First-of-its-kind center offers both childcare and coworking in same space

By Caroline Vandergriff

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    FRISCO, Texas (KTVT) — Finding affordable, high-quality childcare in North Texas continues to be a struggle, and research shows it is causing parents to miss days of work or leave their jobs entirely.

A first-of-its-kind center in Frisco aims to help children, parents, and employers with a nursery school and coworking space in the same facility.

“This is so unique and special,” said Angela Swindell, the school’s play-based curriculum director. “I’ve been doing this in North Texas for 20 years. I’ve never seen anything like it. Usually, it’s drop your child off and go about your day, we’ll see you eight to 10 to 12 hours later.”

At Savanna, which opened about six weeks ago, parents can be as involved in their children’s lives as their workdays allow.

“If I want to pop my head around the corner and see how he’s doing, I can,” said Carly Clark, whose 18-month-old son attends the program. “And it has given me so much peace of mind as a parent to be able to sit and actually focus on my work.”

Clark started looking at childcare options when she was pregnant.

“And got on waitlist after waitlist, tour after tour,” she said.

She and her husband ended up cobbling together help from family as they both worked from home until they heard about Savanna.

“I could not believe that this concept had never been done,” Clark said. “And every single time that I talked to another working parent about it, we have the same struggles of finding a space that fits what our families need, that supports our child and supports our work environment.”

That struggle is exactly what led founder Jessica Bravo to open this space. She used to work in tech in the Bay Area.

“So I found the best play-based preschools, and I was working out of my car and Starbucks and things, and it just didn’t work out,” she said.

Bravo doesn’t want parents to feel like they have to choose between their careers and being present for their kids.

“So that’s our goal, to be a family center versus childcare or coworking,” said Bravo. “We really want to marry the two. My hope is that parents really understand the importance of them being involved in their children’s lives from 0 to 5 years old.”

The demand for this type of approach is clear.

“Every person I’ve talked to has said, ‘How has this never been done before’ and ‘How can I get one in my area?'” Clark said.

It will take more investment from either the public or private sector to expand.

The ongoing childcare crisis not only impacts working families but businesses and taxpayers as well. Researchers from the University of Texas at Austin found the Texas economy loses $11.4 billion every year because of childcare issues.

“That’s kind of some of the hope is to partner with those larger businesses where they can provide something exemplary for their employees, so that keeps that parent able to work,” said Swindell. “It makes good business sense. For those businesses, they’re going to have a greater outcome.”

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