A new study from the Institute for Women’s Policy Research offers data on access to child care for the 4.8 million parents who are students at colleges and universities nationwide. Previous studies have shown that parents who have access to campus child care facilities are more apt to stay in school and go on to complete their degrees.
The new report finds that of the 4.8 million parents who are college students, 43 percent are single mothers and the vast majority of these women have low incomes. Yet affordable child care on college campuses can be hard to find. The percentage of all community colleges with child care centers on campus declined from 53 percent in 2003 to 44 percent in 2015. At four-year public universities, the percentage of all institutions with on-campus child care centers declined from 55 percent to 49 percent. Furthermore, the report found that 95 percent of all child care centers on college and university campuses were operating at full capacity and had waiting lists averaging 82 children.
The report also includes a state-by state analysis on college and university child care centers. There are on-campus child care centers at more than 80 percent of the public two-year and four-year colleges and universities in New York and California. But in Texas, only 38 percent of the public colleges and universities had on-campus child care facilities. In North Carolina, the rate is only 27 percent.
The full report, Child Care for Parents in College: A State-by-State Assessment, may be downloaded here.