[ONLINE] – Crisis Conversations — Live From Better Life Lab

The coronavirus pandemic is disrupting virtually everything about the way we work, live, connect with one another and expect from our government, businesses, communities and each other. And it’s exposing the deep cracks and inequities in American society. We can’t go back.  So what will it take to create a fairer future of work and family? That’s what the Better Life Lab explores every week. Join us on Zoom to share stories, ask questions and make sense of what’s so rapidly unfolding, and imagine together a better new normal.

Join us on Friday, July 31 at 1 pm Eastern time, for a 30-minute interactive conversation on the childcare crisis. Schools, summer camps and childcare centers are closed and may not reopen until next year. How are parents to manage juggling work, childcare and homeschooling, especially now that many have already exhausted the temporary 12 week paid leave Congress passed in early spring? And more importantly, what will it take to not only ensure children can safely return to childcare, but also to build a truly high-quality, universal system that benefits everyone?

Host:

Brigid Schulte
Director, Better Life Lab at New America

Guests:

Marla Schuchman
Entrepreneur, mother of two, struggling to launch a start-up with no child care.

Alycia Hardy
Policy Analyst on childcare and early education for the Center for Law and Social Policy who wrote about including parent voices in policy solutions and her struggles with remote work for her two children and caring for her nieces while her sister and husband risk their health as essential workers

Caitlyn Collins
Sociology professor at Washington University in St. Louis and author of Making Motherhood Work: How Women Manage Careers and Caregiving

Renée Boynton-Jarrett
Professor of pediatrics at Boston University, social epidemiologist and the founding director of the Vital Village Community Engagement Network who focuses on the role of early-life adversities as life course social determinants of health. 

Maria Cancian
Dean, McCourt School of Public Policy at Georgetown who researches the dynamics between public policies and family wellbeing