Seeking summer camps: Slots filling quickly, parents waitlisted
Mar. 12—TRAVERSE CITY — Scott Nahama and his fiancé, Samantha Straub sought a place to send their 6-year-old son, Robert Nahama, this summer.
Grand Traverse YMCA's annual program "Summer Camp at the Y" had parents lining up at 10:30 p.m. Sunday night for Monday morning in-person registration. According to staff, registration closed in 45 minutes, as the 200-child capacity had been met.
"I was beyond ticked off that I was there at 3 a.m. and got only one week of camp out of 10 weeks," Nahama said. He was among hundreds of parents who were turned away, he said, and frustrated.
Nahama's next move was to try TCAPS' Summer Explorers' program but they weren't aware that the program serves TCAPS students first. Robert, their son, is a student at Grand Traverse Academy.
He said that the family's current plan is to drive their son an hour and a half to his grandmothers for nine weeks out of the summer, unless something else comes up.
They, like many parents, are still on the hunt for summer daycare options, as many programs maxed out at full capacity quickly.
Traverse City Area Public Schools' "Summer Explorers" program is no exception.
Families attempting to register on Feb. 8 encountered a system error, and the district hosted another registration event on Feb. 10. Parents were waitlisted minutes after the spots opened, according to social media posts.
Currently, registration is paused "due to high demand" according to the district's website. The club will run Monday-Friday from June 17 to Aug. 16.
"It's a good and bad thing," said Dr. John VanWagoner of the demand, noting that the district would like to serve more parents and students. However, because of state licensing laws and staffing, TCAPS isn't yet able to expand the program, he said.
Locations for this year's program will be Eastern Elementary and Willow Hill Elementary schools. TCAPS Child Care Director Jessica Anderson said that program staff would like to expand to three locations if possible.
"Right now we can have 70 kids at each location," she said, explaining that the current ratio allowed is 18 students per one staff member.
"We truly wish we could offer beyond our own students as well, but what we've found in previous years, due to staffing we had to reduce the size of our program, and make some decisions as to which student populations we were going to be placing as priority," Anderson said. "We are trying also to work with other community organizations and programs in the area to see if there's a way we can all work together to solve this problem. There was a period of time where it was competition. But we've spoken with some great community partners, and we are just trying to talk though what we can do collectively."
Editor's note: Reporter Travis Snyder covers child care availability in the region. If you have an experience you would like to share, please contact him at tsnyder@record-eagle.com
