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What’s the best way to invest in early education and care?
State advocates have come up with nine guiding principles for policy leaders.
These policies are “designed to help create one mixed delivery system of care that is equitable and inclusive of all providers including family child care, public and private child care centers, Head Start, and public schools,” The Alliance for Early Success explains on its website where the nine principles are listed.
These principles also:
• focus on family choice and preferences
• ensure access to quality programs for all families
• create supply that can meet demand, and
• respond to communities’ needs and values
The nine principles are:
• make child care affordable
Families living at or below the poverty level would not have to pay a fee for child care. And no family would pay more than 7 percent of their income.
• fund the real cost of care
Child care providers should receive government funding that is based on the actual, full costs of providing high-quality care.
• enact reforms and policies that are equitable
Equitable reforms and policies should benefit all families and invest additional resources in “communities that have been traditionally underserved.” (more…)
Eye on Early Education focuses on the twin goals of ensuring that Massachusetts children have access to high-quality early education and become proficient readers by the end of third grade.
eyeonearlyeducation.org 