Infants and paperwork — together at last!
CoHatchery, the city’s first combination workspace and day-care center, is opening in Park Slope next month. The co-creator says she first got the idea when she was attending grad school and raising a young child, and realized it was the obvious solution for new moms and dads who don’t want to choose between supporting their family and seeing their tot’s formative moments.
“For the first crucial years of the child’s development, it felt very weird to have to be separated from them all day and not be able to see what they’re doing,” said Wendy Xiao. “If it’s just real estate and special requirements keeping that from happening, then that’s quite silly.”
The shared office space, which opens July 11 on President Street, between Seventh and Eighth avenues, offers parents of children ages 6 months to 4 years old a place to take of care of business while someone else takes care of their kids nearby, allowing them to check up on the squirts several times during the work day, according to Xiao.
With their parents so close by, the little ones tend not to suffer from the dreaded separation anxiety that leads to so many crying fits and tantrums, she said.
“Many children have this pent up anxiety, because when they say goodbye to their parents, they know they’re not going to see them until 5 pm,” said Xiao. “This way, they know they’ll come in during lunch and they’ll see them a few times a day.”
CoHatchery’s workspace includes shared desks where parents can chip away at their budding businesses, while the day care center a block away features a child to caretaker ratio of 2 or 3 to 1, according to Xiao.
Some 43 percent of women who graduate with a Masters in Business Administration drop out of the workforce after having a child, Xioa said — a statistic that especially inspired her co-founding partner Susann Friedrich, who doesn’t have kids but was raised by a single mom.
“She’s looking at it more from a woman’s empowerment view point,” said Xiao.
CoHatchery (808 President St. between Seventh and Eighth avenues in Park Slope, www.cohat
