Call Rafael: Childcare workers face fallout from budget crunch

FISHERS, Ind. — Katelyn Brydon is getting ready for the day at the Teddy Bear Learning Center in Fishers. Working with young kids, you never know what they are going to do or say.

“I like the connection, and I like seeing kids develop and change in their own way,” Brydon said.

Katelyn, looking for career development, signed up to get her Child Development Associate Credential, better known as a CDA. It’s required by childcare licensing and involves 120 hours of coursework work, a portfolio, passing a test, and being observed by a master instructor before getting the certification.

“I would want the best for my child. In the daycare, I would want the best,” Brydon said.

Katelyn was expecting to get trained by the Early Childhood CDA Training Center.

It had received state funding to provide people, mostly women, with the skills needed to get their CDA. Each woman was eligible to get a grant totally $3,300 through the Department of Workforce Development to cover the training costs.

Weeks before 100 women were set to begin their classes, the center, hoping for changes in state funding, was forced to tell students that their grant would not be available.

Deb Pierce and Patricia Dickmann are retired education professors who started the training agency.

“Our training was approved by the state for Next Level Jobs funding through DWD. It was only last year, when we started our agency, that childcare was first recognized as a “high-demand” job to qualify for grant funding,” Pierce said. “This was incredulous to us, since quality childcare makes all other occupations possible.”

She feels Hoosier families have been betrayed.

“Our children are worth it. Our children are worth it. If you don’t have trained teachers, we can’t get quality childcare,” said Pierce.

The Department of Workforce Development points to a major cut in the budget of $5 million that will impact the funding. On top of that, the legislature changed which job categories would get training dollars based on demand and earning potential.

Training providers like the CDA Center have been put on hold, though the state said it will reimburse childcare employers if they pay for their workers’ training.

The Early Childhood CDA Center is concerned about the fallout in communities across the state.

“There will be a lot of news stories you don’t want to hear, accidents and incidents from untrained teachers caring for kids, and we don’t want to see that,” Pierce said.

Pierce is not giving up on her students. She said with more than 3,000 open childcare positions statewide, she is looking at any other options to help workers get the training that children and families deserve.

“It is only by acquiring additional education that a childcare provider can earn more money,” Pierce said. “Otherwise, they are stuck in a low-paying position in a poor-quality program. Poor quality programs put Indiana children at risk in many, many ways.”