The necessity of day care center has been growing more and more in accordance with that social participation of women is raising and family making-up is reaching to nuclear families. But now Korean women’s economic activate rate is 54.9% in 2011 as contrasted with OECD average of 61.8% which is lower level than OECD. Changing jobs and retirement of 30’s women are mainly because of child care and house keeping reasons. And this trend is going to be connected with the reduction of labor supply caused by low fertility that influences to the enterprise. So it must be checked. The compatibility of working and house-keeping for female workers is the one of solutions to improve working environment, and we suggest workplace day care center as an example hereby.
Workplace day care center is the facility that a business owner build and operate independently or jointly for the workers in the business site. It is a principle that over one-third children of the fixed number must be the children of workers in the business site. They must get the permission by The Ministry of Health and Welfare under The Act of Infants and Little Children Care in order to operate the facility. And also they must be instructed and supervised by The Ministry of Employment and Labor under The Act of Gender Employment Equality and Compatibility of Work and Home Supporting by which they could get the supports of building and operating expenses.
There are four steps in workplace day care centers as follows. Examination step, preparation step, building step, and concluding step. In the step of examination, they can decide the plan based on a preliminary study. In the step of preparation, they can make a plan of numbers, the site, building size, the method of operation and budget for real installation on the basis of the preliminary study. In the step of building, they can procure for the facility construction and operation. And in the last step of concluding, they can get the certification of authorization from the relevant city, county (gun), district (gu) with the documents.
The focuses of architectural planning for workplace day care center in the steps of preparation and building are as follows. / natural light, wind and beauty / making up safe, natural, changeable space / giving helps to the infants and little children’s mental, physical development / the space having similarity like a home between the workplace and house / filling of the dwelling character / and convenient and comfortable planning of environment for child care through teachers and professions. With considerations for conditions and finance, facility site could be decided. With consideration for building’s layout plan on the selected site, natural light, ventilation, view, natural characteristics of topography, movement channel for vehicle and pedestrian, parking lot, location of outdoor playground, go in and out building site, location of entrance, etc. should be decided. In the interior space planning, child care room as a main space, connectivity with the supporting spaces, on the other words, access and separation, variability, must be considered. With the introduction of natural factors in designing phase, plan of energy savings of air conditioning and environment-friendly materials should be used. With the installation of emergency, disaster facility for safety, periodical check should be accomplished. In order to serve for disability or ages, the application of design (universal design) which could be used for architecture, environment, service should be got interests. The design goal of the workplace day care center is to make comfortable and clean place in child care with the condition of safety. Present standards are the minimum guidelines, so the characteristics of the infants and little children should be checked. They should give helping to the infants and little children in mental and physical development making desirable day care center. Many researches and considerations are needed in order to meet these requirements.