for-profit child care provider.
The letter — written by several parents of children at D4C and shared with College President Sian Leah Beilock, senior vice president for capital planning and campus operations Josh Keniston, Provost David Kotz and chief human resources officer Sara Lester — has gained more than 390 signatures from professors, graduate students, D4C employees and others affiliated with the College. The signatories wrote “in support of” D4C and warned against the potential “sacrifice of childcare quality” if operations are transferred, according to a copy of the petition obtained by The Dartmouth.
In an email reply to di Blasi — a parent of two children at D4C — and petition signers obtained and reviewed by The Dartmouth, Keniston wrote that “no final decisions have been made” about the future of the childcare center. However, in an interview with The Dartmouth, Keniston confirmed that the potential privatization had been discussed.
“It is a scenario that is on the table, but we haven’t yet finished understanding all of the different ramifications,” Keniston said. “The petition got a little ahead of us, but that’s okay — we value the feedback.”
According to a teacher at D4C — who will be referred to in this article as Amanda — signatories learned of the potential privatization through the “rumor mill.” Another D4C teacher, who will be referred to as Sophia, wrote in an email statement to The Dartmouth that she heard about potential plans to transfer ownership of D4C to a for-profit childcare company during a parent-teacher conference in August. A third D4C teacher, who will be referred to as Grace, said a member of the Center’s custodial staff told her that for-profit childcare center Bright Horizons Family Solutions “had a walkthrough” of the Center one evening.
According to di Blasi, writing the petition became “urgent” when the authors developed a “strong belief” that Dartmouth would sign a contract with Bright Horizons before the end of August. This contract, according to several community members, could have had wide-reaching implications for employees of D4C and the children it serves.
According to sociology professor Casey Stockstill — whose academic expertise includes childhood and education — for-profit childcare chains tend to cultivate “hard working conditions” for teachers and “cut labor costs wherever possible.” For example, she wrote in an email statement to The Dartmouth that the chains may employ the “fewest teachers allowed by legal ratios,” send teachers home early and combine classrooms “when they can.”
“That’s the only way to profit in [the] care work industry,” she wrote.
These conditions lead to higher teacher turnover rates at for-profit childcare chains compared to childcare centers sponsored by non-profits, such as D4C, Stockstill added.
Currently, D4C’s teacher-to-student ratio exceeds the minimum set by New Hampshire state law for preschools, Grace said. This allows teachers to give children individualized attention and affords children the opportunity to “learn at their own pace” in a “fun and enriching way,” Sophia wrote.
“Children learn best this way and not from some cookie-cutter binder curriculum,” Sophia continued. “Classrooms shouldn’t be overcrowded with children … and teachers should be able to teach not only what they want to teach but what they see their students are most interested in.”
According to the petition, for-profit chains seek to reduce the labor costs of teachers, affecting the teachers’ “important bonds with their young students.”
“I love watching [the children in my room] grow from babies to little preschoolers,” Grace said. “…They become so independent, and they are so proud of themselves. To [not] be able to spend time one-on-one or in small groups — to [not] be able to actually teach them and show them how to do things for themselves … just crushes me.”
Moreover, Grace said she is concerned that teachers may be laid off in order to prioritize “making money over quality care” if D4C is taken over by a for-profit child care organization.
A fourth D4C teacher, who will be referred to as Olivia, said she has a similar concern. Even if it “may not be accurate” that the operations of the childcare center will be transferred to a for-profit company, she said she did not sleep well one night because of the uncertainty about her future employment status — especially as a single mother.
“What if I lose this job?” Olivia said. “Someone else gave me another job offer [as a private nanny] — do I wait? … Do I leave [D4C] and go to this job that I know is going to be stable, or do I stay here because I’m making more money, and I know what my insurance is, and I know what my income is, and I know what bills I have to pay?”
Olivia added that she has felt “frustration, anger and uncertainty” because she feels the College has not been “transparent” about the impact that changes to D4C may have on current staff members. The perceived lack of transparency between higher-level decision-makers and D4C teachers has made it difficult for teachers to trust the College, she explained.
“When they tell us something, we don’t know if they’re telling the truth or not because they haven’t been transparent this whole time,” Olivia said. “Are we going to believe them when they tell us something? Will they give us a contract [so that teachers] know that they’re not going to try this again?”
Amanda wrote that she believes the College’s current decision-making process involves “secrecy.”
“Staff and families should have been informed much earlier on in the process by the people making these decisions,” she wrote. “Instead, we heard through the rumor mill, then the petition and a newspaper article. As staff, we still have yet to hear from the College.”
Keniston said he and Lester have been “charged” with “coming up with the solutions [and] making recommendations” for the College to increase access to affordable child care — which he said is one of Beilock’s “key initiatives” — with a “small feedback group.” According to Keniston, the group includes D4C administrative director Sunnie McPhetres, two D4C staff members, two parents of children at the Center, two parents whose children are not currently enrolled at the Center and a representative from the College’s Council on Work-Life Issues. He and Lester are also “relying” on reports that have been issued by COWLI about housing and childcare, which have “informed some of the things [he and Lester] are looking at,” Keniston said.
In an email statement to The Dartmouth, COWLI member and Geisel School of Medicine professor Erika Moen wrote, however, that she had “first found out” the College may be considering an ownership transfer when she read the petition letter.
“As a member of the Council of Work-Life Issues, we had been requesting an update on the administration’s plans for childcare but had not received a response,” she wrote.
According to Keniston, the College plans to “roll out” and solicit feedback on potential scenarios from the community at large in the fall.
“Our plan is, later in September and into October, to put forward to the community a couple of different scenarios of what we’re looking at, and to ask for feedback about which ones make the most sense for Dartmouth,” he said.
