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Flanagan discusses child care education issues on Range visit

Mesabi Daily News - 7/10/2018

BOIS FORTE RESERVATION - Bois Forte Head Start and Hibbing High School were two stops on a three-day education tour for DFL State Rep. Peggy Flanagan in her run for lieutenant governor.

Flanagan is running alongside 1st District U.S. Rep. Tim Walz.

Flanagan's stop at the Bois Forte Head Start included a discussion with Center Manager Amber Wilke on how the state can better address its child care issues. Services across the state are slimming, creating higher costs, fewer options and long waiting lists for parents - up to two years at some providers in the Twin Cities.

Bois Forte, Wilke said, is the closest it has ever been to capacity, drawing children from beyond the Tower-Soudan area and reaching into Cook, Virginia and Eveleth, primarily to serve Fortune Bay Casino employees.

"It's a great opportunity for some people," Wilke said. "They need that support, especially our single parents and grandparents taking care of children."

Flanagan, who sat on a DFL subcommittee to address child care needs, said a number of issues need to be addressed including raising reimbursement rates for providers, streamlining the licensing process and working with businesses and partners to provide for more services.

"We've been trying to tackle the issue in pieces and parts," she said, "and I really think it's going to take a holistic approach."

Minnesota's child care reimbursement rates to providers are in the 25th percentile among the national comparisons. Flanagan said the state needs to be in the 75th percentile. A bump in payback rates could offset the relative loss child care providers take on when caring for kids on assistance programs and keep more providers from leaving the field.

Cooperation with the state, potential providers and third parties can lessen the financial risk of starting a child care center. Flanagan pointed to Women Venture, a group that helps women start small businesses, as the ideal type of partnership to kickstart new child care options.

There's also a need, she said, to address second and third shift workers, whose hours typically fall outside of a normal day care provider's operating hours.

"If we really want to make parents and families the center of child care in Minnesota," Flanagan said, "we need to get serious about working with the business community."

In Hibbing, Flanagan met with teachers and administrators to discuss K-12 issues, which ranged from credit recovery, to funding, special education and increasing technical education.

Funding ranks among the top issues in greater Minnesota, where disparities can run the gamut. Flanagan points to school districts that are building new high-end sports facilities while others struggle to fix leaky roofs without increasing levies.

"We need to level the playing field," she said, "so school boards are not always having to go back to the voters."

Technical education as a pathway out of high school is the center of talks between the Eveleth-Gilbert and Virginia school districts, who are considering a collaborative high school model built around so-called academies that prepare students for college or the workforce.

Exploring options beyond four-year higher education is being heard around the state, she said, and in practice at districts like Alexandria, where the E-G/Virginia boards have toured multiple times they move forward in planning.

Alexandria has planned its academies around local jobs, including health care and farming. Other areas are focused on sheet metal and welding, with a direct route into well-paying jobs.

"We don't talk about that being an option enough," she said.

While the Iron Range schools may be able to tap funding through the Department of Iron Range Resources and Rehabilitation, that isn't the case for schools statewide looking at a curriculum change.

Flanagan believed there could be opportunities through the state Department of Employment and Economic Development or the Department of Education. She also said Minnesota State Colleges and Universities may have training program options to increase the number of teachers in the technical fields.