Child care is a huge concern for single parents who want to go back to school. There are so many things to worry about when it comes to this. You don’t have another person at home to watch the children so you can go to school at night or on the weekends.
Cost of child care is a big concern while going to college. Let’s face it, you will be going to school several hours a day that you will need child care for, and won’t be paid for going. How will you make up the money that this time will be costing you? If your child’s other parent is involved, you can ask them to take the child while you are in school. If they are willing, make sure you work it around their schedule. You support network is another great place to turn. Family and friends may be willing to do it free or cheap, and you already know and trust them. There are also grants for child care when you attend college. Look into them, fill out the paper work. The small amount of hassle it will require is well worth it in the end. You won’t be making money for going to college, but at least you won’t be paying as much either.
Location is another thing to think about. If you work 30 miles north and your current child care is 2 miles away from work, but your school is 20 miles south you will want to look into either new daycare or additional daycare. Now if you have someone in your support network close by who is willing to do it, then you don’t have to worry about location. If you have someone in your support network who is in the opposite direction, you may want to offer them gas money to drive to your house so you don’t add on a lot of additional drive time and gas money. If you are bring your child to an in home or center day care, you may want to either look for one around your house in a central location. If you don’t want to completely switch child cares you can look for one around your house or around the college to do just the hours while you are in school.
Figuring out how much time you’ll need is another thing to think about. You have to see how many hours you’ll be in class and of course add any drive time to that. You will also need to check if the class has any internships you will have to take and figure that in. Also, if it is a lab class, you will have to figure out how much time you will need to work with you lab partner(s) outside of class, if any. Try to figure out all of this ahead of time so if/when that time rolls around, you aren’t stuck without child care.
If there is something specific that you want covered and it isn’t covered here, please let me know by leaving a comment, or sending me a private message.
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