Community-Based Childcare Center

The dilemma of working parents is to find a professionally run place to send their children for day-care. This problem is becoming more critical as current spate of issues related to Indonesian maid such as freezing of employment of new Indonesian maids and the proposal to increase the minimum wage to RM800.

One possible solution to the problem is by running a community-based childcare center. The characteristics of the center should be as follows:

1. Employers need to have a special unit to supervise it so that everything is in order.
2. Ensure that all of the conditions are being met such as building standards, security, the children’s curriculum and nutrition, and the child-minder’s skills.
3. Ensure on time payment of rent, workers' wages, and other operational costs.
4. Due to the prohibitive costs as listed under items 1 to 3, each center should be shared and managed by several companies instead of having the centers in each organization.
5. In order to achieve item 4, the facilities should be located near the participating companies or organizations so that the mother can visit their children during lunch break or other convenient time without jeopardizing their job responsibility.

However, the proposal will work best if the location has several organizations that are willing to participate. There should be some kind of incentives given to the participating companies in order to ensure the success of the idea. Also, an agency should be created to ensure the center will runs smoothly without any untoward incidents.

I am not sure whether the idea can be implemented at very small community areas. However, for the small community sites, the working mother can easily visit their children since their work place may be just a walking distance from their home.