ABSTRACT
Across the United States in public policy debates on child care and other family support measures (such as maternity leave), the working parent’s need for child care is seen as a problem primarily from the time the child is born until the child enters school (see Bloom and Steen, this volume, for a discussion of the need for more and better child care programs in the US). By the late 1980s, there were more children under age 5 than at any time since the mid-1960s (Trost, 1988), and currently 60 per cent of mothers of preschool children are in the paid labor force (US Bureau of the Census, 1992a). The availability and quality of child care for preschool children have, quite rightly, become important issues. However, 75 per cent of mothers of school-age children are also in the paid labor force (US Bureau of the Census, 1992a). And these working parents can attest to the new set of challenges posed by the child’s entry into school, including arranging before-and after-school care, planning care for irregularly occurring school vacations, holidays, and early closing or staff development days. Beyond this they have to coordinate the child’s increasingly complex and independent activity patterns with those of other family members.
