PEC creates Statewide Map Showing Numbers of Homeless Children by Each Pennsylvania County |
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People’s Emergency Center created a map using the Pennsylvania Department of Education, Education for Children and Youth Experiencing Homelessness Program (ECYEH) 2020-2021 County by Entity.
This map shows the county's total number of identified homeless children and youth. It also includes the number of identified homeless children and youth by the school district.
Viewers can use the map to understand better the prevalence of child and youth homelessness in the Commonwealth.
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Pennsylvania’s Historic Investments into Early Learning |
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Governor Wolf signed into legislation the state budget as approved by the PA General Assembly, adding new resources to the early learning system. Among them are:
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An additional $79 million for Pre-K and Head Start Expansion
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$60 million for Pre-K Counts; provider rate increased by 14%.
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$19 million for the Head Start Supplemental Assistance Program. It will be used to serve over 2,300 new children and provide an increase in rates for programs.
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$90 million in one-time funds via American Rescue Plan to help childcare programs afford and retain staff and rebuild the supply of available childcare for retention bonuses.
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$25 million to increase eligibility for families to qualify for childcare subsidies, now up to 300% of the Federal Poverty Line (approximately $69,000 for a three-person household).
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Level funding for the state Child Care Assistance line item.
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Creation of a Pennsylvania Child Care Tax Credit equal to 30% of the federal credit to support working families.
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“Historic” increase of $15 million for evidence-based home visiting. This is a 77% increase in state appropriations.
- $1 million for the Nurse-Family Partnership line item.
However, the budget does not:
- Fill the thousands of open staffing positions and open up more than 1,600 closed classrooms.
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Eliminate the waiting list of 32,400 children in childcare programs as a result of 7,000 vacant childcare staffing positions statewide. Nearly 30,000 fewer children are enrolled in subsidized child care now compared to pre-pandemic due to a staffing crisis.
- Raise child care wages on an ongoing basis to help solve this systemic issue. Advocates were seeking a $2/hour wage increase.
- Create a universal lead screening mandate for infants and pregnant women by health care providers and require health insurance policies to cover blood lead tests.
Almost 100,000 three- and four-year-old children will still go without high-quality early learning opportunities this year. So, there is work to be done!
But for now, we are grateful for new support from Governor Wolf and the PA General Assembly, especially Philadelphia’s State Senator Vincent Hughes.
We encourage you to send them a note showing your appreciation:
We also thank our coalition colleagues at Start Strong PA, PreK for PA, and Childhood Starts at Home for their persistent advocacy. Without them, these victories would not have happened.
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Children’s Work Group Not Meeting in July |
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We hope you enjoy your summer. The next two CWGEC Conferences will be:
Friday August 19, 9:30 am to 11 am: The Conference will feature discussions on preparing for the upcoming school year and feature School District of Philadelphia’s Deborah Hartranft and Colleen Landy, plus new data. Ms. Hartranft is the SDP Program Manager, Intake PreK, and Ms. Landy is the Assistant Director of Educating Children and Youth Experiencing Homelessness.
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September 16, 9:30 am to 11 am: The Conference will feature researchers Dr. Felice Le-Scherban and others from Drexel University's Dornsife School of Public Health on data they published in January 2022 on the health status of young children experiencing homelessness in Philadelphia. The report examined the extent that specific unmet basic needs (housing, energy, food, and healthcare hardships) were associated with preterm birth status among children in their first 1,000 days. This paper provides insight into infant health factors that should concern both the Philadelphia Department of Public Health and the homeless housing system as 28% of the cases experienced housing insecurity.
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May: Four shelter staff discuss their challenges and successes in supporting young children experiencing homelessness, especially during the pandemic.
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April: Families Forward Philadelphia shelter staff discussed their successful Resident Advisory Council and offered advice for other housing agencies to start their own
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March: FathersRead365 discusses its mission to encourage fathers and/or caregivers to read daily with children in a variety of settings to develop literacy from birth. Also, PEC’s Sarah Vrabic presented her newly published peer-reviewed article in the Child: Care, Health and Development journal, “Perceptions of support in shelter environments for caregivers and young children experiencing family homelessness.” The article centers around family interviews she conducted with a team of colleagues before the pandemic.
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Upcoming National Webinar Featuring PEC’s Sarah Vrabic
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National non-profit SchoolHouse Connection is facilitating a webinar featuring PEC’s own Project Manager, Sarah Vrabic! Co-presenters include Beth Bordeaux, Co-Owner and Senior Advisor of Partners for Impact, and Erin Patterson, Director of Education Initiatives at SchoolHouse Connection.
The webinar will showcase how North Carolina and Pennsylvania have been using The Administration for Children and Families Early Childhood Self-Assessment Tool for Family Shelters to build relationships between the family housing and early childhood education systems to better ensure the healthy development of young children experiencing homelessness.
Register now to learn how Sarah and The BELL Project have been utilizing the Self-Assessment for the past six years – adding value to their important work and leading to stronger relationships between Philadelphia’s family housing programs and local high-quality early childhood education programs. The webinar will be held July 21st at 2:00pm.
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Reminder: Resource Map for Housing Providers and Parents Highlighting Early Learning Centers
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PEC published this resource previously but are sharing once again to help parents experiencing homelessness find childcare this summer. BELL created a Google® map that can assist parents and providers to learn where the high-quality early learning programs. The map includes updated information on childcare centers with ‘non-traditional hours,’ i.e., after 9-5 and overnight. Click here for the map: https://bit.ly/3pLWpZZ.
Also, the Early Learning Resource Center is available to assist parents seeking childcare. The Early Learning Resource Center is a single point of contact for families, early learning providers and communities.
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TEXT PECBELL TO to 844-961-3547 for BELL news!
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PEC's Building Early Links for Learning (BELL) project is supported in part with funding from by Vanguard Strong Start for Kids (r), William Penn Foundation, and United Way of Greater Philadelphia and Southern New Jersey. |
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