College of Health assistant professor of practice and child care policy researcher Megan Pratt recently traveled to Washington, D.C. to testify before U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren about the challenges facing the child care industry. (Watch their conversation here.)
Pratt has worked at OSU for six years, and the biennial child care desert reports she produces as part of the Oregon Child Care Research Partnership are frequently cited by journalists and lawmakers.
“The work I’m doing builds on work that’s been going on in Oregon for 30 years,” Pratt said. “It felt important to be able to speak about Oregon and the partnership work that I’m carrying the torch for now.”
Plus, she said, she’s a born-and-raised Oregonian, so U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, who chairs the Finance Committee for which she gave testimony, has been her senator for nearly three decades.
The whole trip came together in about two weeks — which is actually a lot of lead-time for Congressional committee witnesses, Pratt learned. Child care industry advocates in Oregon recommended her to Finance Committee staffers as someone who can speak to the reality of child care in Oregon.
At a July 9 hearing, Pratt told the committee that parents across the country currently shoulder the burden of paying for child care, with states providing some funding, but without much support from the federal government. Reliable, long-term government funding would allow child care providers to plan ahead and increase worker wages and the number of child care slots they offer, she said.
“I hope that some pieces of what I shared are able to be used toward solutions at a federal level,” she said.
For any other faculty researchers who may be asked to testify before Congress, Pratt says it’s important to accept the help being offered by committee staffers, who are very knowledgeable about the process and what’s needed; and to have talking points carefully honed to fit into the five-minute testimony slot.
“I’m a researcher for a reason,” she said. “I totally didn’t want to do it, but I made myself. If I can do it, you can do it too.”
The OSU Media Relations team also offers media training to help faculty and staff get more comfortable speaking about their work. Learn more: https://today.oregonstate.edu/news/faculty-and-staff.
~ Molly Rosbach
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