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Center School District used ESSER III funding to open a child care center for staff.

Child care was already a problem for the teachers and staff in Center Consolidated School District that was made worse when the pandemic hit, but fortunately, the school district found a solution with the aid of ESSER funding.

The tiny rural school district in the San Luis Valley has 600 students and used $175,000 of funding from the ESSER III direct LEA allocation along with additional district money to create the child care center for up to eight toddlers. The district is adding an infant care room to accommodate up to nine babies.

“We have a lot of young teachers and child care is definitely an issue,” said Center Superintendent Carrie Zimmerman.  “Center is a really small community, so a lot of our staff commute.”

One of the first investments was hiring Lucia Miranda as the center’s director. 

“She jumped right in and got all the furniture and all the equipment and stuff that we have to have in there,” Zimmerman said. ESSER funds help pay for changing tables, supplies, and playground equipment, as well as some salaries.

Currently, children from 1 to 3 years old are enrolled and attend from 7 a.m. to 4:45 p.m.

“We do teaching strategies,” Miranda said.  “We do numbers, we do letters, and we normally do English and Spanish.” Additionally, the teachers talk to the children about their feelings. 

“The older ones can say something like ‘I am sad today and they say why,’” Miranda said.

The district has about 130 staff members including 50 teachers and all are eligible to apply for child care. “That's an excellent recruiting tool and retention tool for us,” Zimmerman said.

“It's really awesome to go into the classroom,” Zimmerman said. “It just brings your heart joy and the kids are learning and they're learning through play.”

The third phase of ESSER funding ends this coming September and the district is preparing to maintain the child care center and shift to a new funding model.

“The staff do pay a small fee,” Zimmerman said. “We started at $150 a month and now we are up to $200. We do an automatic deduction out of their paychecks, which is extremely reasonable because child care costs in our area are upwards of $1,000 a month.

“We have built into our budget the maintenance of the program,” Zimmerman said. “The ESSER funds have been very, very helpful to the district. We were able to offset some salaries. Obviously, we're going to feel the impact of not receiving the funds, but we've been fiscally responsible with the funds that we've received and so our district is in good shape.”