Elliot Haspel, a former fourth grade teacher and policy expert, is calling for “a new form of local infrastructure,” the “early childhood district.”

These districts would create an easy way for parents to understand what – and where — their early education and care options are.

Haspel explains his take on this approach in a new white paper posted on the policy website Capita:

“Child care is not yet a right, and it lacks this kind of easily recognized governmental entity to oversee and provide services. If Kindergarten finds you, child care requires you to find it hidden within a deep, dark forest.”

“In a sentence: Early childhood districts are like school districts but for children five and under.”

This kind of local governance of early education is a concept that Strategies for Children explored in 2019, when we released the policy brief, “Local Governance for Early Childhood: Lessons from Leading States.” We pointed to North Carolina as a good example.

Haspel says that rather than creating new districts, “Early childhood districts, or ECDs, would layer onto the boundaries of public school districts, cities, or counties either by one-to-one layering or layering across multiple adjacent jurisdictions,” the white paper says.

And, as Haspel writes in this related Early Learning Nation post, “Child care programs within the early childhood district will have the option to join up while maintaining their independence and autonomy. All program types—from centers to faith-based programs to family child care homes—will be eligible.”

“Being part of the district would come with a raft of benefits for programs; not only ready access to parents, but centralized support like hiring or facilities help, joint professional development, a common substitute pool, technical assistance, and possibly even a group health insurance or retirement plan.”

“Eventually,” he notes, “child care financing could be entirely reconfigured to flow through the districts.”

In addition, the white paper adds, “Early childhood districts would do more than [provide] child care. Home visiting, child welfare, maternal and child health, WIC—eventually, these districts [would] become the umbrella for any number of programs that improve the flourishing of families with young children.”

The cost of ECDs’ “core district operations” would be paid for “by utilizing a combination of state and federal funds,” and possibly include small local contributions. “Many existing funding streams can be leveraged, so a good chunk of the annual cost does not require new revenue.”

One local example Haspel points to is Neighborhood Villages, which “serves as the unofficial umbrella infrastructure for a group of five child care centers in Boston, MA, called The Neighborhood. The nonprofit operates as a quasi-central office, and educators, parents, and programs in The Neighborhood benefit from centralized resources.”

Haspel says that ECDs would be guided by a number of core principles. They would be:

• “Oriented towards affirmatively and actively supporting the parent ‘user’ experience”

• “Focused on the entire birth-to-five continuum”

• “Aware of and responsive to historical and current inequities in the early childhood (and K-12) system”

• “Built with an explicit eye toward raising practitioner compensation and lowering parent costs by leveraging new state and federal dollars,” and

• “Relatively simple, streamlined entities that reduce barriers to entry and engagement for parents and programs wherever feasible”

Launching early childhood districts will probably mean starting with “a combination of finding pilot communities, doing deep stakeholder engagement, and making sure any needed enabling legislative and regulatory language is in place,” Haspel says in the Early Learning Nation post, where he concludes:

“As the U.S. finally turns its eyes towards creating a real child care system, appropriately, 50 years after the last significant attempt died by President Nixon’s veto pen, we need to meet the moment with a governance construct that treats child care like the public good it is. Early childhood districts are a key that can help unlock the gateway.”

The white paper is still a “discussion draft,” and Haspel is eager to hear public feedback, so please check out his proposal and let him know what you think. To learn more about Haspel’s ideas, check out his 2019 book, “Crawling Behind: America’s Child Care Crisis and How to Fix It.”