Child Care Patterns of School-Age Children with Employed Mothers

An Urban InstituteProgram to AssessChanging Social PoliciesAssessingthe NewFederalismChild CarePatterns ofSchool-AgeChildrenwithEmployedMothersChild CarePatterns ofSchool-AgeChildrenwithEmployedMothersJeffrey CapizzanoThe Urban InstituteKathryn ToutChild TrendsGina AdamsThe Urban InstituteOccasional Paper Number 41 Occasional Paper Number 41The UrbanInstitute2100 M Street, N.W.Washington, DC 20037Phone: 202.833.7200Fax: 202.429.0687E-Mail: paffairs@ui.urban.orghttp://www.urban.orgAssessingthe NewFederalismAn Urban Institute Program to Assess Changing Social PoliciesChild CarePatterns ofSchool-AgeChildrenwithEmployedMothersJeffrey CapizzanoThe Urban InstituteKathryn ToutChild TrendsGina AdamsThe Urban Institute Copyright © September 2000. The Urban Institute. All rights reserved. Except for short quotes, no part of thisbook may be reproduced in any form or utilized in any form by any means, electronic or mechanical, includingphotocopying, recording, or by information storage or retrieval system, without written permission from theUrban Institute.This report is part of the Urban Institute’s Assessing the New Federalismproject, a multiyear effort to monitorand assess the devolution of social programs from the federal to the state and local levels. Alan Weil is the pro-ject director. The project analyzes changes in income support, social services, and health programs. In collabo-ration with Child Trends, the project studies child and family well-being.The paper has received funding from The Annie E. Casey Foundation, the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, The RobertWood Johnson Foundation, The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation, The Ford Foundation, The John D. andCatherine T. MacArthur Foundation, the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, The David and Lucile PackardFoundation, The McKnight Foundation, The Commonwealth Fund, the Stuart Foundation, the Weingart Foun-dation, The Fund for New Jersey, The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, the Joyce Foundation, and TheRockefeller Foundation.The nonpartisan Urban Institute publishes studies, reports, and books on timely topics worthy of public consid-eration. The views expressed are those of the authors and should not be attributed to the Urban Institute, itstrustees, or its funders.The authors thank Stacey Phillips, Sarah Adelman, Sharon Vandivere, N’Kenge Gibson, and Kathy Snyder fortheir assistance, as well as Freya Sonenstein, Stefanie Schmidt, Alan Weil, Beth Miller, Martha Zaslow, DuncanChaplin, Kristin Smith, and Joan Lombardi for their helpful comments on an earlier version of the paper. Assessing the New Federalismis a multiyear Urban Institute projectdesigned to analyze the devolution of responsibility for social programsfrom the federal government to the states, focusing primarily on healthcare, income security, employment and training programs, and social ser-vices. Researchers monitor program changes and fiscal developments. In collaborationwith Child Trends, the project studies changes in family well-being. The project aimsto provide timely, nonpartisan information to inform public debate and to help stateand local decisionmakers carry out their new responsibilities more effectively.Key components of the project include a household survey, studies of policies in 13states, and a database with information on all states and the District of Columbia,available at the Urban Institute’s Web site. This paper is one in a series of occasionalpapers analyzing information from these and other sources.About the Series ContentsExecutive SummaryviiIntroduction 1Data and Methods2Analyzing Patterns of School-Age Child Care3Understanding the Data 4Child Care Patterns of School-Age Children with Employed Mothers, by Age5Younger School-Age Children (Ages 6 to 9)5Older School-Age Children (Ages 10 to 12)7Child Care Patterns of Families with Different Characteristics9Different Family Incomes 9Different Racial and Ethnic Backgrounds 12Different Amounts of Parental Time to Care for Their Children 16Different Work Schedules—Traditional versus Nontraditional20Child Care Patterns of School-Age Children in Selected States23Younger School-Age Children across States23Older School-Age Children across States 25Conclusions26 viCHILD CARE PATTERNS OF SCHOOL-AGE CHILDREN WITH EMPLOYED MOTHERSAppendix 1:Child Care Patterns of Five-Year-Old Children with Employed Mothers31Appendix 2:Standard Error and Sample Size Tables33Notes 39References41About the Authors 43Assessingthe NewFederalism Child Care Patterns of School-AgeChildren with Employed MothersExecutive SummaryArranging child care for school-age children presents a difficult set of challengesfor working families. Although the time a child spends in school provides a super-vised environment for a significant number of hours each day while parents work,many families experience “gaps” between these hours and