Sydney S. - Educator

I have been working as an educator for 3 years. I started because I love teaching children, and watching them grow and strengthen their skills. The biggest obstacles to deal with are definable the children sometimes. They can be a little crazy but we help them and we teach them to be better. Some problems we have in our system is that we don't have enough workers. We need more people in our program! A lot of people don't do childcare because of the pay, everyone says we don't make as much money as we should make. I think we deserve more then what we get. We work extremely hard to teach these children, and it is the most important time to teach them.

What would the existence of an affordable, high-quality early education and child care program mean for you as an educator? What would be different if such a program existed?

It would mean a lot to me. Us teachers deserve more money then just minimum wage. I make minimum wage at the restaurant where I work. When I work there I literally wash tables. We do so much in our trade, we teach children! Without teaching them they wouldn't be able to read, they wouldn't be able to write. The world without childcare would be insane. This system is broken!! It would be very different because there would be many more people in the childcare program, and parents would want to send there children because it shows that the teachers work hard and now will get paid correctly.

Lawmakers and policymakers should know that the childcare program works very hard and teaches children things from how to talk, write, walk, to how to cut, glue, and much more. We teach them how to behave properly and much more. We definitely deserve more then we make.