Cedar Rapids Metro High day care center closing at end of school year

CEDAR RAPIDS — Metro High School will end its in-house day care program and child development course at the end of this school year.

The day care program, which opened in March 1980, has experienced a steady decline in participation from students and staff in recent years, according to district officials.

The day care center had its peak registration in 2009-10, when it had 51 children related to students and 10 children related to staff members.

This school year, up to 10 children related to students and three children related to staff have attended, but only one to two children attend regularly.

“The Metro High School day care has always been a great program that both the Metro Principal Dan DeVore and I have supported,” Superintendent Noreen Bush said in a statement.

“The program was originally created for students’ needs, but due to declining student participation, (the school district) has made the decision to end the program based on the data.”

The money needed to operate the day care center — $418,426 in 2020-21, according to DeVore — will be reallocated to new music and business programs for Metro students.

Chris Evans-Schwartz, the teacher who taught the dual-credit child development course at the day care center, was reassigned during the pandemic and retired last year. Students interested in child care as a career can access the course through Kirkwood Community College, the district said.

Currently, a director and four child care paraprofessionals operate the day care center. They will have the option of being reassigned, DeVore said.

Between 300 and 350 students attend Metro High in a given year, DeVore said. Enrollment has been declining at the alternative high school since a peak of 585 in 2009-10.

DeVore said the Metro enrollment experienced a sharp decline 12 years ago when the school went from a half-day to a full-day program.

Opposition

Community members, Metro High alumni and staff members came to the Cedar Rapids school board Monday evening, asking the board to reconsider closing the center.

Sarah Mason said she would not have been able to graduate high school as a teen mom without help from the Metro day care program.

Ending the program “risks” other teen parents’ chances at making a better life for themselves and their children, she said.

Metro graduate Gabrielle Galloway, 25, launched a petition drive on change.org to keep the center open. The petition had more than 1,000 signers this week.

“When I went to Metro, every teacher supported me, she said. ”I hope to change the district’s mind.“

“Ending the child care program would eliminate a crucial opportunity for young teen mothers and fathers to improve their lives through education,” Galloway wrote on the petition website.

Paula Pino said she attended Metro 24 years ago when she was a teen mother.

“The center taught me so much about how to parent,” Pino said. “Those first few months are full of emotion, lack of sleep and trying to find a new normal, trying to balance being a parent, a student and an employee. The on-site child care alleviated stress for me, so I could focus on what was important — taking care of my child and finishing my education.”

Pino said Metro students with a child may face problems finding transportation to a child care center, then school, then back to the child care center.

“We won’t just be eliminating that support. We will be creating additional barriers for those students,” she said.

Curt Minor, a retired Metro teacher, said many of the students he taught would not have been able to finish high school without the day care center being available.

“My personal litmus test for quality leadership is seeing to the needs of the most without losing sight of the needs of the least,” Minor said. “ … I hope data and metrics don’t take that away.”

Mary Meadows told the board she is losing her job at the Metro day care center, where she has worked for 19 years.

She acknowledged the center’s numbers dropped during the pandemic, but “things are coming back and doing better than they were in March 2020. I have seen so many moms and dads go through this program, and if it wasn’t for this center, they wouldn’t have gotten their diplomas.”

“What will this mean for the moms that breastfeed? How will they feed their babies? Or the comfort of coming to the center at lunchtime to check on their child for peace of mind?” Meadows asked. “All of this will be gone.”

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