Worried about child care in remote school? Woman turns event space into learning center
Kelsey Shackelford had a gut feeling this fall that her 8-year-old daughter wasn’t going back to the classroom amid rising COVID-19 cases. She immediately began thinking through options and planning for her child to come to work with her should USD 259 move to remote learning.
“It’s like we’ve been on pins and needles over what’s gonna happen this year,” she said.
Then, an idea dawned on her. Shackelford is the community manager at Strategic Workspace, a coworking space and event venue at 5025 E. Kellogg.
With so much event space that can’t be used for traditional gatherings during the coronavirus pandemic, why not open the building up to children who need supervision for remote schooling while their parents go to work?
After about a month of planning, she has a new Learning Center up and running. There’s immediate space for about 20 kids to enroll, she said. Once more supplies arrive, she hopes to be able to fit about 60 students total.
The coworking and event center is a large open space with room to maintain physical distance, said Shackelford. She’s worked with the Kansas Department of Health and Environment to ensure she has the proper safety guidelines to follow. The cost is $125 per week per child, plus a one-time $75 registration fee.
Shackelford has a third-grade daughter at College Hill Elementary school who began virtual learning last week. The Wichita school board voted Monday to move 13,000 elementary school students from in-person classes to remote schooling. The change came as community spread of COVID-19 grows and the Wichita school district experiences a shortage of teachers, with about 16% of the workforce in quarantine.
The shift created concern among working parents who scrambled to find child care or shift their own work back home. Some parents must go to work in person and can’t stay with their young children during the school day. Others work from home but find it difficult to focus on a kid’s educational needs and their own career at the same time.
“We started the Learning Center because we think it’s a need we can fill for people, and we wanted to bring a solution to table,” Shackelford said.
The Learning Center at Strategic Workspace will be open from 7 a.m. to 6 p.m. Most staff have experience in child care or working with children and all pass a background check and drug test. The center isn’t fully staffed yet but is actively hiring.
If students need to stay beyond the typical school day hours, Shackelford has planned out additional programming. Through a partnership, the YMCA will send a trainer twice a week to keep children physically active, with zumba or other fitness classes. She’s also discussed bringing in a nonprofit leader to create entrepreneurship activities with the kids.
“It’s bringing in community engagement to put their own spin on child care,” she said.
The Learning Center is not a traditional day care and the focus will remain on children in remote school. Shackelford encourages parents to enroll kids who are in the second grade or older, but will consider children in first grade as needed.
Strategic Workspace opened in February, just about a month before the pandemic began to sweep Kansas. The business has faced its own challenges weathering restrictions on gatherings as the space has not been able to host networking events or other groups as planned.
“It’s been wild, but we’re just making the best of it that we can,” Shackelford said.
If families want to continue remote learning beyond January, the Learning Center will remain open as an option, even if USD 259 returns to in-person classes for elementary students.
Parents interested in enrolling their children can visit strategicworkspace.com/learning, call 316-683-3021 or email learning@strategicworkspace.com.
