Programs that require that children are fully potty trained also creates a barrier to access.
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In our rural community, the barriers include staff with the qualifications and understand of a program to provide high quality care, and the lack of decent wages to retain staff.
one barrier - there are not enough high quality preschool programs/ centers that are high quality that are free for families to consider enrolling their children in. Parents are clear there is one type of Kindergarten - the one offered at the closest elementary school. In contrast, there are tons of options for children before kindergarten and it’s overwhelming - the concept of “high quality child care” is another layer we are asking parents to worry about/be knowledgeable about in that 0 to 5 age space before their babies enter the very well -established K-12 system.
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Child center aproach
We need
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Parents, have to give us data about their chilsd such us: where, how, the situations at birth, family status size, income and social situation.
2. State how, what can be done to help the child
3. Systems to cater our kids (languages disability, and learning this all have to be equitable, inclusion, of all children’s
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Financial accessibility is also another barrier. Often times families that make more money don’t qualify for CSPP; however, there are wait lists for private/paying programs, so they are left without an option for their child.
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Yes, resource and referral agencies support families with referrals and tell families about their options. The central eligibility list allowed for programs accesses the list of families who are interested in care. It provided a two-way system for families and programs to find care. Currently in some communities, families are given a list of programs that the family has to contact on their own. The eligibility list allows programs to reach out to families when a space opens up. (someone else may have a better explanation of the central eligibility list that ended some years ago)
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Blending funds is definitely possible. I work for a Head Start program that also braids CSPP and CCTR funds. We looked to partner with a district and through chatter I was told the district didn’t want to deal with the braiding of funds (what LEAs receive and Head Start dollars) and thus is why they didn’t partner with us.
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This!! We are unable to find and retain qualified staff! This is a huge barrier in providing quality care!
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Building on Lozano’s comments about language: families who have deaf/hh children often find that they cannot find programs/caregivers that know ASL. thus, they are forced to put their child in a program that may look like “inclusion” but the child is actually excluded because of lack of access to their environment.
barriers families face “accessing high-quality universal preschool programs”?
- California doesn’t have a common eligibility criteria for accessing the variety of preschool programs available
- California doesn’t have a common definition of high-quality preschool programs across all program models and types (what is in Title V doesn’t apply to all preschool programs)
- California doesn’t have a systematic access point to preschool programs available
- 1-3, therefore, shows us that we don’t have a universal preschool program in our state
- QCC/QRIS has a framework for helping us to define quality ECE programs, let’s not forget that and let’s try to build off of it
- California needs to have a state-wide, on-going marketing campaign about what preschool programs area available and bring along other common-sense partnership in to the distribution process of the marketing and outreach campaign (e.g. hospital, pediatricians, health clinics, schools, CDE, CDSS/CCLD, CDSS/CCDD)
I agree with Mei’s comments. We need to provide clear communication regarding all of the options for UPK that include eligibility criteria for the various programs. A central location with clear information is critical to communicate clearly so parents can make informed choices.
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Including doctors and hospitals in disseminating information to parents is one way to to help get information to them. Resources could be sent to them as part of a well-baby packet.
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Centralized eligibility lists previously offered a single, consolidated source of information about children and families waiting to receive subsidized child care in each county, but state funding for the lists was eliminated in 2011. Some places still operate them, however, and that might be useful for us to look at in this group–how they operate and what is working well, what would support them at the state level. Especially as we expand access yet many programs remain under-enrolled.
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There have been significant investments in our systems over the years and when we don’t get the results we are seeking to achieve, we scrap them and eliminate them rather than improving upon them. How can we integrate approaches to strengthen the system.
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Quality Counts at one time intended to be a way for families to understand the rating and the level of quality in programs. Think about quality counts as a way to continue to transparently share with families information about programs, and what are their options to provide families with real information about the quality and specialties of different programs. What type of communication campaigns can Quality Counts, and First 5 put out to help outreach to families through radio, tv, social media ads etc.
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I concur we throw them away waisting millions of dollars versus using feedback from the field to help inform the changes that may need to be made to make it a better system.
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Thank you, you said much better than me.
Yes in my county programs are having a hard time finding families, and our resource and referral program has a long list of families waiting for care. The problem is that the R&R cannot share the families with the programs and the programs are waiting for families to contact the program on their own. The current system is frustrating for families and programs
I’ve always thought this.
Per ADA licensed and publicly funded programs should not have requirements for children to be potty trained and a requirement for enrollment.
really great dialogue…I value everyone’s perspectives greatly