Hi all, i'm new to this site, only joined today. I am involved with Balbriggan Childcare Committee and our aim is to set up an affordable full day integrated childcare facility in Balbriggan. At present there is no such community facility in Balbriggan and high childcare costs mean that many people can't access training, education and employment opportunities or are paying a high proprtion of their earnings to childcare providers. We have identified a suitable site in Balbriggan and we are in the process of applying for a childcare grant in order to set up. We envisage the facility will cater for children from under 12 months up and we intend to offer places for the length of hours that parents need. E.g full time, playschool, part time, a few hours a day etc. There is a lot to do to apply for the grant and to set up and run this much needed community facility and we need new members to achieve this. Anyone who is interested can contact Lisa Tonge at Co-operation Fingal on 018020484 or by sending me a private message or by posting in this topic. Thanks
Help is needed in the shape of more committee members. Our next meeting is next tuesday at 6.30pm. If anyone is interested in joining please let me know and I'll give you more details.
Thanks for your interest, no we still need people. We have a lot of work to do to get this application in on time so all help gratefully received. I will post details of meetings in this thread but sometimes meetings are cancelled/venues change at the last minute and you might not see it in time. You could ring Lisa at Co-operation Fingal on 8020484 and ask them to register your details and then they can contact you directly with information if there are changes. The next meeting is next week probably Tuesday or Wednesday. I don't have the full details yet but I will post them when I do. Thanks again
We (finally!!!) got the application finished and it went in on Friday, we have applied for funding for a full day care facility offering 42 full and part time places.
We won't hear if we were sucessful for a while but I'll keep you posted.
We should be hearing about our application in the New Year and I will post here how we got on.
Unfortunately the way the funding is calculated, eligibility and staffing funding has changed since we started our application. We are still hopeful of opening a full day care facility but we might need to do more fundraising ourselves than we had first expected. I will keep you up to date with this and hopefully some of you will be able to give us a hand with our fundraising.
Hi all, no news yet I'm afraid, the wheels of Government grants grind very slowly!!
The only update is that we put in our application for staff funding under the new rules last month and, depending on when we hear back, we hope to be open for September 2008.
Can you place your child's name down on a list for a place in the creche that is in the process of being set up or can you only do this at a much later stage when the creche is actually set up? If you can, who do you contact? When is the opening of the creche likely to be as I am very interested in sending my child there is possible.
Hi Justine aplogies for the long delay in answering you, I got out of the habit of checking this board and I've only just seen your post.
As things stand we are still waiting on word about the funding and we can't do anything until we get it so our opening date would be dependent on that. Realistically I could see it being Jan 2009 before we open.
Before we open we will be advertising locally and then you would contact the creche itself for enrolment, I will also keep this thread updated as I know more.
We can't take enrolments til then I'm afraid.
Thanks for your interest and hopefully things will get moving soon
