The Delivery Driver Father Became a Scapegoat... A Country Where Daycare Centers Operate Late Into the Night [Reporter’s Notebook]

Lee Hyun-chil, a delivery driver in his 40s, recently found himself in an awkward situation while consulting about extended daycare services. Lee is the head of a single-parent household raising a five-year-old child. He sought extended daycare as a solution to care for his child until he finishes work.

However, the daycare center director responded unexpectedly. "Extended care is stressful for the child and there aren’t enough teachers available to supervise..." The director’s uneasy reaction implied, "Do you really need to use the extended care?" Especially, the director’s question, "Is there really no one else to take care of your child?" left Lee speechless. The father of the five-year-old suddenly felt like an unwelcome outsider.

Extended daycare is a government free care policy that extends operating hours from 4 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. for families struggling with childcare. Yet, parents met on the ground all expressed difficulties in using the extended daycare services.

The biggest problem is the lack of dedicated teachers willing to work late hours. A woman with experience working as an extended daycare teacher asked, "Everyone wants to go home and rest after work, so why would we want to keep working?" Often, even after 7:30 p.m., teachers stay past 8 p.m. handling administrative tasks. This is why the supply rate of extended daycare teachers remains in the 30% range.

The government introduced night daycare centers to support single-parent and dual-income families facing childcare difficulties. While the intention to help those struggling with care is good, the reality on the ground is producing unintended consequences.

Children, who need to spend time with their parents during emotional development stages, end up alone in classrooms late at night; teachers feel sorry for the children they cannot care for more; and parents feel guilty.

"Wouldn’t it be better to create a society where parents can leave work early?"

Why did this comment from a parent on the ground resonate so deeply? Parents, teachers, and children all want to be at home, not in the classroom, late in the evening. This obvious and most important fact is something we may have forgotten.

A society where a single-parent father of a five-year-old can go to work without worrying about childcare?that is the world we dream of.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.