TCC Meeting Notes: Thursday, January 8, 2009

9:30 AM, meeting at Asian American Civic Association, 87 Tyler Street, 5th floor

Attendees: Anna Tse, Barbara Rubel, Beverly Wing, Bill Moy, Chau Ming Lee, Chutze Chou, Cody Yu, Enoch Liao, Jane Leung, Liau Yu, Megan Cheung, Nicole Newendorp, Richard Goldberg, Samuel Tsoi, Sherry Dong, Sue Kim, Sunny Schwartz, Susanna Zweig, Weijie Huang

Agenda Items

I.       Refreshments, Welcome, Introductions

II.     Organizational Update, Asian American Civic Association – Richard Goldberg, Director of Adult Education

5 Components: (Richard)

–          Education

–          Training Programs

·         Automotive Education

·         Office Skills

·         Facilities Management

–          Workforce Development (Sunny)

·         Retention Services up to 2 years after helping them find a job, keep job, work with supervisors, get another job.

·         Incumbent Training

·         Employment Center with walk-in services

–          don’t need training but need job

–          free-for-service until they get funding

·         Language capacity for Quincy Career Center

–          Initiatives

·         Youth Initiative (started planning in 2008) – working / serving families. Want to work with another community youth providers – exciting because they provide services up to 6PM. Also develop young leadership, join board, work with Sampan to provide youth voice. Plan there but iron out priorities.

·         Meeting January 21 for youth providers.

–          Early Child Education Project – have child care center on ground floor. Distinct for Mandarin immersion. About 51 spots. Most difficult to hire staff with license, speaking Mandarin.

–          Constituency – beginner / intermediate level ESOL

–          70-80 % women, young 20s

–          Evening ESOL very diverse, training programs

–          PACE Automotive Repair Technicians

–          20% Moroccan, 15% Albanian, 50% Chinese

III. State of Child Care & Early Education: Update & Discussion – Bernadette Davidson, Director of Child Care, BCNC

–          Infant / Toddler care NEEDED

–          Because it is the most costly, highest legalized mandated ratio

–          E.g. $290/ week at BCNC (private market)

–          State reimburse less than others

–          Need pre-school programs supplemented to help offset infant/toddler

–          Wanted in “family childcare home”

–          But most agencies don’t have Infant / Toddler care because:

–          Higher labor

–          Work well with parents

–          Only 6 children at a time (including your own kids), with only 2 kids < 2.9 yrs

–          Rigorous with housing requirements (issue for Chinatown)

–          Child Care High Costs (issue for Chinatown)

(NB: nobody makes money on this; barely breaking even.)

(centralized, computerized waiting list state-wide for all child care)

–          Two basic ways for low-income to pay

1.      Contracted care by state – more stable

2.      Voucher – have to go to Resource & Referral to demonstrate they are low-income. But problem now with economy is that the state has restricted vouchers to those coming off welfare or identified by DSS.

–          this is not really applicable to Chinatown families

–          at BCNC, the last time it happened, our program turned 90% (?) non-Chinese, not from our community. That hasn’t happened yet.

–          As standards and education goes up, our teachers tend to move on to public school jobs because BPS pays much higher.

–          150 children from Chinatown community lose child care because of inability to afford care.

–          Multi-lingual Action Council (grant to work across communities on such issues)

Announcements:

  1. Nicole Newendorp, professor of Anthropology at Harvard: Drawing up research proposals on Cantonese-speaking overseas born immigrants over the age of 55. She is looking for concrete suggestions for targeted groups she can have in-depth involvement with over a longer period of time.
  2. Sue Kim from the BRA –

    (1) Harrison Albany Strategic Planning (South End) study. Taking nominations for Advisory group until the end of the day tomorrow.

    (2) Maternity leave in a few months. Temporary contact people.

  3. AACA‘s Community Forum with Suffolk County D.A. Daniel Conley. Topic: Crime, Justice, and the Immigrant Community. Date: Thursday, February 12, 2009 at 12:00-1:00PM. Location: AACA 87 Tyler Street, 4th Floor. RSVP: 617-426-9492 ext. 312 or rsvp@aaca-boston.org

V. Attachments:

1. ESOL Flyer for Chinatown ACCESS

2. Summary of presentation on State of Child Care in Boston by Bernadette Davidson, BCNC


Next Meeting: Thursday, February 12, 2009 @ BCNC 4th floor Conference Room