Au Pair Program Helps Amid Federal Return To Office, Fairfax County Family Says

FAIRFAX COUNTY, VA — Working families face a challenge when looking for child care in a competitive and increasingly costly Northern Virginia market. That especially rings true for federal workers who are returning to full in-person work.

For one of those families, the au pair program provides an alternative to traditional child care that works for their schedule. Fairfax County resident Rachel, who did not disclose her last name due to her husband's federal job, told Patch they have two elementary school-aged children and one preschooler.

While the couple used to have professional nannies for their children, they have been using au pairs for the last year and a half.

Rachel's family appreciates the cultural benefits the program offers in addition to child care.

"Frankly, it was first a child care question, but then the more that we talked to people who had au pairs, and the more that we learned about the program, the more excited we were about the cultural exchange aspects," the mother of three told Patch. "My husband and I both traveled a ton internationally, and I speak the language of our au pairs, and so I love having a young person from somewhere else in our house, and hanging out with our kids, teaching us about language and culture and food, and little nursery rhyme songs and stuff like that."

Mission Of U.S. Au Pair Program

The au pair program in the U.S. dates back to 1961 as a strategy for international diplomacy. An au pair refers to an 18- to 26-year-old from another country who received a criminal background check and J-1 cultural exchange visa for up to two years to provide child care for an American host family.

The family in turn provides a weekly pay stipend, room and board, and educational opportunities. The U.S. State Department-regulated au pair program provided more than 1,325 au pairs in Virginia in 2022, making it one of the top states for au pairs.

Au pairs can be one option for families struggling to find quality child care in the populous Northern Virginia region. The program allows for au pairs to work up to 10 hours a day, or 45 hours a week. Flexible scheduling is an option that can help parents or guardians working in fields like the military, medicine and emergency services, as well as single parents.

Rachel recalls that halfway through her first pregnancy, the family was already facing child care wait lists. The child care facilities they toured informed the couple they couldn't take their child right away, even after Rachel's three months of maternity leave. Finding nannies was difficult, too, and the family had a bad experience with a nanny agency.

While Rachel is not familiar with traditional child care costs, she says au pairs are a fraction of the cost of a professional nanny. Cultural Care, the largest sponsor of the U.S. au pair program, estimates the cost of an au pair starts at $21,424, or about $1,785 per month. According to the Department of Labor, the estimated child care center cost in Fairfax County as of 2023 was $22,953 for infant care, $19,280 for preschool and $17,750 for school age care.

The au pair program cost covers the $11,245 Cultural Care program fee and the minimum weekly pay of $195.75, or $10,179 per year. Rachel notes that the program benefits families with multiple children, as the cost remains the same. Along with items covered in the program cost, some families choose to pay for additional benefits for the au pair.

"As required by the State Department, we pay a weekly stipend," said Rachel. "Many families pay more than that. We pay more than that because it's such a value to us for our au pair to be happy and have spending money, and you'll be able to live a life while she's here."

Costs, Flexibility Seen As Benefit

Aside from the cost benefit of an au pair for multiple children, Rachel says an au pair based at home offers flexibility when work situations come up. That's especially helpful as her husband's federal job transitioned from hybrid to full in-person, requiring him to leave for work early in the morning.

"My work is very unpredictable. Sometimes I might have to stay late, and I might not know that until I get to work," the mother said. "So having her here and having her have this bulk of hours that we can use, you know, without going beyond the 10 hours allotted per day to be so flexible that I can text her and say, like, I'm so sorry I'm running late. Can you drop off, you know, this child at this activity? That is invaluable."

As the spouse of a federal worker, Rachel understands that families are scrambling to find child care as the federal government implements its return-to-office plan. When her husband had to return to the office for five days, the family was able to discuss adjustments to the child care with their au pair.

"The abruptness of the requirement, I think, leads to a slew of folks looking for a service that is already kind of at its max capacity in the area," she said. "Daycares are already kind of maxed out. I don't know, you know, the middle of the school year. I have tried, in odd times like this to find nannies before, and it's so impossible. It really works on like a school-year cycle."

Navigating The Au Pair Process

So how do families get an au pair from another country to come care for their children?

Rachel says families start by signing up for an agency like Cultural Care. Once a family gets signed up, they can look at profiles of potential au pairs with extensive questionnaires and videos showcasing their English skills and personality. Families complete their own questionnaire to inform au pairs about who they would be living with.

After that, families can reach out to a potential au pair to start an interview process. Rachel and her husband tend to do four interviews, including by themselves and the last one with the kids. When the kids are present, they are very certain about moving forward with the au pair.

"I'm pretty protective of my kids. I don't want them to get their hopes up about someone who might decide not to match with us," said Rachel. "So we're usually very certain at that point that they, you know, that they're going to match with us."

From there, the family pays a deposit and receives the au pair's travel arrangements from the program while preparing the home for their arrival. According to Cultural Care, many au pairs are still in their home country and may need at least six to eight weeks to secure a visa and complete training. Other who are already be in the U.S. and searching for a new host family may be able to arrive sooner.

Rachel had an au pair for one year and is halfway into the second au pair's term. After the first year, au pairs can seek a six-month, nine-month or one-year extension. Sometimes they choose to seek a new host family so they can experience living in another location. Having an au pair already present helps with finding a new one too, Rachel says.

"We're as honest as we can about family, our kids and whatever, because it's our family, but them being able for them to interview your current au pairs is super healthy because they just get unfiltered answers," said Rachel.

Hosting an au pair also means taking care of the au pair's own well-being. Some au pairs can get homesick for their country, which Rachel says would prompt the host family to pay more attention to their mental health. Other au pairs have a youthful thirst for new experiences in their time beyond their child care obligations. For example, the family's open line of communication allowed their au pair to travel out of state to visit a friend in March.

"Ours have been, you know, excited about new opportunities, new friendships, new adventures, and so all we've really done is foster that, you know, making sure that there's a set schedule and that if we need flexibility, we give them as much notice as possible," said Rachel.

To families intimidated by the thought of a new person coming to live in their home, Rachel says, "it's not any person." For Rachel, the au pairs and their friends have become her "grown up kids." Her former au pair still comes to visit with her friends, or even with her family from her home country over Christmas.

"I never anticipated feeling like I was also going to be mom to these young adults, and love them so much, kind of like my own kids in a way," said Rachel. "And I think that if families knew that they would also be gaining that kind of love in their house, or that kind of relationship for themselves and for their kids, I think there would be a lot more excitement and interest in the program. Because it's not just about childcare. It's about gaining new family members."