![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
The Women's Initiative
This morning a key member of the Women's Initiative at the Looni spoke to the monthly assembly of my colleagues. As a result of this initiative, my employer has added 3 weeks paid parental leave for staff (previously: none), has expanded the on-campus child-care facility, doubling it in size, and has renovated the campus Lactation Rooms.
Of course, the on-campus child care facility now has ca. 140 slots for childen aged 0-5; there are 25,000 staff members. You pay $75 to get on the wait list, receive an email that you are on the wait list, and then, you wait. You are told nothing about the length of the wait list or how soon you may reasonably expect a place even if you ask. You are not contacted again unless there is a place. My colleague enrolled her daughter 6 months before the daughter was conceived, and just got in when daughter is aged 9 months. That's two years waiting, despite huge expansion in the size of the facility (infant positions went from 4 to 24), and a boost because my colleague's son was already in care there and they have a sibling program. We got on the wait list when Casper was 2 months old. Today I complained about the lack of communication to the Women's Initiative person, and was told, "you know, there are 100 infants on the wait list." We are clearly towards the bottom of that list, and I knew we should have got on the list when she was in utero, but it's damned hard to be that perspicacious. Our current (good) child care situation expires in May, and then we will scramble all over again. I have clearly wasted the $75, and $75 bills do not grow on trees in my yard.
I took the Women's Initiative person to see our "newly renovated" Lactation Room. In the renovation, they added a comfy chair, a table which they then covered with pamphlets so you can't use it, and a lamp. There is also a nice new Medela Lactina professional pump. Still there from before the renovation are: yawing sofa/bed, bare white walls, linoleum floor, scary prehistoric hospital grade pump, assorted trash and boxes. There is a key-card entry to the door, but it has not been activated, so anyone can turn the handle and walk in, and currently there is no way to latch the door. I put a sign on the door saying "occupied" when I use the room twice daily. Women's Initiative person took notes about what was still not up to par - we'll see what transpires. This is the Lactation Room for our campus (one of three campuses). And they wonder why nobody uses it.
Of course, the on-campus child care facility now has ca. 140 slots for childen aged 0-5; there are 25,000 staff members. You pay $75 to get on the wait list, receive an email that you are on the wait list, and then, you wait. You are told nothing about the length of the wait list or how soon you may reasonably expect a place even if you ask. You are not contacted again unless there is a place. My colleague enrolled her daughter 6 months before the daughter was conceived, and just got in when daughter is aged 9 months. That's two years waiting, despite huge expansion in the size of the facility (infant positions went from 4 to 24), and a boost because my colleague's son was already in care there and they have a sibling program. We got on the wait list when Casper was 2 months old. Today I complained about the lack of communication to the Women's Initiative person, and was told, "you know, there are 100 infants on the wait list." We are clearly towards the bottom of that list, and I knew we should have got on the list when she was in utero, but it's damned hard to be that perspicacious. Our current (good) child care situation expires in May, and then we will scramble all over again. I have clearly wasted the $75, and $75 bills do not grow on trees in my yard.
I took the Women's Initiative person to see our "newly renovated" Lactation Room. In the renovation, they added a comfy chair, a table which they then covered with pamphlets so you can't use it, and a lamp. There is also a nice new Medela Lactina professional pump. Still there from before the renovation are: yawing sofa/bed, bare white walls, linoleum floor, scary prehistoric hospital grade pump, assorted trash and boxes. There is a key-card entry to the door, but it has not been activated, so anyone can turn the handle and walk in, and currently there is no way to latch the door. I put a sign on the door saying "occupied" when I use the room twice daily. Women's Initiative person took notes about what was still not up to par - we'll see what transpires. This is the Lactation Room for our campus (one of three campuses). And they wonder why nobody uses it.