We have had an au pair since DD was six months old. She is going home in August and we had thought about not having an AP and just doing PREK3, but we are going to get another AP and try PREK3, just in case we are not able to send DD full-time. It's expensive, and we would prefer to rent out our ADU, but it is what it is.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We won't know for a while, we don't even know how long the vaccine lasts.

And why a whole thread on PK?? All kids should have school in person.

Because when PK parents post in more general threads, people yell at us “Pk isn’t mandatory! Who cares? Let’s talk about the grades that actually matter!”

Of course all kids deserve to be in school, but it’s ok for PK parents to have a thread discussing concerns unique to them.

This x1000. Pay for daycare for another year.

WTU is demanding no in person 5 day a week school until 2023 when all children are vaccinated. It’s simply time to move.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd plan to have to pay for another year of childcare and hope for the best.

When you say plan ... what does that mean? Mentally? Financially? Are you looking at schools and putting your name on waitlists? Some preschools wr looked at have apicatkon deadlines and you have to sign contracts in thr spring!

I meant financially. My kid was supposed to be in K this year. So we had 1.5 years of free school (PK3 and half of PK4) and have been scrambling to pay for childcare ever since. It sucks but I’m grateful we can swing it.

You don’t necessarily need to be applying to application pre-schools for PK4. Lots of daycares and camps are being flexible and are offering programs to facilitate online learning. My kids has been going to one since August. These places are making decisions and opening spots based on DCPS’s announcements. So just do the lottery like you’d normally do. If you get into a school you’re excited about longer-term (whether that’s your IB or not), enroll, but be prepared it won’t be full time, and be prepared to pay for supplemental childcare.

Anonymous wrote:We won't know for a while, we don't even know how long the vaccine lasts.

And why a whole thread on PK?? All kids should have school in person.

Because when PK parents post in more general threads, people yell at us “Pk isn’t mandatory! Who cares? Let’s talk about the grades that actually matter!”

Of course all kids deserve to be in school, but it’s ok for PK parents to have a thread discussing concerns unique to them.

We won't know for a while, we don't even know how long the vaccine lasts.

And why a whole thread on PK?? All kids should have school in person.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I'd plan to have to pay for another year of childcare and hope for the best.

When you say plan ... what does that mean? Mentally? Financially? Are you looking at schools and putting your name on waitlists? Some preschools wr looked at have apicatkon deadlines and you have to sign contracts in thr spring!

Both mentally and financially. My kid is supposed to be in PK3 at DCPS this year, and I was so excited to finally not be paying ~$25,000 a year for daycare/preschool. In august, we realized in person def. wasn't happening and scrambled to secure a spot at the preschool DC had been at the year before. Luckily they had a spot and after she started I couldn't have been happier to pay- like, take all my money!

I do think it's likely DCPS will be open in the fall, but I have concerns as to whether it will be at 100% capacity. Having a backup plan might not be a bad idea.

Anonymous wrote:I'd plan to have to pay for another year of childcare and hope for the best.

When you say plan ... what does that mean? Mentally? Financially? Are you looking at schools and putting your name on waitlists? Some preschools wr looked at have apicatkon deadlines and you have to sign contracts in thr spring!

This seems like a ridiculous question. My friends in Mass and RI have been in school since Sept. 15th, full time. (NOT in the city but still...)

We will have all teachers vaccinated and many parents. If they aren't going to fully open schools, they have simply decided this is a good excuse to stop educating. (And then I hope tax dollars aren't allocated.)

I'd plan to have to pay for another year of childcare and hope for the best.

yeah, i don't think we're at the "eliminate PK" point of the conversation, yet. more like, are we looking at part time PK solutions next year, or full time PK?

Our daycare this year allowed the class of kids who should have aged out to stick around for their PK3 year (paying daycare tuition, of course). I'm not sure they'll be able to keep offering this solution next year to another class of would-be-pre-K kids.

The only way I can see this happening is if they only accept 8 kids per PK3 class that way they meet current OSSE covid guidelines. But who knows if those will change by fall.

Do not listen to the prior poster. Funds for the 2021-2022 school year have already been allocated. The lottery is already underway. If we get to the point where DC is eliminating PK (totally eliminating, not offering it as DL, but like laying off staff and reallocating classrooms) we have much bigger problems on our hands. Also, charter budgets work differently and many charters rely on PK classes to create a pipeline of students for upper grades, which in newer schools might not even exist yet. They are highly motivated to keep those classes around. If DCPS eliminated PK and charters didn't... well there would be hell to pay. Especially if parents turned down charter slots in the lottery in favor of DCPS schools, only to discover their program was cut. You can't do that.

But I'd definitely prepare for more of the garbage DL for PK. We are PK3 this year and are absolutely preparing for the possibility that it will be virtual again next year. I really, really hope not, but we got screwed this year (everyone kept promising us that DL was a temporary stopgap and yet... here we are) and I can't do that to my kid again next year. I hope DCPS gets their shit together and teachers get vaccinated and they can offer 5-day PK. But I am definitely not counting on it.

Economy will get worse. Less tax collected when stores and restaurants sell less. So less taxes for schools. There will need to be cuts in District services. Are you going to cut trash collection or PS3 classes for an unrequired grade? Unless there is federal funding (via headstart-type programming) I think it's a good bet PS3 will be cut.

Or will we be stuck paying for another year of daycare/preschool b/c DCPS will only offer partial PK3 hours? Any predictions/ideas out there? Our school currently has a small group of PK3 and PK4 kids attending, so that's better than nothing. But if more kids want to return in the fall, and the schools still have distancing requirements, I assume they will have to offer a hybrid solution. Blerg. Was really hoping to be done paying for daycare but i feel like we can't count on DCPS to provide a full day, 5 day/week PK3 option for Fall.

Anyone else have a hunch?