2024 Air, Space & Cyber: United Forces and Families: Creative Childcare Solutions

The “United Forces and Families: Creative Childcare Solutions” panel at AFA’s 2024 Air, Space & Cyber Conference featured Lt. Col. Maria Quinn, military childcare advocate; Leslie Janaros, co-founder of Five & Thrive; Lesley Smith, chief of Air Force Child and Youth Programs at the Air Force Services Center; and Chief Master Sgt. Israel Nuñez, senior enlisted advisor to the chief of Air Force Reserve. The panel, held on September 17, was moderated by Melissa Shaw. Watch the video below:

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw, Program & Management Analyst, United States Space Force:

Good morning, everybody. Thank you so much for being here. My name is Melissa Shaw. I’m a civilian Guardian working with our headquarters to build the Guardian Family Career Program for our service. I’m also an active duty Guardian spouse, and I’m honored to be the vice chair of the F2 Task Force here for the Air & Space Forces Association. I’m also the mom of three kids. And just before the session started, I was considering, between the five of us on stage, how many … we’re all parents … how many kids we have collectively. I think you’re looking at the parents at P of 21 children combined.

One of the things that is amazing about that is we’re civilians. We’re service members. Some of us have service member spouses back home whose command teams allowed them to take leave so that others of us could be here speaking to you today. We work in a climate and a culture where we can embrace the fact that we are parents, that we love our children, and we are committed to the service of our country. This is a good place to be. I’m honored to be here today to talk about military kids. It’s one of the most important subjects that we could possibly discuss. On the stage today with me are members of our uniform service. We have civilians. We are representative of our active duty reserve and Guard components, dual military families as well. Each of us bring different perspectives to the conversation, as do all of you.

For anyone who is watching virtually today, who is in the room physically with us this morning, or who’s on the stage with me today, if you have ever advocated for the well-being of a military child, thank you, all of you. Thank you, Kari Voliva and the team at the Air & Space Forces Association for your awareness and your continued advocacy and investment in the importance of quality of life for mission readiness and retention. Now, I mentioned the diversity of experiences of our panelists here, but I do want to point out that through our preparation for the panel, despite the diversity, we found three common themes emerging in our conversations. And I think as you listen to the panel today, you’re going to hear them too. The first is that childcare is not a one-size-fits-all solution. Right? It doesn’t look the same for every family, and it doesn’t look the same in every duty station or installation.

The second, and I hope that everyone will really listen for this during the day’s panel, it is that childcare matters for everyone, not just parents. It matters to every commander, every senior enlisted leader. It matters to every colleague who is working side by side with someone who needs childcare for their kids because when the childcare system fails them, it fails you, and it fails our readiness. It matters to all of us.

Finally, we noticed that the best solutions, when we talk about creative solutions, the best ones are the ones that are collaborative. They involve our uniformed leaders. They involve our communities, and they also involve our military families coming together to say, “How can we make it better? How can we leave it better than we found it?” So, we’re here today to unite around those solutions, not to talk about what’s broken, but to talk about what’s working and to hopefully leave all of you in the room feeling a little more empowered with some creative ideas that you can take back to your units, your communities, to help empower our total force for readiness in the great power competition. So, before I continue into questions for our panelists, I’d like to give each of them an opportunity to introduce themselves briefly, and then we’ll dig in. So, Leslie, would you mind at the beginning?

Leslie Janaros, Co-Founder, Five & Thrive:

Thanks. I sure will. I see lots of friends in the audience, but for those of you who don’t know me, my name is Leslie Janaros, and I am an Air Force veteran. I am a military spouse of nearly 30 years, which is so hard to believe. I’m the proud mom of seven incredible children. They are and always will be my life’s greatest work. I’m one of the co-founders of Five and Thrive. That’s why I’m on the panel today. I am also part of AFA’s F2 initiative. And I’m just delighted to be here with you all today. I also work with the Military Officers Association of America. I was hired there about six months ago to lead their Total Force Plus project. It’s a conference that will take place here at the Gaylord in October of 2025 and hope to see you there as well.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you.

CMSgt. Israel Nunez:

Awesome. Hey, I’m Chief Master Sergeant Israel Nunez. I am the command chief for Air Force Reserve Command and also dual-added as a senior list advisor, so the Chief of the Air Force Reserve. And so, up here, not only representing the Reserve, but I also want to represent our Guard brethren as well. And so it’s 200,000 garden Reservists roughly in the Air Force, and so want to make sure that I can highlight and do right by our component. So, I’m coming not just as a senior listed advisor but also as a dad. And so I have two awesome little girls, a six-year-old who, thankfully, is a six going on six. And I have a 14-year-old going on 20. And so, we all know how challenging that can be. I’m also male-to-male, and so the challenges of being two full-time parents, both being mil-to-mil and having to serve, yeah, it’s super challenging. So, this is a subject that’s near and dear to my heart, not only as I try to advocate for childcare for our Guard and Reservists, but also as I try to advocate for childcare solutions for my own family. And so, look forward to the questions and the rest of the panel.

Lesley Smith, Air Force Service Center, Chief of Air Force Child & Youth Programs :

Hi, my name’s Lesley Smith. I am the Air Force Services Center Chief of Child and Youth Programs, but more importantly, I’m a mother of two. And my daughters, not only did they work in the child and youth programs when they were in college, my one daughter now serves as a lieutenant in the Marine Corps. My husband is retired military, so I have that experience from being a military spouse, working in the child development centers, having daughters who worked in the child development centers. So, I feel like there’s so many different aspects of childcare and how we need to go forward, so I’m just really excited to be here today.

Lt. Col. Maria Quinn, Military Childcare Advocate:

Good morning. My name is Maria Quinn, and I’m one half of a dual military family, both serving in the Space Force. He is holding it down in Florida for us today with our six little ones, ages 11, nine, seven, five, three, and one, so you can imagine why this matters to us. Thanks. I’m currently serving with STARCOM on their Advon team at Patrick as we get ready to move that entire command to Florida. And I’ve just been so humbled to learn from families and leaders the last three years on where this impacts them.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you guys so much for introducing yourselves. And Lesley Smith, you did mention your daughters, but you did not mention a very important newest member of your family.

Lesley Smith:

I also have a granddaughter. I am the old one on the stage. And she’s two, so it’s much more fun when you’re the grandmother.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

I think it’s evident how much the panelists and, hopefully, me too, love our kids and are committed to families in our service. So, Mrs. Janaros, I’d actually like to start with you for the first question this morning. You mentioned your background, eight years in OSI. I know you personally to be a dedicated advocate for quality of life for military families and also a dedicated mentor to those of us in the military-connected community. You are also somebody who has a deep awareness of the connections between recruitment, readiness, retention, and our family. So, how do you think, from your experiences, all the ways that you have served our community, how have you seen that military-connected quality of life in issues like childcare affect not just overall readiness but, in the current climate, our ability to maintain a competitive edge in the great power competition?

Leslie Janaros:

Yeah, thanks for that, Melissa, and a quick thank you to Kari for inviting me to be a part of today’s panel. I’d also like to first acknowledge one of our teammates that couldn’t be here this week. Some of you know her, Ann Parker, as she really has been instrumental in helping us to frame some of our messaging around this topic that family readiness is mission readiness, that underlying that mission and our Airmen and our Guardians’ technical expertise, and I would say especially their service, is family. And it is this place that we call home. It is there that that foundation is set for lethality, for the mission, and for us to compete in this great power competition. And this is why quality of life has to be a priority to the leaders because when we take care of our families, we actually increase our competitive advantage, and we set the foundation for our warfighters to win.

And so family readiness and mission readiness is one of the reasons that we created Five and Thrive in the first place. And I want to explain a little bit about family readiness. When I say that, I’m talking about all components. I’m talking about our active duty, our Guard, our reserve, our single Airmen and Guardians, the married ones, and their families too. And so I want to share with you a little bit about what Melissa touched on, and even Jessica Norske touched on yesterday during her panel. It’s called the Military Community Quality of Life Experience model. And this model has three key stakeholders. We have our military leaders, our community partners, and our military-connected families. They are what make up this model. And you can think of QX like CX, and that’s the customer experience. It can be either positive or negative, but our model at Five and Thrive represents that positive outcome that we can achieve when we work together, when we work collaboratively towards a common goal like childcare.

But I will tell you the effectiveness of that model 100% starts with that leader. And that’s because it’s our leaders that have the authority. They have access to the relationships and the resources that are required in order to creatively tackle things like childcare, education, healthcare, housing, and spouse employment. But what I don’t want you to think I’m saying is that our Airmen and Guardians aren’t responsible because they are too. Our Airmen, our Guardians, and their families, they need to do their part to advocate for quality of life improvements. They need to do everything they can in their power to be ready for whatever comes next. But at the end of the day, they do not have the authority to create the public-private partnerships that will be required in order to effectively tackle these challenges. And that leads me to that second part of our triad, and that’s our community partners.

And everything that we’re hearing from them is that they do want to help, but the challenge is that sometimes they don’t understand exactly what the pain points are, what are the problems, and so they don’t know how to help us solve them. And that’s where that third component comes into play. And that’s our military spouses because they do know. Oftentimes, as we transition from place to place, our military spouses are the ones that are having to navigate these challenges, so they know the specifics of the pain points, and they can help leaders find the solution. So, when a leader invites a spouse to be part of the conversation, to have a seat at the table, you will be much more effective in identifying and solving those challenges. I’d like to close with this thought, with this question. Our forces are strong. They are. But if we want our Guardians and our Airmen to be able to focus on the mission, they have to know that their families are cared for at home. And the best way to do that is through partnerships, partnerships between our military leaders, our communities, and our military-connected families.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you so much, Leslie. Looking around the room and seeing all the spouses nodding their heads along to a lot of that reminds me of how powerful our community is, not just the strength of our force but also the power in our total force, including our families. Chief Nunez, you mentioned your family, and we know that you are carrying quite the load in a very large job right now. Part of what you have had the opportunity to do in this position is work on essentially that QX model between some of the elected officials here in the nation’s capital and senior military leaders and community partners as well because those of us working for the federal service, we cannot directly lobby for these changes. And so, can you please talk with us more about the insights that you’ve gained working at that level on these issues on childcare?

CMSgt. Israel Nunez, Senior Enlisted Advisor to the Chief of Air Force Reserve:

I appreciate the question. Yeah, so I’m very fortunate in this job that I get to engage with a lot of senior leaders, either senior DOD leaders, Air Force leaders, congressional engagements. And so, last year, I think we had over 40 congressional engagements and just highlighting the fact that there are challenges that our Guard and reservists, and not just Guard and reservists, but all DOD members face. And so childcare, overall, it’s not an Air Force issue. It’s not just a DOD issue. It’s a whole of nation issue. And so, if we’re going to get after childcare, we’re going to have to engage not only with our legislative officials. We’ve got to engage with our community partners and then in our half OST leaders.

And so, just from the senior leader perspective, I think it’s important for our DAF leaders, our DOD leaders, to understand what the challenges are at the formation level. So that way, they understand if there are policy issues that are preventing our members from accessing quality and accessible childcare, we need them to know. And so, a couple of weeks ago, I had a conversation with a senior enlisted advisor to the chairman, and one of the top issues that I talked to him about is childcare, not only childcare but childcare for our Guard and reservists. For example, oftentimes, we forget that our Guard and reservists is not just the Air Force Reserve. It’s not just the Air National Guard. It’s 800,000 reserve component members. So, when we go to war, and we go to conflict, we don’t go to war alone. And so we have to make sure that when we pass policy, that we pass policy uniformly that also affects our Guard and reservists equally. And so, there are things that trickle down from the active component, but we have our challenges in reserve because we have multiple different statuses, either civilian status, part-time status, full-time status, and we have to figure out how to write policy that can help affect change for every single one of them.

On the legislative side. I think that’s where maybe where we make most of our money. We have to balance not lobbying because we can’t lobby, but we need our legislative officials to understand what the challenges are. One thing that I expressed to them, and I’ve learned my first engagement on Capitol Hill was probably not that good, my last one probably a little bit better. And what I’ve learned is that when I go in there, I can’t just tell them what the problem is. I need to be able to provide solutions, and I need to be able to speak truth to power. And so, oftentimes, what you see in the media is probably not how they are behind closed doors. There’s a lot of bipartisan support for quality of life issues, and we have those really honest conversations. One thing that I remind them is you can pass legislation all day, but if you don’t increase the top line, things are not going to change.

And so you can advocate for taking care of our CDCs and providing infrastructure, but there’s not additional funding for that. You put DOD in a really hard place because then they’re going to have to figure out, what do I fund? That bill was passed, and that’s great, but at the end of the day, I still have to pay for new weapons systems. And so that’s the challenge that is presented, and that’s the challenge that I try to put back on them to say, “Hey, if you really think and want to advocate for quality of life and get after childcare, put your money where your mouth is and increase the top line and get after it.”

And last thing I would say from a community partnership standpoint, we also need our community partners. And so I’ll talk a little bit later about the things that we have done with help for our community partners, and I think that’s where you all at the formation level can help us engage with the community to make sure that we have additional options outside of what the Air Force offers.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you, Chief, and thank you so much for being here. Our Guard and reserve communities are so frequently overlooked in conversations about quality of life that I think I probably speak for a lot of people when I say how grateful we are that you made the time in your schedule to be here with us. Ms. Smith, I’d like to come to you next. We actually did not plan to go down the row in order, but this is how it turned out. But we know that readiness for our total force involves all of our personnel, our officer enlisted and civilian personnel. Right? So, a lot of the times, our childcare conversations come back to uniform member childcare, but we need our civilians to also be ready. Also, much of our childcare is provided by civilians. So, in your role, 31 years working … I’m sorry, you told me that it makes you feel old, but it makes you wise.

Lesley Smith:

Wise, yeah.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

31 years of experience and dedication to the DAF’s Child and Youth Services programs. What kinds of things have you seen that show creative solutions from the civilian perspective? So, for example, the recent OSD pilot program, expanding military childcare in your neighborhood to the civilian service members we’re working alongside. What other things have you seen that civilians have played a role in?

Lesley Smith:

Well, thank you for that. Our civilians are key to solving a lot of our solutions. And take a look at what happened in our Peterson and Schriever team. They faced this huge challenge where they had a waiting list of between 250 and 300 children. What do you do with that? Our CDCs were full, family childcare. So, they looked outside the gate, and they found a partner in Carlton Academy. And that was a brand new center that was vet owned who understood our unique challenges and needs, and they developed a partnership with that. And the team down there applied for an OSD grant, and the grant initially was to subsidize care for 50 children, and that would’ve made a good dent on that waiting list, but that program has grown so much. Currently, we have 113 children in three different centers. Next year, OSD and DAF has agreed to fund up to 150 children. So, that’s an out-of-the-box solution that we depend on our partners. And so that is a win-win for everybody.

Also, look at New Mexico right now. New Mexico has a state alliance grant where we have all of our CDCs that are registered with it, and then families who apply based on their income are able to get free childcare. And 50% of our DAF families in Kirtland, Holloman, and Cannon are receiving free care. But the other neat thing about that grant is they have extra money to pay more for our caregivers. Recruitment and retention has been quite a challenge for us, and we’ve been able to successfully increase our staffing by 13% over the last year with our recruitment and retention incentives. But those New Mexico grants, they even allow them to do a lot more. So that’s two examples of out-of-the-box solutions that we need to continue to look for. There are other options, and that’s going to be our focus this year. We’re going to be trying to help installations find those additional supports.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you so much. And I think it’s important to note with the Peterson and Schriever example, when you shared that with us, when we talked in more detail about it, correct me if I’m wrong, but you said they were fully staffed and at 100% capacity at that time.

Lesley Smith:

At that time.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Because so often, we assume that the problem is childcare providers, but in some cases, it’s not. In that case, they still had that wait list fully staffed at 100% capacity, correct?

Lesley Smith:

At that time, absolutely. Yeah. So, what are you going to do? There’s no room, nowhere to put them. So, we had to come up with a new solution.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you for sharing those. I think it’s fantastic to hear about the ways that we’re partnering with local communities to figure those things out and veteran-owned businesses, even better. So, Colonel Quinn, everybody’s offered some really fantastic insights here on different elements of essentially the QX model, but you bring what I think is a really unique perspective to the conversation because you are a working mom. You’ve got a large family. Your spouse is also active duty, and you have had so many conversations in recent years with Guardians, Airmen, and their families about what they’re doing, what their challenges are, and how they’re solving them. And so, what types of creative solutions have you heard them talk about that maybe we would benefit from hearing?

Lt. Col. Maria Quinn:

Thank you, Melissa. Yes, it’s been an honor the last three years to really research childcare from the family perspective. It’s been all ranks, all services, all locations worldwide, and I’ve learned a lot. And hearing directly from families and leaders, what we’re hearing is they want to serve. There’s a deep desire to serve, and they want to have a family. So, learning from them how it impacts their mission readiness, their recruiting, retention, their ability to stay on active duty, spouse employment. It impacts all of those things. And we know that. The number one thing I have learned is that childcare is personal. It’s personal, and it impacts every single one of us, as you heard mentioned earlier. We are all serving at a time of consequence where we need every single Airman and every single Guardian and their families to be serving at their highest capacity.

Every hour that our families and our leaders, right … because as you’ve heard, leaders are a key aspect of getting after the childcare challenge in our individual units and locations. Every hour they’re spending on the phone, trying to Google something, not sure where to go, is an hour away from our mission. That is where we can focus. I’ve learned that as a department, we’re going to achieve our greatest mission effectiveness, our best home front impact, our best family readiness when there’s two elements in place, education and support. So, for education, did you know … you can raise your hand if you want. Did you know that there’s over 12 DOD programs for childcare, and those do not include the CDC and the FCC?

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

I’d be curious. Raise your hand if you knew that.

Lt. Col. Maria Quinn:

Okay, let’s start there.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Maybe six or seven people knew.

Lt. Col. Maria Quinn:

Don’t start there. We have a video for that later. There’s lots of resources out there. Okay, so that’s a lot of programs. The DOD is focused on this. That’s what I want you to know from today. Did you know that there’s fee assistance and there’s subsidies available for many different reasons in many different locations? A lot of us don’t know that, right? We went through our careers just not knowing that. Here’s the deal, as my three-year-old tells me every day, “Here’s the deal, Mom.” When leaders and families have the information at their fingertips, they can make the best decisions for themselves for what lies ahead. It cuts through the uncertainty and reduces a lot of stress. There are two ways the Space Force is getting after the Guardian experience, as our Chief said this morning, and I want to talk about those very briefly.

The first one was led by our own S1, Ms. Kelly, and her team for the childcare community. Oh, hello? Childcare community forums. We had four last year, each quarter, and we focused on raising the overall understanding of what’s available to make sure that every Guardian knew what was going on. And Guardian means military and civilians. They’re half our force, so we are very focused on making sure our civilians, as you heard, have the options, know what’s available to them. And that’s been a huge approach with the DOD, which I’ve been really impressed to see is helping them out because we need every single one of them.

So, those community forums are recorded. If you want to get them, let me know. I’d love to send them to you. But that increased our first step of let’s get on the same page of what’s available. The second one led by, again, S1 in the Space Force is a new platform that we’re working on to reduce … I believe the latest count is 150 different clicks of families trying to find their own solutions to ask these questions. And so this platform that they’ve been working on, we’re working with our DAF partners, will increase, for the Guardians, a better understanding of where to go, how to get those questions, and who to ask for help.

That’s Ms. [inaudible]. I need to give out a huge shout-out to her. She has worked tirelessly for our Guardians. And when Guardians are helped, it helps the entire DAF when we’re resourcing them correctly. For the support, this is the second piece. Once the family has figured out their option based on this education, they are going to be able to figure out what’s best for their family at this time, at this place where they’re at. And the next step is actually getting that access. We’ve got all these great initiatives. I want to make sure the families are actually able to access them. That’s where I’ve been focused. So, getting what they need to know, who to talk to, we’ve got experts up here. How to get through processes if something gets a little bit tricky and they get stuck, how do we get them back on the mission? That’s the number one thing. And really, it’s meeting them where they’re at, just like you heard, right? So, my whole focus is taking families and leaders from going from overwhelmed to back focus on the mission because their family’s secure.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you so much. One of the things that, to me, is really clear from the conversation so far is that childcare looks different depending on what community you are in, what your family composition is, if your kids have special needs, if they have medical needs. These things all affect our childcare solutions that work for our families. I’m going to come back to Ms. Smith, if you don’t mind, next. One of the topics that is of pretty high importance right now within the DAF is remote and isolated installations. We also have a lot of OCONUS installations that families spend time at. And my family spent four years in Germany on two different assignments. So, we know that it looks different in those dynamics than it does maybe at a larger CONUS duty station where there are more resources readily available. In your time-serving, you’re not-

Lesley Smith:

In 31 years.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

In your 31 years, what are some of the best practices you’ve seen in those contexts, the CONUS, the remote and isolated? Because I think that many people in the room will find themselves in those situations at some point in their careers, and that information could be helpful.

Lesley Smith:

Yes. So, you’re right. Childcare is not a one-size-fits-all solution. And typically, we used to think of childcare as our brick-and-mortar. You went to the CDC, and that was it. And we’ve come to realize that there are many solutions for families. And one of our best solutions we have is our family childcare program. And we were challenged this year by Ms. Willie, Chief of Child and Youth Programs, to come up with ideas for how we can increase our FCC program. We started out the year with 300. By the end of the year, we were up to 350. So, here it is almost two years later, and I’m proud to tell you we have 433 family childcare homes. Family childcare is an awesome solution for families that want a smaller environment, and they’re a lot more flexible to meet family needs. But we’ve taken it a step further.

In family childcare, we have the extended childcare program, and that program is targeted to those with unique schedules, nontraditional schedules. Not everybody works 7:30 to 4:30 that serve, so we’ve targeted programs specifically for that. And we also, in the family childcare homes, we provide spousal support. So what do you do when your spouse deploys, and you need childcare, and we can’t meet your needs in the Child Development Center? So, we have several different programs in the extended childcare program to meet those needs. In addition, we also have partnered with Childcare Aware, and we offer military childcare in your neighborhood. That is a great resource for families that are not at the traditional locations. Or the waiting list is so high you think, “I’ll never get in there.”

We have partnered with communities, child development centers outside the gate. We provide subsidies to those families. So, they’re getting a quality program. And honestly, we have several thousand families that are very happy with that. And that is a great solution for an ROTC recruiter or somebody that’s not at a traditional base.

For our Guard and reserves, like the Chief said, to be honest, that’s a new thing that we actually started thinking about, and we provide those care on the weekends for … I don’t know if it’s politically correct to say the weekend warriors, but during that time, we provide home community care. And currently, we are in 48 states with over 80 installations serving those weekend drills, and we support the families there. But let’s not forget about our families overseas. What do you do when you go overseas and you sign in for your new location, and there’s no room in the child development center? There’s no room in family childcare, and you feel like you’re stuck. Or you show up to a location that doesn’t have a traditional deaf childcare program.

So, we’ve created community partners outside the gate, and we currently have partners in the Netherlands, Australia, United Kingdom. And as of right now, I have a team that’s in Volkel, Netherlands, and at the end of the week, they’ll be down at Maron, Spain, trying to create those solutions for those families. So, we’re trying to provide resources. We have a lot more work to do, and we know that, and we’re counting on installation leaders and families and spouses to help us with some of these solutions because it’s just not that much of an easy task. But we’re trying, and we’re looking forward to new solutions.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you. And these last couple of questions are going to be something of a lightning round. I’m watching the clock. My husband will be really proud of me for that. So, the last couple of questions will be a little bit quicker-paced here. But Leslie, I did want to mention that we happen to have a very strong group of recruiter spouses in the room. And so I don’t think you knew that beforehand, but they’re there, and I bet I’d love to ask you some questions afterwards. Within the DOD, we know that there is an office that focuses on state-level policies, the Defense State Liaison Office. So, we’ve talked about big national stuff. We’ve talked some about local partnerships. At the state level, the DSLO liaisons are resources to military families. They exist to help work on policies at the state level to benefit military families. So I’m, Mrs. Janaros, I’d like to come back to you and ask, given everything we’ve talked about so far, how do you see partnerships with, for example, the DSLO liaisons, installation-level leadership, local communities and elected officials at the local level, or maybe regionally elected officials, depending on how your community is composed?

Leslie Janaros:

Thanks, Melissa. I think we can all agree. We can nod our head that there is no single solution. We’ve established that. And it will require a multi-faceted approach to address these challenges with childcare. And as I mentioned before, we believe the greatest way to do that is through partnerships, partnerships at the local level, at the state level, and at the national level. I know Leslie just mentioned the partnership that DOD shares with Child Care Aware of America, I think, of partnerships with organizations like Five and Thrive, like AFA, like Kayla Corbitt’s Operation Child Care Project. But the real change and the most impactful enduring solutions will happen at that local level where leaders are partnering with their communities, with their defense state liaison office. For those of you who don’t know, your defense state liaison can be a real tool for you to help you advocate for the policy changes that have to take place at that local level as well as that state level, and so I’d encourage you to learn more about the work that they do and tap into them as a resource as well.

I want to quickly share with you one community that has, in some ways, cracked the code on childcare using this multi-faceted approach, and its Eglin Air Force base. And so I’m going to share with you a couple of examples quickly of what they’ve done. First and foremost, they have increased those FCC providers that Leslie was talking about earlier from six to nearly 30 in the last year. And they’ve done this through innovative recruitment strategies. They’re using what’s called geofencing marketing. They’ve partnered with the Chamber of Commerce so that they can recruit the talent that they need in order to find providers to take care of our kiddos. The leadership there also worked closely with the local and state officials so that they could change the law. And so they were able to change the law so that these providers could open their homes provisionally, which allowed them to get to work much quicker while they were pursuing their state licensing. So, as long as they met that DOD requirement, they could open their home. These providers are now serving 175 children.

Eglin’s leadership also increased childcare capacity by implementing these quarterly hiring events. So now they’re focusing on those CDC providers, and they’re offering these on-the-spot job offers. They’re rapidly onboarding them within 30 to 45 days, and this effort has led to the reopening of eight previously closed classrooms. And they’re now serving 90 additional children. On the infrastructure front, they are restoring a child development center that will provide care for nearly 100 children. They’ve also been approved for MILCON building to build a new CDC north of Eglin and Crestview, where they need that care the most. That will serve 250 children.

They’ve also partnered with the local community to provide off-base childcare solutions. And what they’ve been able to do is work with the community so that they could provide priority placement to these new facilities that will be open in 2025, and that party placement will go to our military members. And finally, they’re using SkillBridge. I don’t know of another installation that’s doing this. They’ll be onboarding their first transitioning service member next month. And so what you can see with the work that they’ve done is they’ve taken a multi-faceted approach. It is no single solution, but it’s been this series of coordinated actions that have been driven by leadership, strengthened by community partnerships that have led to real sustainable solutions for our military families.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you so much for sharing those. We know that there was data released earlier this year by the Military Family Advisory Network that indicates that about 16% of our service members do not have childcare after hours and on weekends. And I know in the space community, we have families who are constantly employed in place doing 12-hour shifts. Somebody has got to be on the job at all hours. How are we learning, or are we learning from the things that the reserves could potentially … do you all have anything figured out? Do you have any answers that we can learn from? Can we admire and acquire from you, Chief?

CMSgt. Israel Nunez:

So, we have some. Again, there is no silver bullet. The challenge for us is five-fold, six-fold, again, multiple different statuses. Sometimes, you’re on an active duty installation, sometimes you’re not. The CDC is not open on the weekends. Again, childcare is a whole nation problem, and so it’s tough finding childcare during the week. Just imagine how hard it is on the weekend. And so, it’s multiple solutions. Leslie talked about the HCC program. And so if you’re a Guard and reservist in the room, if you’re not taking advantage of the HCC program, I need you to find out how to take advantage of it. Oftentimes, it is no fee or low cost, providing childcare close to your home or record or outside the gate, or inside the base if there’s a FCC who’s willing to open up their home. And so that is a great solution that we applied for our Guard and reservists.

Right now, for example, at Pittsburgh Air Reserve Station and at Dobbins Air Reserve Station or Air Reserve base, they’ve partnered with the local community to open up a childcare facility like a Kinder Care or some sort of facility of that sort to provide childcare for our reserve dependents, and so one central solution, one location. They can take their kids. They know they’re getting quality care. And they pick them up once they leave the drill weekend. And so that’s one solution.

The last thing that I’ve been pushing for, especially on Capitol Hill, is every reserve component, be it the Navy Reserve, Army Reserve, Air Force Reserve, is trying to figure this out. We need a DOD solution. And we do childcare very well via contract in the Yellow Ribbon Reintegration Program. I won’t go into detail about that. But I think there’s a solution there where we can actually get contracted childcare that is quality and accessible, and it’s repeatable. So, I think that’s where we need to go to. Ultimately. It’s not a one-size-fits-all for our Guard and reservists. We need multiple solutions to make sure that we can meet every single one of their needs, depending on what their status is and depending on more than working.

Panel Moderator: Melissa Shaw:

Thank you. Lieutenant Colonel Quinn, we are down to one minute and 37 seconds, and so I’m going to toss this last question to you. What opportunities do you see at the squadron level, like small groups? What opportunities do you see there for families and for leadership to come together to support families?

Lt. Col. Maria Quinn:

Okay, here we go. Leaders, this is for you. Service members expect you to be active, to advocate for them, to be aware of what’s going on in their lives. That is the privilege of leadership. You are in the right place at the right time, which is right now, and when you go back to your units, to make a difference. Our members cannot bear the full weight of childcare on their shoulders. This is a leadership opportunity in the best way possible. So, figuring out how to bring this up early and often before they come to their unit, asking them, “Hey, do you have kids? Do you need childcare? Let me get you to the resources.” Right? So that when they come to your mission, they are ready to go. Those are easy questions that you can bring up. Anything you as a leader can do to reduce the shame and the stress, and the uncertainty around childcare for your members will have an immediate impact on your mission readiness. Finally, the data shows that today, our Airmen and Guardian families, especially those parents in your units, are raising many of our future Airmen and Guardians. Any investment, again, that word investment. Any investment you make into our families and to their children today will have an impact on our national security tomorrow.

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This transcript was auto-generated, and may not be 100 percent accurate. The source audio and video can be accessed above.