Rural immigrants lack child care

URBANA, Ill., Nov. 1 (UPI) -- U.S. researchers say finding child care is difficult for rural U.S. Latino immigrants due to language, cultural, cost and time barriers.

Researchers at the University of Illinois College of Agricultural, Consumer and Environmental Sciences in Urbana say these immigrant parents in rural areas need child care that meets a certain cultural comfort level, is affordable for them and is available during shift work.

"Suppose you're living in the rural Midwest and you don't speak English very well. Can you imagine leaving your child with a child-care provider if you couldn't communicate well with that person?" researcher Angela Wiley said in a statement. "The immigrant moms we interviewed for this study faced just this dilemma."

Wiley says the Latino population in non-metropolitan areas of Illinois grew by 71 percent between 1990 and 2000 and has continued to grow. In Champaign County alone, the number has more than doubled. The mothers' situation is further complicated by their husbands often working double shifts making it difficult for them to share child care.

Wiley, Marcela Raffaelli and colleagues gathered data by having 112 mothers with at least one child age 12 and under in several Illinois counties interviewed in Spanish.

The report is at: http://familyresiliency.illinois.edu/research/documents/LatinoFamiliesinCentralIllinoisMay2010.pdf.