Greenville County First Steps, YMCA of Greenville, and Greenville County Schools have partnered together to create after school programs for the upcoming school year.
Many parents are faced with the difficulty of working while there is not daily care for their child, as there would be in a normal school schedule.
The partners said they did not want parents to have to choose between a job and a child.
Since it is uncertain how many days children can attend school in person, the three partners created a way to mitigate the financial and academic issues associated with eLearning and provide spaces for learning to occur when in-school is not an option.
Derek Lewis, the executive director of first steps, said the proposal asked for up to $2 million of CARE funding to support this plan.
Lewis reported scholarship funds are available for Greenville County School employees, Greenville County employees, essential workers, and families who are at 300% of poverty level.
He estimates about $500,000 are available for financial assistance, which will help approximately 500 families.
To break down the math for the scholarship, the assistance funds would provide a family with $100 per week; the current plan lasts approximately 10 weeks.
Thus, it is expected that approximately 500 families will have the $500,000 of financial assistance split among them.
Julie Hollister with YMCA of Greenville said they have utilized their experience to create training programs and resources for other childcare facilities.
One aspect of the training and resources will cover COVID-19 protections, extensive cleaning policies and procedures, small huddle group sizes of 11 children and one staff that do not intermix with one another to help minimize risk, social distancing guidelines, masks worn by staff, and temperature checks and health screenings which will be conducted daily for all of participants and staff.
Another aspect will cover how to provide nurturing safe and enriching environments, including child safety and well-being, programming, risk management, and program operations.
Kidding Around Greenville has been designated as the hub for all information about childcare.
The partners direct parents to the page The Ultimate Guide to School-Aged Childcare in Greenville for more information.
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