Survey: Parents 'Happy' With Before- and After-Care School Programs

Generally, parents are ”happy” with the before- and after-school care programs offered by vendors and the Framingham Public School district at the nine public elementary schools, said Framingham Public School’s Director of Community Resource Development Joseph Corazzini.

Corazzini unveiled the results of a parents survey conducted by the public school district in March, at a forum for parents at Wilson Elementary on Tuesday night.

A second forum takes place tonight at King Elementary at 6.

Issued identified in the survey were affordability and consistency, said Corazzini.

There are nine elementary schools in town offering what the district calls ”out-of-school time” (OST) or before- and after school care. The Framingham Public Schools, under Corazzini, runs the OST programs at Wilson and King.

The MetroWest YMCA was awarded the contract to run the programs at Barbieri, Hemenway, McCarthy, and Potter Road last summer. The contract is for 3 years.

Kidsborough has the contract for Dunning and Stapleton. Springboard has the contract for Brophy. This is the first year in the district for Springboard.

Each OST program has a different rate for parents and each offers different programming.

Of the survey respondents, 46.9 percent had a child in the YMCA program, 28.9 percent had a child in Kidsborough, 8.7 percent in Springboard and 5 percent at Wilson and King.

Editor’s Note: Survey results had not been posted to the Framingham Schools website as of 3:30 p.m. May 28. Framingham Patch will update the report when the survey is published for the public.

Corazzini said 47 percent of the parents said their OST program is excellent and 42 percent said good.

“In general, parents are happy,” he told the audience of four parents Tuesday night.

“Parents feel they are getting a quality program,” he said. ”69 percent felt they were getting their money’s worth.”

Affordability was an issue raised in the survey, including the fact that each program has a different rate.

The cost for a 5-day a week after-care program or a 3-day week before-care program, for example, is not standard across each of the nine elementary schools.

One parent raised that issue at the Tuesday night forum, too.

The single mom had a child enrolled at King Elementary and took advantage of the OST program there. But recently her son, transferred to Hemenway Elementary and she said the rate was “50 percent more” for the same number of days and she had to drop out as she could not afford it.

In the survey 80 percent of parents said the OST programs were affordable and 15 percent said there were not, said Corazzini.

Ideally, it would be great to have a “reasonable rate for all across the district, said Corazzini.

About 650 parents completed the online survey in March. Of those who completed the survey, 90 percent spoke English, 8 percent spoke Portuguese and 2 percent spoke Spanish.

Parents are happy with the quality of service across the district, but there is “always room for improvement across the board,” added Corazzini.

Other issues identified in the survey was the need for a nurse, the availability and quality of homework help, enrichment activities, outdoor activities, communication, and parental engagement, said Corazzini.

Corazzini said this is where parents can help craft the wording for the next contract bid. They can identify things they want or do not want the vendors to offer.

In regards to homework, enrichment and other activities, Corazzini explained that each family and each parent is different.

“Some parents want their child to complete their homework” at OST and some do not,” he explained. “Some want their child to spend more time outside, and some do not.”

Flexibility in scheduling was also an issue, identified in the survey. Several of the OST programs fill up quickly and some have wait lists, especially on Thursdays, when there are early release days.

Based on the survey results, Corazzini said he wants to create a cohort of parents to advocate for OST programming in the district.

He said he would like for these parents to meet regularly and identify issues to be addressed, when the next set of bids go out for OST programming. Contracts at seven of the schools end in June 2017.

Corrazini said he meets with the current vendors quarterly and he does not want to eliminate the vendor partnerships but to find ways to “change the partnerships to better serve our families.”

A representative from the YMCA was at Tuesday night’s meeting.

Corrazini said the district does not have a plan to take over OST programming at all 9 elementary schools in 2017. He said the district couldn’t handle that, at this time.

“Even if we did decide to run all OST, we would need to phase it in over 5 years,” Corrazini told the four parents at Wildon Elementary on Tuesday night.

(Editor’s Note: None of the parents were from the Wilson program. Represented was two from Brophy, one McCarthy and one Hemenway, former King.)

In regards to before-school care, most parents would like programs to start at 7 a.m, according to the survey.

Dunning Elementary had the highest number of parents to complete the survey with 24.9 percent, said Corazzini. Hemenway and Potter Road were second in third in participation. Wilson Elementary had the lowest participation rate.