Free Housing for Educators Benefits Teachers as Well as Families

A housing experiment is unfolding in New Haven. Early childhood educators working at the Friends Center for Children—an organization providing education to children between three months and five years old—are receiving free, employer-provided housing. Designed and built by students at the Yale School of Architecture, the new multifamily dwelling completed this year is one of several forthcoming homes that provide relief to this chronically underpaid workforce.

Though Covid 19 lockdowns revealed childcare to be critical infrastructure of our society, many of the pandemic-related federal financial assistance programs targeting low-to-moderate income families have ended. The costs of childcare have risen dramatically; simultaneously, early childhood educators remain some of the most underpaid teachers across the country—poverty rates for those teachers are, on average, nearly 8 percent higher than their K-8 counterparts. Coupled with a shortage of affordable housing, teachers struggle to make ends meet, while families struggle to access increasingly expensive childcare.

According to a 2020 CT Mirror story, the Friends Center received a gift of $750,000 and purchased two, two-unit rehabbed properties to house four of their educators and their families at no cost to the residents. The initiative’s success kicked off a masterplan to provide more free housing to its educators in the next five years, with the intent to ultimately house 30 percent of their teachers, or 24 total, as they grow. The gift also allowed them to begin building another two unit building, but for this one, architecture and construction services were provided by nearly 70 architecture students at Yale, led by faculty member Adam Hopfner, according to an August Mirror story. The mandatory first-year Yale graduate course has, since 1967, provided students with "the unique chance to design and build a structure as part of their graduate education," according to the course description.

Such design-build coursework isn’t uncommon among universities: Famously, Rural Studio at Auburn University has produced nearly 200 projects over the past 30 years through a service learning curriculum. A handful of small yet important programs at architecture schools such as the Illinois Institute of Technology, the University of Utah, and The New School have also served communities often overlooked by commercial design through such coursework. Students gain applicable skills and build relationships with local community members who, in the case of Yale and New Haven, have maintained a mostly-symbiotic relationship that, in recent years, has been strained amidst the pandemic.

Students spent time with future residents to learn about their families needs. "The extra storage under the stairs and throughout the home is critical for parents of young children — something many of the twenty-something students might not have considered before getting to know the clients," reads the Mirror story. They also included wider hallways to accommodate strollers and ample natural light from large windows and skylights. Each two-unit building has a shared kitchen and separate living quarters.

Though residents do pay utilities, providing rent-free housing increases their purchasing power without having to raise salaries, which would further stress those families already struggling to pay for childcare, explains a September New York Times article. Though the Times author notes that this model is not currently replicable at a large scale, it does provide a unique case study for stabilizing childcare costs, increasing housing stock, and ensuring that teachers are supported to remain in their jobs.

Top Photo by Lourdes Balduque/Getty Images.

10/16/23: This piece has been updated to correct the number of teachers provided with free housing.

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