Military spouse Kayla Corbitt already had her life to her liking when she met her active-duty Army husband while she was in graduate school. Married while he was working at Walter Reed and falsely lulled by the straightforward routine of hospital life, military life initially seemed less complicated than she later realized. It wasn’t until they went to their first overseas assignment that she identified the pain points of military spouses navigating their own jobs while also being the main caregiver for their family. The inconsistency of hours, TDYs, deployments, coupled with routine moves that pull families away from their extended family and support, cause many military spouses to give up on careers of their own. With her degree and background in advocacy, Kayla began to work to alleviate specific hardships, particularly when it comes to childcare for military spouses continuing to work.
“I created Operation Child Care, which is first and foremost an information-sharing network and advocacy company,” says Kayla. “We push for more centralized access to affordable equitable child care for anyone who is military affiliated. So that’s active duty, veteran, even DoD contractor. If you have base access and you’re contributing to the mission, then you have access to what we do.”For her business of Operation Child Care, Kayla was chosen to be a Semi-Finalist for the Military Entrepreneur Challenge. Nine Semi-Finalists joined the Second Service Foundation in Austin, TX, each with strong businesses to benefit the military community. After a private pitch round to a panel of esteemed judges, Kayla was selected as one of three to move to the final round where they pitched to a live audience. Kayla received a $1,000 grant from the Second Service Foundation, and has the opportunity to join us at the Military Influencer Conference (MIC) for our national Military Entrepreneur Challenge pitch competition. This year, MIC will be hosted in Las Vegas, NV, in November.
