Women

Professionalizing child care would be good for kids and for working mothers.

Posted on by HyeSook Chung

Lack of access to high quality child care is one of the biggest missing pieces to welfare-to-work efforts.  The care available to most low-income women and their children is usually unreliable and substandard.  In fact, many former welfare recipients themselves work providing child care – in extremely unstable situations with low wages. 

So why is supporting child care and early learning opportunities important? 

Because it would provide a critical work support for low-income mothers.  It would improve devastating and often irreversible outcomes of at-risk children. 

But most importantly, it would raise the income and career opportunities of many people formerly on welfare, serving as a model of how to upgrade low-wage work into a desirable and supported profession.

Unfortunately, public and private funding is not providing the adequate funds needed to support high quality child care.

Many states have placed income-eligibility limits on child-care subsidies.  States also require co-payments from families, which makes quality care unaffordable to many low-income families. Further, states reimburse providers at less than the cost of quality care. Furthermore, many child care providers will not accept government vouchers because they need to maintain their bottom-line and maintain quality.

Yet with more low-income mothers in the paid workforce, demands continue to exceed the supply and the majority of eligible low-income children are not receiving subsidized care.

The average family earning $36,000, paying for care for a three-year old (at $8,800) and an infant (at $12,000), can spend up to 57 percent of their income on child care.  Earning more money does not solve the problem of access and quality because improving their income makes low-income families ineligible for subsidies.

Is this the best support to encourage families towards self sufficiency?

In the District alone, there are 6,300 full-time equivalent early care and education jobs – more than better established professions, such as public relations, public and ground transportation, and commercial construction. The early care and education industry sustains five times more jobs than investment banking in the District, according to an economic impact of early care and education industry study conducted by the National Economic Development and Law Center.

If we believe that high quality child care and early learning benefits the regional economy by enabling both low-income parents and caregivers to seek the professional advancement they need to earn more, which in turn will increase income tax revenue and improve the overall quality of life for everyone who lives in the region – there’s no question that a better trained workforce supports the region’s economy and attracts new capital investments.

But the job ladder in traditional child care is limited: teacher-aide, teacher, and supervisor.  The child care industry is characterized by long hours, social isolation from adults, few breaks, limited advancement opportunities, and poor compensation.

Job dissatisfaction produces high turnover– resulting in inconsistent, and often inadequate, care for children.

You can see the circular problem this creates, as low wages attract workers with few skills. 

Unskilled workers cannot provide quality child care.  High turnover further decreases the quality of care. Attempts to upgrade the profession fail because there is a lack of money and public will for better salaries.

There is a need for greater professionalization, for the sake of children and child care workers!

Given the difficult economic and social circumstances that many children of welfare recipients face, we (the providers) have two institutional points of contact–public school and child care–with which to improve outcomes of low-income children.

When it comes to early childhood development, there is a huge disconnect between child-development experts who make an overwhelming case for high-quality early care and education and the absence of the political will to acknowledge the need and spend the necessary funds.

A big part of this challenge is to recognize that people who work with our young children need to be well trained, paid appropriately, and appreciated as professionals.

We do know what it takes to professionalize the workers who care for young children.

What’s missing is the public will and financial support needed to make long-term sustainable change.  Investments in professionalizing the child care industry would support child care workers, women trying to transition from welfare to work without sacrificing early learning opportunities for their children, and all parents with young children in care.

HyeSook Chung is The Women’s Foundation’s Early Care and Education Program Officer.

Transportation is key to getting low-income families to work and out of poverty.

Posted on by Gwen Rubinstein

In the best of times, lack of transportation is a serious barrier to employment for low-income, single working mothers.

And now is not the best of times.

According to the congressional Joint Economic Committee, the current economic downturn threatens women’s employment more than ever, with women-headed families being particularly squeezed.

So whether an economic stimulus package focuses on creating jobs in infrastructure, public works or the “green economy,” it must include support for transportation–including for car ownership–for low-income workers to help them obtain and retain any new jobs created.

Consider:

  • Low-income workers are less likely to own an automobile than other Americans. Nationally, 7.8 percent of all U.S. residents did not have access to a car in 2000, compared to 20.4 percent of poor U.S. residents.
  • Many construction jobs are not accessible by public transportation, both because of hours (generally not the traditional 9-5 work day) and location.
  • Research has shown that for low-income (and minority households), car ownership is positively correlated with improved access to jobs, higher household incomes and more weeks worked per year.
  • Low-income single mothers are more likely to make sequential trips, such as to daycare and then to work, which are not easily supported on public transportation.

The Annie E. Casey Foundation released a documentary this year called Pursuit of the Dream: Cars & Jobs in America that looks at these issues in more depth.

Unfortunately, little public support is currently available for car ownership for low-income individuals, including women. What support is available can also be difficult for community-based organizations working with low-income, women-headed families to obtain.

Public programs, including the existing Job Access Reverse Commute (JARC) program, must be expanded – both financially and in their scope – to meet the full range of transportation needs of low-income, women-headed families.

Private programs —such as Vehicles for Change and Opportunity Cars – must be expanded through government funding and increased car donations from private citizens.

It is time for all of us to stop overlooking this important barrier to work for low-income women with children.

Gwen Rubinstein is a program officer at The Women’s Foundation.

Giving circles proving a powerful way to give more by giving together–without breaking the bank.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

As donors try to think of a way to maximize their gifts at a time of such great need througout the country, a lot of attention is falling upon giving circles as an innovative way to give a lot–as a collective, without breaking the bank–as an individual.

MSN Money recently featured a piece called, "How to give away $500,000," highlighting the African Women’s Giving Circle as one example of how giving circles allow individuals to pool their resources and make their personal gifts go further.  Not to mention have fun and forge inspiring, powerful new friendships.

Additionally, PhilanthroMedia had a post recently on how a giving circle lets everyone be a philanthropist.

And, while not a giving circle, GoErie.com featured a story yesterday on how women in Erie are pooling their funds through the Erie Women’s Fund.  Each woman gives $1,000 a year over five years, resulting in their first grant of $50,000 to the "Listen, Mentor, Act Poverty Reduction Program."

If you’re in the Washington metropolitan area and are interested in learning more about getting involved in this growing trend that can help your individual philanthropy have a bigger impact through the power of collective giving, click here.  We have two giving circles currently recruiting new members.

Lisa Kays is The Women’s Foundation’s director of communications.

Weekly Round-Up: News and Analysis on Women and Poverty (Week ending November 28, 2008)

Posted on by The Spotlight and Opportunity Team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a national foundation-led initiative, is excited to collaborate with The Women’s Foundation to bring you the latest news and analysis on women and poverty.   Spotlight is the go-to site for news and ideas about fighting poverty.

Here are the holiday week’s top stories on women and poverty. The round-up will normally appear on Fridays:

• In an Op-Ed for the San Francisco Chronicle, a sociologist argues that the abortion debate must recognize the connection between poverty and abortion.

• The Sacramento Bee reports on two low-income counties with low rates of mothers seeking prenatal care.

• The Buffalo News says that legislators must ensure WIC benefits for local mothers and their children.

• Teen mothers are struggling to get by, according to the Salem Statesman-Journal.

To learn more about Spotlight, visit www.spotlightonpoverty.org.  To sign up for our weekly updates with the latest news, opinion and research from around the country, click here.

The Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity is a foundation-led, non-partisan initiative aimed at ensuring that our political leaders take significant actions to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in the United States. We bring together diverse perspectives from the political, policy, advocacy and foundation communities to engage in an ongoing dialogue focused on finding genuine solutions to the economic hardship confronting millions of Americans.

Through the Kitchen Door teaches culinary skills that nourish the body and mind.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

The day before Thanksgiving, as thoughts are turning to time with family and friends and, of course, holiday meals, it seems an appropriate time to reflect on the work of Through the Kitchen Door, a Grantee Partner of The Women’s Foundation that teaches culinary skills to low-income youth and adults as a pathway to better careers and nutrition in their lives.

Last week, the Washington Times ran a piece on Leisel Flashenberg, co-founder of Through the Kitchen Door, and how she and her husband came to create the organization while living in Costa Rica.

The article states:

In one 24-hour period, she [Leisel] says, she catered for a French ambassador who complimented her work and also heard from a woman who had participated in a training program Ms. Flashenberg had established for local women to learn kitchen skills — enough so that some could earn a living. 

The trainee told her: ‘Today I could pack up my children and leave the man who has been beating me for 25 years because I know now I can support myself.’

‘You can tell which one resonated with me the most,’ Ms. Flashenberg says. ‘The subtext became the curriculum of what we are doing today.’

A great story around the holiday that draws our appreciation not only to the value of a good meal in our lives, but in its ability to bring people together and nourish the soul. 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Lisa Kays is The Women’s Foundation’s Director of Communications.

Washington Post story on local sex trafficking features work of two Grantee Partners.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

Yesterday, Washington Post reporter Robert Pierre’s story, "Anti-Prostitution Initiative Taken to D.C. Schools," explains how children in D.C. are being coerced into prostitution and sex trafficking, and how agencies throughout the area are working together to stop this phenomenon.

Two of the organizations involved in this work are Grantee Partners of The Women’s Foundation: Fair Fund and Polaris Project.

Read the full story in the Washington Post here.

For more on Fair Fund’s work on this issue, and the report they just released on trafficking of youth in D.C. and Boston, or for information on how to get involved, click here.

Lisa Kays is The Women’s Foundation’s Director of Communications.

Friday Round-Up: News and Analysis on Women and Poverty (Week ending November 21, 2008)

Posted on by The Spotlight and Opportunity Team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity, a national foundation-led initiative, is excited to collaborate with The Women’s Foundation to bring you the latest news and analysis on women and poverty.

Spotlight is the go-to site for news and ideas about fighting poverty.

Here are this week’s top stories on women and poverty:

• Job cutbacks are causing parents to consider sacrificing daycare, as noted by The Chicago Tribune.

• “A Welcome Drop”: The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reports a significant reduction in local teen pregnancy.

• The Washington Post calls attention to the role of poverty in a changing debate on abortion.

• According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the souring economy leads to divorce and affects child support payments.

• Social Security is called a “women’s issue” in a story by The Telegraph Herald.

• The Oregonian argues that government job growth programs must focus on jobs for women.

• Families and working moms are among Dallas’ growing homeless population, according to The Dallas Morning News.

To learn more about Spotlight, visit www.spotlightonpoverty.org.

To sign up for our weekly updates with the latest news, opinion and research from around the country, click here.

The Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity team

Spotlight on Poverty and Opportunity is a foundation-led, non-partisan initiative aimed at ensuring that our political leaders take significant actions to reduce poverty and increase opportunity in the United States. We bring together diverse perspectives from the political, policy, advocacy and foundation communities to engage in an ongoing dialogue focused on finding genuine solutions to the economic hardship confronting millions of Americans.

Sex trafficking strikes in D.C. just as it does in Dakar or Dubai.

Posted on by Lisa Kays

When I lived in Africa and worked on girls’ education and HIV/AIDS prevention issues, I encountered what was known as the Sugar Daddy phenomenon.

In various countries in Africa, girls are the first to be pulled from school when money in a family is tight.  They’re also the last to eat, and the last to receive basic necessities like health care or clothes.  Busy with caring for siblings or fetching water, they also often go without much attention or sense of self-worth.

But Sugar Daddies are more than willing to make up for that. 

Older men, usually with means, they prey on these young women–sometimes as young as 11, 12, 13.  At first, they just show them attention, maybe by paying school fees or purchasing a new uniform.  Then, they might take a young woman out to dinner or pay for her to have her hair done.

All innocent enough.  Until he begins to convince her that she owes him and that her debt can be repaid with sex. 

I got all too used to seeing this in various African cities and villages, where poverty is rampant and there are few social services to assist vulnerable youth who may fall through the cracks into such situations.

Of course, now I’m all too used to hearing about it happening on K Street, in my city’s schools, throughout the region where I live.  In our nation’s capital.

It’s not okay that this happens to children anywhere, but there is something about it happening in one of our country’s wealthiest cities, just blocks and miles from the White House and Capitol Building, that I’m not sure I’ll ever get used to.

Which is why I was so pleased to attend an event on Tuesday evening hosted by Fair Fund–a Grantee Partner of The Women’s Foundation.  The event brought together members of our community to learn more about how human trafficking and sexual exploitation are impacting youth in Washington, D.C.   

About how young men and women in this city are routinely entrapped by pimps who start out as friends or boyfriends and then demand a return on their kindness with sex, first with them, and then with others. 

And thus the cycle of entrapment in sex trafficking continues, here in Washington, D.C. just as it does throughout the world.

Here though, we are fortunate to have a committed coalition of activists, including Fair Fund and a number of other nonprofits and Grantee Partners of The Women’s Foundation (including Polaris Project, WEAVE, Latin American Youth Center, SMYAL, AYUDA, DC Rape Crisis Center, and Ascensions Community Services), who are all working together to break this cycle by advocating for a safe house to take teens to when they are pulled out of dangerous situations and building awareness among teachers, social workers and police officers throughout our community who can help identify, assist and protect young people who fall into this trap.

To learn more about this important work or to get involved:

Fair Fund’s new report documenting these trends locally: Pathways Into and Out of Commercial Sexual Exploitation 

3-minute interview with Fair Fund’s Executive Director Andrea Powell in the DC Examiner

WAMU radio piece on Fair Fund’s work and local sex trafficking

To learn more about how to get involved, visit FairFund.org.

Lisa Kays is Director of Communications at The Women’s Foundation.

How a bank account can help a woman escape domestic violence.

Posted on by Emily Appel

CBS Evening News aired a story last week about a mother of three in Washington state who is rebuilding her life after leaving a domestic violence situation.

One of the tools that helped her is an IDA (Individual Development Account) matched savings account, which she used to buy a car, a computer and a home. The three-minute video is on Capital Area Asset Builder’s Web site.

This same tool is available through CAAB for low-income women to help improve their financial situation.  They can earn up to $3,000 to use towards buying a car or a home, starting a small business, paying off medical debt, or continuing education or job training classes.

Christine Walker, a client of CAAB and Lydia’s House–both Grantee Partners of The Women’s Foundation–used an IDA to help pay for school.  You can read her story here.

Emily Appel is the Matched Savings Program Director at Capital Area Asset Builders, a Grantee Partner of The Women’s Foundation, which supports CAAB’s IDA program through Stepping Stones.

It's up to all of us to learn to identify, report and assist victims of domestic violence.

Posted on by Debbie Billet-Roumell

In a crowded room at the Catholic Charities, more than 60 people gathered to hear Kathy Zeisel, Domestic Violence Staff Attorney at The National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty, and Robin Runge, Director of the Commission on Domestic Violence at the American Bar Association and Commissioner at The DC Commission on Women, spoke on learning to recognize red flags for indications of domestic violence and what to do if you suspect someone is a victim.

The event was organized by The DC Women’s Agenda to honor the month of October as Domestic Violence Awareness Month. The event served as an opportunity to reach out to the broader community serving clients and educate them about recognizing and creating a safe comfort environment for victims of domestic violence.

Ms. Runge addressed the prevalence of domestic violence and the need for the public to help victims. Domestic violence effects one out of four individuals in heterosexual and homosexual relationships.  More than 80 percent of domestic violence victims in families become homeless; and 20 percent of women victims become homeless. 

The insidious nature of domestic violence causes individuals to withdraw from society, friends and family, isolating them from potential sources of support. This is why it is imperative that in our professional and personal lives, we look for signs of domestic violence.

Ms. Runge spoke about her work with lawyers who are legally mandated to report domestic violence. When victims gather the courage to speak about their abuse, they are often referred to seek relief through legal channels. Many lawyers are not adequately trained to work with survivors and often seek a protective order, which can cause additional trouble for the victim.  When individuals disclose that they are victims, they should be referred to experts in domestic violence who have the knowledge, updated information and skills in understanding how to navigate the system for victims.

Ms. Zeisel addressed red flags that are often seen with survivors of domestic violence.  If a survivor is with their spouse and is meeting with a third party, the survivor often stays quiet and looks uncomfortable, the spouse controls the conversation and will not allow the survivor to be without him. Another classic sign is that a spouse will become violent toward the victim’s property; for example, they may run over their cat.

The speaker addressed the need to create a safe environment for individuals to disclose that they are victims. When a professional is screening for any type of service, they should always screen partners separately and ask about domestic violence. The screening should be standard policy to ensure that victims don’t get nervous as to why they are being asked. The victim often feels that they are the one to blame in the situation; other times, victims are in denial and will make excuses for the partner. 

Individuals working with clients should always have material available on domestic violence.  Restrooms are an excellent place to put material on domestic violence because the victim is alone.

When screening for domestic violence, it is imperative that you know the limits of your confidentiality. If you are required to report instances of domestic violence, you need to tell the victim before they disclose. Once reported, the victims’ life can be turned upside down. They may lose their job because they have to go to court and their perpetrator may come after them for disclosing.

In conclusion the speakers explained that there are resources available. In addition, the DC Coalition against Domestic Violence can come to organizations and train staff.

Additional information on screening for domestic violence.

Debbie Billet-Roumell is the coordinator of the DC Women’s Agenda, a Grantee Partner of The Women’s Foundation that is a coalition of advocacy organizations, service providers, and individuals working to promote the advancement of equality, safety and well-being for women and girls in the District. It is chaired by the DC Employment Justice Center and Wider Opportunities for Women.