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On Tuesday, May 28th the Select Board will discuss after-school care needs in Sudbury. This conversation is long overdue for many families with children in our elementary schools. To be clear up-front: this is not an ask for subsidized child care. This is a plea for targeted, solution-oriented coordination and planning between relevant town departments to make space, programming, and transportation available. Parents will pay for these things–but they need something to pay FOR. To that end–let’s get a working group together, and let’s get the Select Board to help us make that happen.
Elementary kids in Sudbury are released at 2:25pm on full days, and at 11:45am anywhere from 1-4 Wednesdays per month–the inconsistent schedule makes things even more complicated. After-school care has always been a “thing”, but it was exacerbated when our schools voted to delay start times for high schoolers (who could use the sleep) and begin the elementary school day earlier. Further compounding things, the new structure meant high schoolers were now released later than the elementary kids, obliterating the availability of teenage babysitters.
Sudbury Extended Day has had a heavy lift in meeting the needs of the Sudbury community, and they’ve done an exceptional job trying to adjust the system and spaces to eliminate waitlists. The reality is–the waitlists remain. The resulting stress on dual-income families has been intense. In January, a group of parents invited rising K-5 families to participate in a survey to determine community needs for after-school care and enrichment. 303 families representing 467 children or nearly 30% of elementary students in the 2024-2025 school year. You can see the results here.
We’ve got to get people to talk. The School Committee manages the Building Use Policy where “after-school care provided on school premises” is listed as a priority for building use. The SC also signs the contract with Sudbury Extended Day and holds the bussing contract with First Student. SPS already has one SED bus route, which takes students from Noyes to First Parish as well as upper-elementary kids to Curtis Middle School for after-school care. The Select Board also has a Transportation Committee, which could be helpful here. And Parks and Rec has an amazing new space, as well as other properties around town.
After looking at the results of the after-school care survey at its February meeting, the Sudbury Parks and Recreation Commission voted unanimously to send a letter to the Select Board and Town Manager advocating for a Town Manager’s Working Group to create solutions to Sudbury’s after-school care crisis. The idea was that a Town Manager’s Working Group will be the most effective way to advance the town towards a viable solution since this will take close coordination and cooperation between the Town and school departments.
Can a working group help? The conversation has to start somewhere, and our neighboring town of Wayland has made some great strides. We should follow their lead.
We have some amazing town-owned spaces that could be part of a multi-faceted, comprehensive after-school program. Progress toward this vision of a family-friendly Sudbury requires the cooperation of multiple town departments. I encourage all of you to encourage the formation of a Town Manager group by making a public comment at Tuesday’s Select Board meeting or by emailing the following stakeholders: [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], and [email protected], [email protected].