Cornell broke ground Nov. 1 for a new child-care center with space for 158 children, ages 6 weeks to 5 years, of Cornell staff, faculty and students. The facility is being built on Pleasant Grove Road in the village of Cayuga Heights, just north of the university's "A" parking lot.

Scheduled to open in fall 2008, the 16,240-square-foot facility will help meet the increasing demand for quality child care for young children by people who study and work at Cornell, says Mary Opperman, Cornell vice president for human resources.

"The new facility will be a quality center, expected to be accredited by the National Association for the Education of Young Children, and will accommodate 48 infants, 50 toddlers and 60 preschool children," said Opperman, noting that it will be operated by Bright Horizons Family Solutions, which runs more than 600 employer-sponsored centers in the United States, Europe and Canada and is chaired and was founded by Linda Mason '76.

Whether the spots in the new center will be determined by lottery, first-come, first-served basis or by another method has not yet been decided, said Lynette Chappell-Williams, director of Cornell's Office of Workforce Diversity, Equity and Life Quality. Undoubtedly, there will be more parents requesting a space for their children than slots available, she acknowledged.

"As pleased as we are to be able to open this new center, we realize that it fulfills only a portion of the child-care needs in our area," noted Chappell-Williams. To help Cornell faculty, staff and student families, Cornell began a child-care grant subsidy program to help with the rising costs of child care. In 2007, 696 families used the program, up from 239 in 2001.

Furthermore, she added, "the university will be exploring an increase in this child-care grant funding to achieve our goal that no household pay more than 20 percent of their household income for child-care expenses."

In addition, Cornell has created and filled a new position; Eileen Whang is Cornell's new dependent-care consultant. Her objective is to help families identify local child-care options, locate drop-in child-care facilities in other parts of the country for when faculty or staff members travel, and identify elder-care options, both locally and nationally.

Information on the progress and operation of the child-care center and on child-care grants and other benefits and services for families at Cornell can be found at http://www.ohr.cornell.edu/workLife/childCare/index.html.