Lisa Reisman photo
Stephanie Bartocetti (center), using her outside voice.
It was not the time for inside voices on the Green on Wednesday morning.
“We tend to be respectful and polite, but we are outside today, so not today,” Friends Center for Children Executive Director Allyx Schiavone told a spirited group of roughly 475 early childhood educators, childcare advocates, and families clad in bright yellow T shirts beneath a chilly, overcast sky. “Today, we’re using an outside voice and we universally say, ‘We need you to fix childcare, governor. Our collective future depends on it.’”
The occasion was the third annual “Morning Without Childcare,” an hourlong rally that eschewed protest chants for lively calls and responses, and a children’s singalong that included a lesson in Gaelic. Organized by the Child Care for Connecticut’s Future coalition, it was one of ten such gatherings across the state on Wednesday morning to push for adequate government funding to support families, educators, and child care providers.
One interested party at Wednesday's protest.
“Right now, we are trapped in this destructive cycle,” said Schiavone amid a crush of color-saturated signs bearing slogans like PAY TEACHERS LIKE HEROES and TEACHERS JUST WANT TO HAVE FUNDS. “We pay teachers poverty-level wages. No teachers means closed classrooms. Closed classrooms means families don’t have reliable childcare. Without reliable childcare, families can’t work. Families not working means less money in the economy.”
She then led the crowd in a chant that called for 100 percent of Connecticut families to pay no more than 7 percent of household income for childcare — the current level is 20 percent, she said — with half calling out “NO MORE THAN” and the other half “7 PERCENT.” The coalition is also pushing for the state legislature to pass HB 5002 which would pump $100 million into an early childhood fund to increase pay for teachers and decrease tuition across the state.
With that, emcee Aundrea Tabbs-Smith introduced Friends Center toddler teacher Rondraya Barron, lamenting the average $29,500 annual salary for early childhood educators and thanking her for “caring for our tiniest humans.”
“I’m happy that that we could all be here today, but I’m also very angry that we are because we shouldn’t have to be here demanding funds,” said Barron. “We should be in the classroom. My classroom at Friends would be having snacks right now and I would be playing Bob Marley to get the positive vibes going.”
As a teacher and a parent, “it’s really hard living paycheck to paycheck, anticipating the next payday and we need more money,” she said to a cascade of cheers and hoots.
Mayor Justin Elicker shifted the focus back to children. “If we reinvest in our young people at a very early age, their trajectory in life will dramatically change,” he said. “They’re less likely to go to prison, more likely to own a home, more likely to have a long-term job.” With the $3.5 million the city has dedicated to early child care, he said, “we’ve done our part, and now we need to see much more leadership and investment from the state.”
He paused, as three young kids chased each other around a flagpole behind him. “I go to a lot of protests and only at the Morning Without Childcare protests do we sing songs, do we learn how to say hello in Gaelic,” he said. “There’s something special about this group, and I think that one word in my mind is love.”
A sign at the protest.
Governor Lamont wanted to steal funds from K-12 budgets to put towards pre k and daycare funding.
But it’s not an either/or situation, it’s a yes/and situation.
The most important learning years are birth through age 18.
The key to a successful student ready for education is great preschool childcare.
The key to becoming a successfully educated adult is a really great k-12 education.