When childcare became essential infrastructure
It was never impossible. It was a question of priorities.
I was a lower school head in New York City during the pandemic. The parents who panicked most during lockdown were the parents of pre-K and kindergarten students—four- and five-year-olds who needed constant supervision.
These families relied on schools not only for education, but for childcare. When that childcare disappeared, panic ensued.
Some of it landed on schools, framed as failure or negligence. But the crisis revealed something we had been avoiding all along.
It wasn’t parental fragility. It was a childcare accounting problem.
Here’s what I can’t stop thinking about.
During the lockdown, certain childcare centers stayed open. Not for everyone. For the children of emergency workers—doctors, nurses, first responders. The people we needed in hospitals.
There was twenty-four-hour care, in the middle of a pandemic, because the alternative was hospitals without staff.
For the rest of us, childcare was deemed too dangerous. Families absorbed the burden themselves. But when it was in the public interest—when it was a matter of life and death—we found a way.
When it mattered to the system, childcare was treated as essential infrastructure.
It was never impossible. It was a question of who we were willing to fund it for.
Independent schools are the industry I know best, and some are beginning to reckon with this reality.
One school I know partners with a childcare provider to offer subsidized, on-campus care for the children of employees. Childcare runs from 8:00 am to 6:00 pm.
Another school is experimenting with childcare during evening events—hiring college or high school students so faculty and staff can attend without scrambling for coverage.
These may sound like small moves. They aren’t. They signal that the institution is accounting for real costs instead of assuming someone else will absorb them.
One reason I chose independent school leadership—and the specific role I held in New York City—was the wraparound care. When my three children were under ten, they were cared for from 7:30 in the morning to 5:30 in the evening. When there were evening events, we offered childcare—not just for faculty families, but for all families.
In my experience, independent elementary schools often do this well. Because every parent in that community needs childcare in order to show up.
The broader question remains: why is childcare still treated as an individual problem rather than a collective one?
What New York City is attempting with universal childcare is forward-thinking. It will differentiate New York as a place to work and build a career.
The same logic applies to any organization. Those that offer real childcare infrastructure—subsidized care, evening coverage, priority spots—make it easier for parents, especially mothers, to work there.
Accessible childcare unlocks flourishing.
🕊️
SAM
