By Victoria Lim for WorkingNation.
Broadcast version by Joe Ulery for Indiana News Service reporting for the WorkingNation-Public News Service Collaboration

A new program in Northeast Indiana is trying to ease the burden of childcare. It’s not just an issue for Noble County’s 47,000 rural residents. As WorkingNation has previously reported, the effect from the pandemic lingers, especially for women. More than 100,000 Americans miss work because of childcare problems, and the childcare sector itself has a workforce shortage.

Noble County has just launched the Tri-Share Program. Modeled after an initiative in Michigan, it’s aimed at reducing parents’ out-of-pocket childcare costs.

“A large part of our employment base is manufacturing,” says Jenna Anderson, Thrive by 5 Early Childhood Coalition coordinator. “Our childcare costs are lower than a lot of areas across the country, but it is still a struggle for many of our residents to afford the costs.

“And those costs that parents are paying often don’t cover the true cost to the childcare for providing the care. One of the local programs was losing $13 per day per child, and another has said their costs only cover 80% of their expenses. That’s not sustainable.”

The Tri-Share Program is a quick, short-term solution to address affordability. As the name suggests, it engages three parties – the parents, their employers, and the government, in this case, Noble County. Anderson reached out to the Noble County Commissioners, who provided seed funding of $50,000. Then, she connected with other stakeholders.

Supporting Employee Childcare Needs

Nate Lowe was convinced. Just about a year into his role as the superintendent for the West Noble School Corporation, he sees how challenging it is to fill critical roles like assistants who can earn up to $16 an hour working with applied skills or functioning skills students. Openings can barely attract one or two applicants.

“What [employees] are telling me is that [the Tri-Share Program] helps them to be here,” Lowe says. “If you’re at a licensed childcare program with multiple people and one of them is sick, you can still drop your child off.

“If you just have friends or family watching your child and they’re sick, then you have to stay home. The immediate effect is our employees are here more and I think the background effect is they’re happier to be here because they know we’re helping them financially in this way. It’s a little more money in their pockets and certainly every little bit helps, and they can be on the clock on more often.”

Lowe heard about the Tri-Share Program from an instructional aide who works at one of his high schools, Alicia Squire. She experienced the very scenario Lowe described.

“My babysitter was my husband’s uncle. He decided he needed to get a regular job because the economy is bad and they weren’t making it. I called a local daycare…and started there within a couple weeks. It was really expensive. I was paying the uncle $50 a week, and daycare is $120 a week.

“I don’t make a lot of money and my husband had a big job change…and took a huge pay cut,” Squire explains. “That was pretty rough. So, $120 a week was pretty hard. It wasn’t even worth it to work at that point.”

The daycare mentioned the program to Squire – who mentioned it to Lowe. He lobbied his school board which agreed to designate $5,000 of this school year’s budget to help their employees. He says while this can help individual employees, it ultimately helps to serve the broader student population.

“This is serving our kids well,” Lowe says. “We are fully staffed, where sometimes it’s one assistant-to-three students, or one-to-two. Some students need one-on-one attention, and if that person is not at work [because of childcare issues], we’re not serving kids like we’re supposed to.”

Squire says splitting the cost of childcare with her employer and the county enables her to have enough money for her kids’ – ages four and six – swim lessons, school lunches, and cheerleading.

“It puts more food in the house, more gas in the car because the cost of gas has gone up,” she says. “Thank God for Tri-Share. I would’ve had to stay home, which is not a bad idea, but I just love what I do.”

Possible Program Expansion

“Employers are truly beginning to understand that a lack of childcare is affecting their hiring needs,” Anderson says. “I am currently working with an employer who is developing childcare within their business because they lost two employees to a lack of childcare and were unable to hire two replacements for them also due to lack of childcare. While the Tri-Share Program right now isn’t addressing the larger issue of capacity, it can help employers retain staff by contributing to their childcare costs, and perhaps recruit employees from other places that might not be offering support through the Tri-Share Program.”

There’s an income limit families must meet or fall below to qualify. So far, four families are part of the Tri-Share Program. Since county funds are used, the program is currently limited to families who live in Noble County. But because the county is relatively small and has employees who qualify based on income and live outside of Noble County, Anderson says she is working closely with the Northeast Indiana Early Childhood Coalition to expand the program to all of Northeast Indiana.

“This is a big burden for families, especially single parents who don’t have the option to not work. However, many families, in order to be stable in this economy, need to be a two-parent working household,” says Anderson.

“Still, the costs of childcare place a big burden on them, financially. The community’s wellbeing is at stake, as well. We already have employers who cannot fill open jobs, and parents who cannot get into the workforce – even though they want to – because they can’t find childcare at all, let alone quality and affordable childcare,” she says. “I think the fact that we are supporting any families is a success. It’s certainly considered a success to those families.”


Victoria Lim wrote this article for WorkingNation.

Support for this reporting was provided by Lumina Foundation.


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State officials in Maine said they are working to expand the number of registered apprenticeship programs to help counter a persistent worker shortage.

The state hopes to add 75,000 workers to the economy over the next five years by growing career pathways in clean energy, health care, and construction.

Joan Dolan, director of apprenticeship and strategic partnerships for the Maine Department of Labor, said the number of available programs has doubled over the past few years and all are currently full.

"There is huge interest and huge need," Dolan observed. "We've been working hard for years to expand our programming and it's really started to take hold and take off."

Dolan said 90% of apprentices who complete their programs are still working for their employer a year after graduation. Studies show they'll earn at least $300,000 more over their lifetimes compared to their peers.

The majority of apprentices in Maine are in the construction industry as federal dollars continue to boost the clean energy sector. The state has worked to recruit more women into the trade along with a growing number of new Mainers. Dolan pointed out even high schoolers are taking advantage, including in the town of Skowhegan, where a group of students is earning income and skills through electrical apprenticeships after class.

"We also have developed bank teller apprenticeship programs," Dolan explained. "There's banks right in the school, so the kids are getting high school graduation credit as well as earning a paycheck and learning a job skill."

Dolan stressed apprenticeships offer lucrative career pathways for students not interested in attending college or for the many rural students who simply cannot afford it. She added anyone can become an apprentice as long as they're at least 16 years old and are committed to furthering their education both in the classroom and on the job.


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Ohio is among the many states where a majority of workers lack access to paid family leave. A new report by Groundwork Ohio finds three in four Ohioans are employed in jobs without the possibility of paid family leave. This means many parents of young children face difficult choices between work and family. Even other conservative states, like Florida and Texas, have developed voluntary systems allowing private market benefits.

Lynanne Gutierrez, president and CEO of Groundwork Ohio, said the need for policies that support families and their workforce participation has never been clearer.

"There is currently a mismatch in policy, and the desires of both policymakers and the people of Ohio, when it comes to both the needs of their young children and families and the workforce," she explained.

The report was supported by grant funding from the Annie E. Casey Foundation. While some people may take advantage of accrued vacation or short-term disability benefits, access to these options remains uneven. Nationwide, only about half of full-time employees have short-term disability benefits, and only one in five part-time employees.

The report also highlights the economic and developmental stakes for young children in families without paid leave. Research shows that nearly 23% of new mothers in the U.S. return to work within 10 days of giving birth, driven by financial need and limited options that support newborn care. Gutierrez stresses the impact on childhood development when families lack adequate support.

"We know that one in four children under the age of five across the state of Ohio live in poverty; they're among our most vulnerable. And so, the more support we can get to children and families in that unique period of time really sets a foundation for their lifelong success," she continued.

Ohio is one of 29 states without a state-administered paid family leave law, but public support for a national policy is high. The report says 94% of Democrats, 83% of Independents, and 74% of Republicans favor a federal paid family leave policy.


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Researchers at Colorado State University have been able to link the economic stress experienced by 78% of Americans living paycheck to paycheck, to behavior that is bad for workers and company bottom lines.

Keaton Fletcher, assistant professor of industrial organizational psychology at Colorado State University and the report's co-author, said people who supervise other workers, at all management levels, are unleashing their economic frustrations on their direct reports.

"When they feel financially stressed, they are more likely to be abusive, berating or belittling, demeaning, sometimes yelling or cursing at subordinates," Fletcher outlined.

The findings, published in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychology, showed financial stress is experienced by bosses regardless of their salary levels, and men are more likely than women to be abusive toward subordinates. The research was done in collaboration with the Anderson School of Management at the University of New Mexico.

When bosses cannot pay their bills, Fletcher explained they feel like they are not in control of their lives. Bullying a subordinate is one way to try and regain a sense of personal agency. Gender expectations may also play a role. Fletcher pointed out women are more likely to be punished socially for "aggressive" behavior than men.

"Both men and women feel this lack of control in response to financial stress," Fletcher observed. "The data show that men are more likely to engage in those abusive behaviors when they have this feeling of a lack of control."

Companies tolerating abusive bosses are vulnerable to costly lawsuits and Fletcher added even workers who do not report abuse or sue can hurt a company's bottom line. They are more likely to show up late for work, be less productive, steal or talk badly about the company to other people.

"They are also more likely to quit," Fletcher stressed. "It is so expensive to replace employees. Pretty much across the board, having abusive supervisors just is financially costly to organizations."