This month, the Senate Committee on Appropriations took a strong stand for the nation’s youngest children by approving a fiscal year 2014 spending bill for the Departments of Education, Labor and Health and Human Services.

“What this bill does is give our next generation the greatest chance at success,” Senator Barbara A Mikulski (D-Md.), the appropriations committee chair said in a statement.

“The bill provides a combined increase of $2.56 billion for Head Start, the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG) and Preschool Development Grants. Together, these programs address the entire age range of birth through five,” the statement says.

As Education Week explains, the bill is a significant step toward meeting President Obama’s vision of a national expansion of early childhood programs.

The details include:

– $9.6 billion for Head Start: an increase of $1.6 billion, which includes $1.4 billion more to expand Early Head Start and the new Early Head Start/Child Care Partnerships that serve children and families from before birth to age three.

– $2.5 billion for CCDBG, including a $110 million increase to improve the quality of the early education and care workforce and strengthen health and safety standards.

– $19.4 million of the CCDBG funding for child care resource and referral and school-aged child care activities; nearly $1 million of this money would fund a national toll free referral line and website.

– $750 million for a new program to help states expand or create high-quality preschool systems for four-year-olds from low- and moderate-income families.

Calling the spending bill a common-sense approach recognized by lawmakers on both sides of the aisle, the First Five Years Fund issued a statement saying, “We are especially pleased to see the nation’s lawmakers making fiscal policy decisions that reflect all of the knowledge we have about human development. Ninety percent of physical brain growth happens in the first five years of life, with the early cognitive and character skills gained during those years providing the foundation for later success in school, career and life.”

For now, however, this bill has to make it through the rest of the budget process.

“Now the question is what will happen to the Senate appropriations bill,” according to the New America Foundation’s Early Ed Watch blog, which includes a detailed budget comparison table for early education and K-12 line items. “Funding for the 2014 fiscal year, which begins on October 1, 2013, is set to decline even further from the final 2013 levels after the sequester made across-the-board spending cuts.

“And though the House hasn’t yet passed a bill, the two are worlds apart in their overall spending limits. Earlier this year, the Senate passed a budget resolution that exceeds the top-level amount the House plans to provide (and the amount set out in law back in 2011) by about $92 billion. That means the funding provided for the Departments of Health and Human Services and Education is also well over the amount the House is likely to approve.”

The Senate appropriations committee statement also addresses the House’s differing approach to the budget, noting, “the House allocation for Labor-HHS is $121.8 billion, or 26 percent lower than the Senate level.”  If the House applied this 26 percent reduction, it would mean cuts to a number of programs, including the risk that “275,000 fewer children and their families would receive early childhood services through Head Start, including 125,000 fewer infants and toddlers in Early Head Start.”

As the Senate committee statement says, “High-quality early childhood care and education has been proven to have positive, lasting effects for children and families. It also supports the nation’s long-term economic security by preparing our next generation of workers, entrepreneurs and business leaders for future success.”

That kind of payoff deserves a significant federal investment.

We will continue to monitor the federal budget progress and keep readers posted.