I have been listening to your input on quality of life issues and the resources and information you would like to receive. One of the top requests is information on spouse employment resources.  

Spouse Education and Career Opportunities (SECO) program has launched a new education and career guide for military spouses worldwide. The site contains customized tools, resources, and activities to assist spouses in meeting their education and career goals. A virtual career counselor guides the person in creating a self-service career plan using the MyICP Wizard or a customized career plan with the help of a certified SECO career counselor.

Eligible spouses create a MySECO account here to access the website and the MyICP Wizard.

Users can create one or multiple individual career plans by inputting spouse type, occupation choice, and challenges and growth opportunities. The ICP is created with the information collected. The ICP is then accessible from anywhere on the MySECO site selecting the “MyICP home” button.

A progress bar (MyICP progress widget) located at the top of the ICP gives the spouse a count of how many activities there are to complete, how many activities the user skipped, and how many activities the user completed.

Activities include the Myers Briggs personality assessment, SECO scholarship opportunities, and a list of military spouse employment partners hiring in specific career fields.

Spouses have the option of contacting a certified SECO career counselor to discuss their ICP or to answer career and education questions by calling (800) 342-9647.

Military OneSource has an interesting newsletter that I believe will be of interest to spouses as well. Since its launch in 2011, Military Spouse Employment Partnership (MSEP) has posted more than 1 million jobs and hired more than 50,000 military spouses.

To access this website and newsletter, click here.

Please share this information with others, especially any new spouses coming into our U.S. Army Recruiting Command family.

I want to thank all our senior spouse leaders for taking time out of their busy schedules to attend the Annual Leaders Training Conference (ALTC) at Fort Knox, Ky., the last week of February. They brought some good discussion to the table and a lot of good ideas concerning family issues, many of which I hope to share and expand on in future columns. This week, I want to make sure all of our geo-dispersed families are aware of all the resources available to them when it comes to child care.

Here are several programs available to Army recruiting families to help parents locate quality child care providers in their communities and help pay for those costs.

Operation: Military Child Care (OMCC)

This is a Department of Defense initiative created to meet the child care needs of military parents who are mobilized or deployed in support of Overseas Contingency Operations but is also available to Army recruiters.

Through OMCC, eligible Army families can get help locating quality child care providers in the communities. Army families may also receive fee assistance to help reduce the high cost of child care. Fee assistance varies by family and is determined by factors such as total family income, geographic location, Army child care fee policies, and available funding.  Eligible child care providers must be state licensed and annual inspected.

For married Soldiers, the spouse must be working, looking for work or attending school. The same policies will apply to unmarried legal parents living in the same household.

Military Child Care in Your Neighborhood (MCCYN)

This is designed to meet the child care needs of service members and civilians living in areas where on-base military child care is not available. 

This program is for families of active duty Soldiers, Active Guard Reserve (AGR) Soldiers and Army civilians, to include Recruiting Command, Cadet Command and U.S. Military Entrance Processing Command personnel. For married Soldiers, the spouse must be working, looking for work or attending school. The same policies will apply to unmarried legal parents living in the same household. Eligible child care providers must be nationally accredited.

Give Army Parents a Break (Respite Child Care)

Eligible parents can get up to five (5) hours of respite child care each month for each child up to age 12. The program is open to Army recruiters and Cadet Command cadre (trainers).

Army Fee Assistance Program Administer

Since 2004, family and MWR programs have offered Army Child Care Fee Assistance programs. The Fee Assistance programs have been administered by the National Association of Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies (NACCRRA) and by the General Services Administration (GSA). 

Find information on the above child care programs at the Child Care Aware NACCRRA website at this link: http://www.naccrra.org/military-families.

The GSA will assume all responsibility for administrating the Army Fee Assistance program on or around May 1, 2014.  More information about the transition can be found at www.armyfeeassistancenaccrra.org.