Be sure to spread the word about the Franklin County RISE program, which is helping families afford child care scholarships of up to $10,000, as well as providing emergency rent assistance for early childhood educators. 
Quotable & Notable
"But this country’s inability to support and protect its own kids extends far beyond gun deaths, which can also be seen as part of a broader failure to prioritize the well-being of children and families."
 
“From the very beginning of life, we expect families to take care of their own children... The government is essentially telling families: You’re on your own. We don’t care.” 
who:
Dylan Scott, policy reporter at Vox and Dr. Jessica Calarco, a sociologist at Indiana University, respectively

where:
Fact of the Week
A report from the National Equity Atlas found that racial gaps among Columbus workers cost the regional economy $10 billion per year. Additionally, the report lays out the inequities in the Columbus labor market and how they threaten the well-being of the region.
Beyond the Buckeye State
A new documentary tells the behind-the-scenes story of efforts to pass a local tax measure to fund child care in Alameda County, California. Early Learning Nation describes the film here (be sure to watch the 2-minute video clip). 
 
This Chalkbeat article frames lessons from four states that have implemented universal preschool. Bear in mind that “universal” translates to a minimum number of weekly hours for children – as few as just ten in these states. We are a long, long way to full-day, wraparound care for young kids and families. 
Crane in the News
Two additional Ohio news outlets cited our third-grade reading guarantee white paper published in 2019 as part of their coverage of state lawmakers’ recent proposal to lift the third-grade retention policy. 
What We're Reading
This article in the Dispatch explores Ohio’s drop in WIC enrollment – the federal nutrition program for women, infants, and children which has been especially important during inflation and the infant formula shortage. Ohio’s decision to keep WIC “offline” - requiring that people show up in person to have benefits loaded onto debit cards - may be a primary reason for the decline. 
 
A new brief by MDRC synthesizes some of the more commonly used measures of pre-K quality (like ECERS and CLASS) - as well as their strengths and limitations. It also describes newly developed quality measures and future implications for the field of quality measurement. 
 
United Way of Central Ohio launched a new program “Success by Third Grade” which will bring Franklin County school districts and stakeholders together to address community issues that affect learning. This is especially pressing as school districts see decreasing third-grade proficiency. Funded by the Columbus City Council and the Franklin County Board of Commissioners, the program’s goal is “to reduce the non-academic barriers for students, and their parents and caregivers, so that students are better prepared to learn in the classroom.” 
Research Round Up
This policy brief from the Institute for Research on Poverty at the University of Wisconsin-Madison outlines research examining the effect of direct cash payments to families after the birth of the first child on long-term outcomes for those children. The cash transfer under study was the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) during three different birth cohorts in the 1980s and 90s in which families were eligible or not based on a child’s birth date, creating a cut-off point that enabled a regression discontinuity design. The brief describes how cash transfers during infancy “can have profound and long-lasting effects, including educational, behavioral, and economic or labor market advantages.” It also offers possible explanations for the effects as well as policy implications.
This edition written by: Jamie O'Leary and Caitlin Lennon
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