NOVEMBER 2019
EYES ON THE EARLY YEARS

An early education newsletter from EdSource
Sending an infant to a child care center takes a bigger chunk of a family's income in California than in any other state.

That's according to the latest report from Child Care Aware of America, an organization that researches and advocates for child care policies that serve all children effectively. The report found:

  • The average annual cost of center-based infant care in California is $16,542, which amounts to 17.6% of the median income for a two-parent family.

  • The cost of child care is more burdensome for millennial parents, born in the 1980s and early 1990s, because they have lower incomes and higher poverty rates than the two generations before them. Center-based infant child care costs 41% of a millennial family income.

  • In California and 29 other states, the annual price of center-based child care for an infant exceeds annual in-state tuition and fees at a public university.

  • In California and 38 other states, the annual prices of center-based child care for two children (an infant and a 4-year-old) exceeds average annual mortgage payments.

How high are the costs of child care in your community? What can be done to make them more manageable? Email me with your ideas and comments.

Zaidee Stavely
Early Education Reporter, EdSource
From the EdSource Early Learning Desk:

The classes are part of a state program to help children in foster care find and enroll in child care programs.


You've probably heard about the early education bills Gov Newsom signed last month. Almost as notable are the bills he didn't sign, which for obvious reasons got much less attention. In case you missed it, read about them here.
  Read more

What we're reading from other sources

By Sasha Khokha, KQED

Classical music plays, silk curtains blow in the wind and comfy couches offer a place to curl up with a book. There are wooden toys, colorful magnetic blocks, and crayons organized by color in glass jars. Children use light projectors to make patterns and shapes on the walls.

It may sound like a high-end early childhood education center in California, but this is Tijuana.


Early childhood essentials

What skills should children acquire before they enter kindergarten? What skills do early childhood educators need to cultivate to provide high-quality learning experiences? The Learning Policy Institute explores both in a new Early Childhood Essentials framework designed to help decision-makers think critically about how to improve the early learning programs they oversee.




Many parents in California work outside of the traditional Monday through Friday 9-to-5 schedule. This study, from the California Child Care Resource and Referral Network, explores the experiences of parents working nontraditional hours, as well as the child care providers who care for their children. It also includes policy recommendations. 

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