Babysitting Co-Op

Henry and his friend Ellie Cate, photo via my friend, Ben

I spend a lot of time bemoaning the fragmentation of modern American society into nuclear families. After all, I really do believe that it "takes a village" to raise a child (or at least it's a heck of a lot easier when you have help around).

I'm so glad I finally get to do something about it! Two of my new friends and I decided to start a babysitting co-op with the other women from our prenatal yoga class. Here's how it works:

1. Everyone who wants to participate begins with three tokens. Each token is worth one hour of babysitting.
2. You contact people in the co-op individually or through the list to find a babysitter
3. You drop off your child at the agreed-upon time at the babysitter's house, and pick them up at the agreed-upon time as well.
4. You agree to the following norms:
   -Babysitting can only be done in one-hour increments. 15 minutes or less can be rounded down, but 16 minutes and above must be rounded up and payor must pay an extra hour.
   -All babysitting is done at the babysitter's home.
   -The clock begins at the scheduled time of arrival, regardless of whether the child is dropped off late.
   -Babysitting appointments must be cancelled with 24 hours notice or else payment is still required.

For "tokens," we are simply printing out the norms on 2.5" x 1" cardstock. Then we are putting a piece of magnetic tape (from a roll) on the back. That way, people can keep their "tokens" on the refrigerator for safe keeping.

Our hope is that the co-op will be completely self-regulating, so we don't need an administrator.

I'm excited to see how it goes!

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