A need for 'solid footing' across access, affordability, and quality
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Space can be challenging to find in child care. It’s expensive and must meet strict regulatory guidelines at the local and state levels. But child care providers and community leaders are finding creative solutions across the state to expand programs, start new ones, and fill community needs.
I wrote a story on the effort in Wilkesboro to save a single five-star child care program by relocating it into a church with extra space. Finding that space was a challenge, and renovating it cost the church close to $600,000, which it raised through private grants and individual donors. Community leaders called the fact that they made it to that new space with seven classrooms a “miracle.”
In Burlington, opening seven new classrooms at First Presbyterian Child Development Center, which is also housed in a church, cost close to $200,000, which the program also received through a private foundation.
The costs and regulatory burdens of finding and renovating facilities are high, both for child care centers and family child care homes. Solutions to those problems are needed, providers say, and church-based child care has its benefits to both the church and the provider.
But the buildings don’t matter if there are not enough people there to provide care and education. And filling those teacher roles falls short if the quality of care and education that individuals are able to provide is not safe or high quality. And that high quality does not matter if families cannot afford it.
In Wilkes County, the owners of PlayWorks Early Care and Learning Center told me that impossible financial equation will continue in their new space. With the pandemic-era funding they used to raise teacher pay gone since March, they will make it on a slim margin — and that’s being optimistic — said Sharon Phillips, the center owner.
And in Burlington, six of the seven new classrooms are sitting empty. Davina Boldin-Woods, executive director of the program, says they cannot find teachers because of low pay. They cannot raise tuition to increase pay because parents cannot afford to pay more.
As the state legislative session continues with the release of the House’s budget proposal, there are proposals to streamline and reduce regulatory burdens to open and expand facilities, including a change in the state building code for licensed family child care homes. There are deregulatory efforts to fill teacher shortages and expand access, including lessening teachers’ training and education requirements and increasing maximum classroom sizes.
Local providers say sustainable investment is needed to address each aspect of “the child care trifecta” — access, affordability, and quality. Focusing on one without the other can only get us so far.
“This is going to take a broader approach, some sustainable funding and some support to get this profession that is absolutely essential to the economic impact of North Carolina, to get us to a place where we can be self-sufficient,” Mrs. Woods said. “It’s not that we are asking for a handout. We just need a firm foundation to get us on solid footing.”
Below, don’t miss early childhood highlights from the House budget proposal. Our team has been busy; we’ve also got an analysis of models to provide early care and education on community college campuses, three child care providers’ stories of closing their programs for a day to advocate for funding, and voices from a big Head Start birthday.
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Legislative Updates
The House released its budget proposal last week. If you’ve been following along this session, its child care components won’t sound new — they mostly come from bills that legislators have already filed. Go here for the education components from early childhood to postsecondary. Here are the child care highlights:
- Subsidy funding: An additional $60 million in the first year, and $80 million in the second to increase funds going to child care programs that participate in the state’s subsidy program. Advocates were hoping this allotment would include funding for a floor rate; it does not.
- Regulatory reforms: Divorces subsidy rate levels from programs’ quality ratings and increases the maximum group size. Creates a specific family child care classification in the state building code.
- Teacher requirement changes: Allows lead teachers to oversee two groups of children instead of one (meaning the other responsible adults would not have to have the same credentials as lead teachers). Makes five years of child care teaching equivalent to the credential needed to be a lead teacher.
- Mental health: Adds a one-time $7.5 million to the North Carolina Partnership for Children for mental and behavioral health supports for children, families, and educators in child care settings.
- Child care expansion pilot: Gives $3.5 million each year for a two-year pilot to expand child care slots and recruit new providers (with a focus on licensed family child care) in three localities across the state.
- Teacher academy pilot: Gives almost $1.5 million for a pilot in 12 counties to draw new individuals into the child care profession with free and accelerated training workshops.
News & Research
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Majority of Parents Rely on Friends and Family for Child Care, Report Finds - From EdSurge
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Officials Sound Alarm Over Delayed Federal Child Care Payments to States - From The 74 Million
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A Child’s First 8 Years Can Lead to Lifelong Success. Why The 74 Is Digging Deeper Into Early Care and Education - From The 74 Million
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Decision Point: State Child Care Assistance Policies 2024 - From National Women's Law Center
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A federal program helped student-parents thrive. Now it’s on life support - From The Hechinger Report
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Not Just More Babies: These Republicans Want More Parents at Home - From The New York Times
Taking flight! Opportunities to spread your wings
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Open grants for capacity building, post-Helene collaboration - From Dogwood Health Trust
The philanthropic organization Dogwood Health Trust has two open grant opportunities for organizations in the Qualla Boundary and the 18 counties of western North Carolina.
One is for organizational internal capacity building for nonprofits, colleges and universities, governmental organizations, faith-based and fiscal sponsorship organizations for amounts of $15,000 to $50,000. The application is due June 6.
The other is for amounts of $50,000 to $500,000 for collaboration and innovation in the recovery of Hurricane Helene for a “Hub Applicant” coordinating multiple partners, “especially imagining new possibilities for the WNC region.” The application is due June 27.
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Documentary screening and community action event in Winston-Salem - From Smart Start of Forsyth County and MomsRising
Thursday, May 29 at Winston-Salem Public Library | Dinner: 5:30pm, Event: 6pm
From the organizers:
“Families across Forsyth County are all too familiar with the crumbling network of care including access to affordable child care. It’s time for us to come together to use our outside voices to let policymakers know that we demand better for our children and families.
… Join MomsRising and the M.A.L.E. Initiative and Board Advocacy Committee of the Smart Start of Forsyth County for a FREE evening of activities and action to come together and raise our voices for comprehensive child care solutions! We’ll provide dinner and fun for the kids – all you need to do is join us.”
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Elevate Family Child Care Homes Project - From Division of Child Development and Early Education
This project from DCDEE, along with the Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute, is “a pilot program offering financial support to better align quality with compensation for home-based early care providers.”
Licensed family child care providers with three to five stars who participate in the state’s subsidy program are eligible. DCDEE’s May 16 newsletter said:
“You may be eligible for a limited-time opportunity to receive monthly payments and professional support to grow your business and strengthen your care for young children.”
This is funded through the Preschool Development Grant Birth–Five Renewal Grant. Here is a registration link for the first webinar information session, on May 28. Here is a registration link for the second session, on June 5.
