Throughout my career, I heard this message, "Don’t talk about care.” At conferences and leadership institutes, I was told, “You will never be understood or respected if you use care to describe your work. Don’t call your school a child care center, call it an early learning center. You are more than just child care, and you should use the language of education.”
But care was the thing that fascinated me the most in my study of human development. I recognized the false dichotomy that education and care were separate. I wasn’t willing to rank care, hide care, or disguise care. I wanted to name care and to show that even the most basic rituals of caring between adult and child require dignity, respect, presence, dialogue, and intelligence.
Early childhood is the original care, and so as a first teacher, I have had the opportunity to practice and analyze care. I have written a book about care, not just because I want to take good care of children, but also because I believe that care offers a way of encountering the other—an ethical model for relationships that we can apply to the whole span of life.
We are connected through care and dependency throughout the arc of our life. Care looks different at each stage of life, but care always builds the foundation for self-worth, for perspective-taking, for empathy. These are not soft skills—these are the vital building blocks of a strong humanity. Care offers all the conditions for progressive education and self-actualization. Care is the next frontier for achieving work-family balance and gender equality. Care is a basic human need, a public good, and a human right. I believe we need to analyze care, and practice care more than ever before because in our country we are in the midst of a care crisis.
Care is endangered by programs that place inappropriate goals and misguided expectations on children and their teachers. Even in early childhood settings where care is assumed, care is most often an afterthought, and responsive care is neglected as an intentional teaching practice. Care is suffering because we have not shown its value as a public good in our country. Working families cannot afford high quality care for their children. The average annual cost of child care for one child in most states is more than the cost of a mortgage and is approaching parity with the cost of college tuition. Care is burdened because the underfunded care system has resulted in extremely low pay for early childhood teachers, many of whom are earning poverty wages.
It will take courage to face the care crisis. It will take courage to challenge the notion that care is subordinate to education or that care is women’s work and a private family matter. It will take courage to lift care from an association with weakness and fragility and align care with strength and power. It will take courage to show that caring is not custodial work that just anybody can do, but caring is an art and a science, and an honorable profession requiring much knowledge and many skills. It will take courage to free care from gender roles, and make care attractive to men and women, to all people, and to position care as a human right and a public good. It will take courage to illuminate care.
During the global health crisis our whole world has paused, as our interconnectedness as humans has been highlighted like never before. The way we emerge from this moment in history will be dependent upon the way we care for one another. I believe that together we can rescue care and I believe that care can rescue us.
Preview Illuminating Care here, https://exchangepress.com/catalog/product/illuminating-care/3600582/
But care was the thing that fascinated me the most in my study of human development. I recognized the false dichotomy that education and care were separate. I wasn’t willing to rank care, hide care, or disguise care. I wanted to name care and to show that even the most basic rituals of caring between adult and child require dignity, respect, presence, dialogue, and intelligence.
Early childhood is the original care, and so as a first teacher, I have had the opportunity to practice and analyze care. I have written a book about care, not just because I want to take good care of children, but also because I believe that care offers a way of encountering the other—an ethical model for relationships that we can apply to the whole span of life.
We are connected through care and dependency throughout the arc of our life. Care looks different at each stage of life, but care always builds the foundation for self-worth, for perspective-taking, for empathy. These are not soft skills—these are the vital building blocks of a strong humanity. Care offers all the conditions for progressive education and self-actualization. Care is the next frontier for achieving work-family balance and gender equality. Care is a basic human need, a public good, and a human right. I believe we need to analyze care, and practice care more than ever before because in our country we are in the midst of a care crisis.
Care is endangered by programs that place inappropriate goals and misguided expectations on children and their teachers. Even in early childhood settings where care is assumed, care is most often an afterthought, and responsive care is neglected as an intentional teaching practice. Care is suffering because we have not shown its value as a public good in our country. Working families cannot afford high quality care for their children. The average annual cost of child care for one child in most states is more than the cost of a mortgage and is approaching parity with the cost of college tuition. Care is burdened because the underfunded care system has resulted in extremely low pay for early childhood teachers, many of whom are earning poverty wages.
It will take courage to face the care crisis. It will take courage to challenge the notion that care is subordinate to education or that care is women’s work and a private family matter. It will take courage to lift care from an association with weakness and fragility and align care with strength and power. It will take courage to show that caring is not custodial work that just anybody can do, but caring is an art and a science, and an honorable profession requiring much knowledge and many skills. It will take courage to free care from gender roles, and make care attractive to men and women, to all people, and to position care as a human right and a public good. It will take courage to illuminate care.
During the global health crisis our whole world has paused, as our interconnectedness as humans has been highlighted like never before. The way we emerge from this moment in history will be dependent upon the way we care for one another. I believe that together we can rescue care and I believe that care can rescue us.
Preview Illuminating Care here, https://exchangepress.com/catalog/product/illuminating-care/3600582/