Another "teachers" question, has anybody ever done this?

[Francine]

I am getting to the point where I am only going to have teachers kids, I live in a relatively small town but there are 5 elementary schools, two junior high and one high school. Teachers are a huge referral source so it seems like all of the calls that I am getting are teachers or at least work for the system. I would love to take on all teachers kids and be closed when there is no school but I can't afford to go without income all summer. I don't know if this is the way everywhere but here teachers can choose to either get paid just for the school year or they can stretch it out over the entire year, have any of you ever done that for daycare? How does it work? Are you still open in the summer with the option for them to bring the kids? What about days that you need to take off? Spring break and Christmas break, do you allow the kids to come or are you closed? So many questions!!!

[llpa]

My teacher family pays half rate for summer. To hold dcbs place in my program.
I have a three hour preschool playdate for 2-3 yr olds in June and July two mornings a week and he is going to come to that. So he gets to keep his place and three days a week that he would normally be here all day, I will take drop ins. I really needed some income, thus the playdate thing.

[daycare_jen]

My situation is probably different than other providers though. My husband is a teacher and I really value having the same time off as him and my kids rather than making more money. And we've adjusted our budget so that I can only be open during the school year and only advertise for teachers, although I will accept anyone if they are willing to only have care based on the school calendar. Also, I do offer care occasionally for the breaks if I am available and it must be prearranged. I use a daily rate for those, which is more than what my weekly rate averages out per day.

I provide childcare for one teacher family. I am not licensed, so I have to keep my numbers small. This family has 3 kids aged three and under. I plan on adding one more opening for next school year. I only charge for the school year, which is based on all teacher attendance days, not just student attendance days. In our area, we have a balanced school calendar, so the schools have two weeks off for fall, winter and spring breaks and a shortened summer break. I do not charge for any of the breaks, but I do charge for any holidays and include the Friday after Thanksgiving in that. I have my weekly rates based on enrollment, rather than attendance. I allow myself 3 sick/personal days paid each school year, if I have to take more than that I would credit their next payment. I charge for snow days and any other unexpected school closures, but I do not charge for make up days, I consider them prepaid... our school district has extra school days already in the calendar, so not all snow days are actually made up.

My thoughts for you are to maybe offer them a higher weekly rate (an amount that would work for you)if they only want to pay during the school year or offer them a weekly rate that is lower if they would rather pay a weekly rate throughout the entire year. I think if they want to pay the entire year rate, that it would have to start in the summer preceding the school year you provide care... because I don't know how you'd enforce it once the school year ends and if they decided not to return for the next school year? So you could have a contract run from the day after school ends this year to the end of next year?

For my families, I have decided to have them sign a contract at the end of each school year for care for the next year. Our contract begins the first day of summer break and ends the last day of school. If they decide to end the contract before the school year starts and care actually begins, they are still responsible for payment of two weeks of care.

[spinnymarie]

I would just charge more/day for having them come only on teacher workdays.

We are only charging for 195 days of the teacher workday calendar, but we are charging more for it.

I worked it out so that I'm working about 75% time/year compared to full year care, but making 90% of what I would've made for full year at average rate per kid.

The teachers, however, still save across the year, by about $1000/year.

ETA - looks like I agree with daycare_jen
I make them put down a deposit at the end of the school year to come back in August, that way if they decide not to come back, they lose it, and if they are going to Kindergarten, well we know that anyway.

[Crazy8]

I don't take just teacher's kids but I have a policy for anyone taking "extended absences" (basically summers off, LOL). I allow them to either pay 1/3rd their rate OR come on a part time schedule equal to/greater than that amount. Many were happy with coming 1-2 days a week and it kept the kids in the routine - I found otherwise September was a heck of a month. It also gave me a few days off each week in the summer.

It kind of depends on if you want your summer off completely or if you want to work p/t during the summer or if you are ok making a little less than you would for the full year.

If you want your summer off completely you can either charge a little more per day/week to help cover the summer (but not completely cover it if that would make them not choose your daycare if rates are too high). If you need your FULL income for the summer then take what they'd pay for a full year and divide it into the 9 or so months they are with you.

For instance, if your rate is $100/week, that's $5,200 a year. If they came year round that would equal $433/month but if they are only coming 9 months that would be $577/month. So charging $577/month instead of $433/month would give you the same amount of income for the year. Does that make sense??

The problem comes in if that $577/month is too much for them and they won't choose your daycare because of it. You can come up with an amount less than that that would help cover your summer off but not quite what they would pay if they came all year.

I know I'm probably not making sense here, but its basically the same way teachers get paid.

[butterfly]

This is what I do: I work the same schedule as the school district. So I work the same days as the teachers.

In order to be able to survive through the summer, I reserve one family's payments all year long to use in the summer. My husband works year round, so we also have his income to live on during the summer. I also try to bank extra money into savings throughout the year too - just for emergency type expenses. We do live on a strict budget also.

I charge the same weekly rate through out the school year. I do not charge for the summers. I do NOT discount for the holidays and breaks through the school year. I am closed those days, but essentially get paid for them.

I do give them christmas break off for free and I present it as their gift from me.

I have them pay one week's rate as an enrollment fee (nonrefundable) to hold their spot for the summer. This isn't really to get me any further ahead financially, but it's enough to avoid everyone having me hold a spot and then find other care by next year. I used to have a huge issue with holding infant spots forever and then they make other arrangements. This was enough to weed out those that weren't really serious about enrolling...

Anyways, I love my schedule and the families I work with. If you want any more specifics on how I do it, just PM me.

[Francine]

Thank you for your replies, it's given me a lot to think about.