Meeting with CoRise May 23, 2019

Ideas generated by the CoRise provider steering committee:

Business expense tool: Texting based business expense tracker. Child care providers could text a picture of receipts (maybe answer some questions about it to know whether it is direct or indirect business expense) and get an expense report at the end of the month. Deductible mileage is also hard to track but an important tax write-off. Could the tool help track mileage too? What level of automation could the tool provide in scanning receipts vs. requiring administrative support?

Collections tool: a billing tool that automatically charges parents tuition and enables them to pay online. To be helpful, the tool would need to be able to automatically charge late fees when parents pay late or pick up their children late (To know when parents pick up late, it would also need a check-in, check out feature). Credit card fees really add up. Can these be reduced or shared with parents (parents would need to be informed/opt-in).

Hub for online tools (1st stage labour platform?): Providers may have to use many online tools to meet all their needs (For example: ProCare for sign-in and billing, KidKare for menus, Tadpole for parent communication, etc). A dashboard that organized these tools would be helpful. Especially if it could display some core data from these accounts and/or support single sign-in. Ideally would include package deals for providers rather than providers having to pay monthly fees for each tool (something we'd need to figure out on our CoRise/ICA end).

Marketing website: a website that highlights the quality of providers’ programs through virtual tours of their home, program, local attractions, etc.

Subpool: A matching app that connects providers with substitutes when they need a day off.

Virtual marketing assistant (part of knowledge platform?): Tool that provides ideas for marketing/communicating with parents and then helps providers post to website, email, Facebook, Twitter, etc. all at once or at scheduled times. For example, through the tool, providers might get a suggestion to share a resource on what to do if a child is biting and then could easily share on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, etc. with one click.

From email sent to CoRise May 6, 2019:

A couple of these overlap with other partners’ needs - in particular the marketing website and also the virtual marketing assistant, which sounds to me like it could be part of a knowledge sharing tool (which in turn could be part of the learning commons). We were also thinking that the idea for a hub or “dashboard” for all the tools could possibly be a first version of the labour platform, since we imagine the platform would provide a way to compile existing tools and find ways of integrating them.

Our thinking is that it would probably make the most sense to prioritize co-design of the three tools I’ve mentioned above, since these seem to have the most in common with the needs of other partners that we’ve identified so far. How does that sound to you?

Meeting notes

In attendance: Michelle, Dana, Cheryl, Anne. Shavon(?), Pam(?)

Shavon

Working on co-rise project, and also our child care project in Pennsylvania and Virginia(?)
Outreach worker on childcare team
Help on the ground client facing work
Outreach work, marketing type things

Meeting notes:

Anne

Ideas I sent were from two different conference calls we had with the steering committee
They’re enthusiastic about this process, especially for in-person meetings
First conversation

Introducing /re-introducing this opportunity
Rep of the union was there who knew of their existing tech
Asked providers to go through their working life to figure out what tech they had, what they liked or didn’t like about it
Pam is the most tech-inclined
Some providers don’t use tools at all, but have expressed some interest in doing so with some support

Follow up meeting

Trying to be very generative, getting ideas on the table
That was the email (above) I sent to you all

Dana

I’d love to hear your thoughts on how this process went
Were things that worked well or didn’t for generating ideas?
Based on the 3 survey questions right?
Anne: Yes, the pre-focus group questions is where we’ve stayed
Dana: was that in phone call meetings?
Anne: Yeah, they’re all fairly geographically dispersed in Illinois
Anne:

There were a ton of ideas
It’s tricky to balance hearing all the voices in the group and a few participants who used more technology already, who were eager to participate
Less successful in pulling in providers that don’t use the technology as much

Dana:

Some of the questions in the longer session try to get at - what are your challenges in general, and taking that step back and not thinking about digital tools at first
What are some challenges in your work, then thinking of features that might help with that

Anne

List of tech that some providers are already using
But some of them are not specifically for at home child care, more for centres
Hoping we can talk about the scale of service that we should be envisioning for people, I could use some support in how to facilitate that conversation - a realistic scope
Because some people are well versed in these relatively complicated technologies, that I’m assuming that’s outside the purview of the work together - where to identify and how to identify a helpful scope of work, that meets needs - this seems like an important thing to grapple with
Is there some scope of activity around your own process that you could share?

Dana

I think it’s really important to talk about the scope - we don’t want to create expectations of things that aren’t going to happen
In terms of activities, some of what we’ve done in the past is allow - give some space for all the ideas to not be limited - but we do have to be realistic in what we can do in this project
It might make sense - you’ve already done that - you’ve done the brainstorming, now it makes sense to choose 2 or 3 of those things to focus on
But I guess within that - we want to make sure the scope makes sense
But with those 3 things we’ve identified - marketing website, virtual marketing asst, hub of online tools - things seems to come up with the other partners so far, and seem realistic in terms of the scope
So we might need to rethink the activities if we’re going to focus on those things - the activities described in the document are quite open to all ideas

Anne

yeah, we’ve gone through - what are the core problems you are all facing - this is from conversations from the past year
Not wanting to start from the beginning who have been a part of a number of those conversations at this point, and are eager to get more specific

Dana

What we can do - going back to the document - do some reworking around more of the 2nd part - activity 2, which is exploring the solutions
In the context of those 3 tools we’ve identified
That’s probably more useful and realistic?
Anne: Yeah

Anne:

Our next step would be a focus group focused on these activity?
Maybe a member of your team might be able to be there?

Dana:

Yes, it’s a matter of figuring out the budget on this and where the funding is coming from
To answer the first part of your question, that would be the next step

Anne:

3 ideas that you’ve identified - is it feasible to work on all of them?
Hub might be something others can fit within

Dana

It might be good to prioritize these
A session could be focused on one tool
If it seems feasible after that one to do another co-design session on the other one
From our end, in terms of building things, I think all of those are feasible
Ask Ned what’s feasible and what’s not

Anne

Yeah, for the hub idea - I think a lot of providers have expressed a desire to have 1 place where they can go, have a home base
Have some basic information
But there’s also a lot of interest in having a single sign on with all the different tools they’re using, something that’s pulling out to some degree the data they’re using and putting it all in one place - ranges from simple idea to something fairly complex

Michelle

Yeah, integration is a bit tougher
What’s definitely feasible within one of these project is a minimal slice - and we plan to continue these slices over time once we get more funding

Ann

What’s the simple version of this that will get us to the more complex thing of this

Michelle

Part of the goal is to figure out this simple stuff, but figure out the bigger stuff - helps in getting out the next round of funding to build the bigger thing

Pam finally joined! Yay
Ann

Pam has been a guiding force on this project before I had started working here
Played an incredibly role in pulling everything together and providing a lot of leadership and steering our strategy

Pam

Lives in springfield
Daycare provider - we wear many hats - administrator, teacher, social worker - we could go on
Very passionate and excited about this
Providers can be overwhelmed, and that’s how they burn out

Dana

As we think about the next steps of the co-design process, we can think about how we can figure out what this “first slice” is

Ann

Next step to do a focus group / session together
To add more detail and specifics - work on one of the services to start on
One of the potential places to start could be the hub

Pam

When I think of a hub, I think of a smart home
I can always add my doorbell, thermostat - it’s all compatible
You can add communication - we can work on one of a time, but it can be added
And be able to have a dashboard
A discussion board

Providers can share information with each other
As a provider, I’m always in a house by myself
I dont have another adult to talk to
It’s easy to talk to another provider
Field trips - another provider knows about field trips - tips and tricks

We need to get communication going with providers, parents, and more childcare
Help is grow into centres.. Into the whole field of early childhood
Home base
Even my biggest thing is - I have to do everything by myself, hard to find assistance or help. If I get sick I still have to work

Even a posting for job
I’m looking to employ someone
People looking for work can find
A lot of providers, centre workers - waiting list - they can’t staff their centre to be able to accommodate them

Dana

We’re identifying areas of overlap with other providers
We’ve recently heard from SEWA - the idea of a dashboard was also mentioned

Ann

In our next steps, Pam is going to play a role in pulling people together to represent a larger range of voices in the family child care industry
If we can plan out that meeting a little bit

Different types of people we’d want to see represented
Discussion and activities

Dana

One question I have is what came up earlier - how do we make sure we hear from those who are less acquainted from digital tools? How do we get ideas from them as well?
If we are going to have a more focused session - we’re going to think about how to design this hub - what does it look like - what features might be included - just thinking about how to get everyone participating
First making sure we have a broad range of people
Then getting ideas generated from everyone

We can suggest activities we have experience with
But wonder if you have thoughts about that, even questions and concerns

Pam

I agree - some tools, you have to learn how to use it
You wanna make it so that people who aren’t computer savvy can use it as well
Here, springfield is as not as chicago
I know a lot of providers - I know those who don’t use any computers, to providers who use social media and computers all the time
How many people?

Dana

Generally we have between 15-20 people in a room

Pam

I can get that together
Should I include other stakeholders like centre directors?

Dana

I think it can be helpful to have different perspectives
I think it’s most important to have people who actually are using the tool
But if the person running the centre is using the tool then yeah
So you can recruit?

Pam

I would just need the tools and activities

Dana

Okay, We can modify our activities to be more focused
If we can do that and then send that to you, call to talk through the details of the activities, modify them as needed

Pam

I have a question - Ann, the 3 things we picked out - Is it like pro care kit, kit care, are you saying that for sure you know that those can be things to add to the hub? Or those are just examples?

Dana

Those are things we’ve identified with the most overlap from other partners
Are also feasible
But feasible in the way of - doing a small first stage of those things, first slice
We probably won't’ have a full tool with all the features, but we’ll have a starting place
But we also have another developer that we can bounce these ideas off of for feasibility - what he thinks is realistic

Ann

What’s the basic version of this that would be helpful
What's the most comprehensive version of this

Dana

We want to make sure we compensate participants, that might be a constraint on that

If it’s easier to do all our sessions in 2 locations, that’s fine too
People in each location or something like that

Pam

We have a [unaudible] in springfield and chicago -
We can communicate with each other

Dana

Oh remote? Yeah that’s possible too!

Pam

How many sessions do you think we need?

Dana

I think ideally, we could explore all 3 of these tools and have 1 session for each
I don’t know if that’s within what we can offer people for compensation, or time

One session on the hub, or one on the other tool
We can even have 2 sessions too - up to what those priorities are

Ann

Any guidance on the length of the activities?

Dana: We had different lengths of meetings
We had a meeting that was 10-2:30 - that seemed like a good focus length - good time frame for dropping off kids
5 hours is a good maximum length
Ann: A lot of family care workers work long hours, scheduling might be tough
Dana; we can work with the needs of the participants

Next steps

Co-Rise

We’ll take this back to the steering committee
It sounds like focusing in on the hub and what that might look like and features it might have
We want to get buy in on that in the full group
Figure out logistics - are we doing one in springfield? Another in chicago? Or pull them together in one room?
Discuss which of the 3 ideas we can focus on

IDRC

Rework activities to be more focused
Map out the details of how many sessions

Have an idea of how many session to have, and then to figure out how long they are
Send specifics / language around compensation