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Child Care Crisis

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a devastating impact on our already fragile child care system. Providers have closed, others are struggling, and everyone it seems is realizing that without child care, America can’t get back to work. (Yes, child care is infrastructure.) Early Learning Nation is covering the field with rigor and nuance from a historical perspective (Universal Child Care was a great success during WWII), to the latest legislative proposals and to ways that we must transform the way we treat our undervalued and largely unseen child care workforce.

Economists Find Investing in Child Care Will Dramatically Reduce Costs, Increase Mother’s Employment and Increase Quality Care

Bryce Covert·June 24, 2022·6 min read

After decades of disinvestment in child care that went largely unnoticed, the pandemic knocked the fragile system even more off...

Innovations in Child Care Investment: Building the Case for Public and Private Funds

Part 1 of a 5-Part Series Explores Innovations in Child Care

Rebecca Gale·June 15, 2022·7 min read

Our country is in a child care crisis, exacerbated by the pandemic, which has shown how difficult it is for...

Wyoming’s Long Main Street: Connection and Cohesion in the Cowboy State

Mark Swartz·March 25, 2022·5 min read

The Great Resignation is happening across the country, but it’s hitting some states harder than others. A recent WalletHub report...

Opinion: Raising Child Care Ratios is a Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Idea

Elliot Haspel·March 15, 2022·3 min read

One of “Aesop’s Fables” goes like this: “A group of pigeons, terrified by the appearance of a Kite, called upon...

Bringing Unlicensed Care out of the Shadows

Mark Swartz·January 13, 2022·3 min read

Experts and officials often talk about “child care deserts” to describe regions without enough formal child care, but Maki Park...

Great Beginnings in the Great Plains: Communities for Kids Builds Nebraska’s Child Care Infrastructure, Cultivates All Community Stakeholders

Mark Swartz·January 11, 2022·3 min read

Marti Beard is a fifth-generation rancher in addition to being vice president of Early Childhood Programs of Nebraska Children and...

Build Back Better Helps, Not Hurts, Faith-Based Child Care

Critics are Overselling the Changes While Religious Programs Fight for Their Lives

Elliot Haspel·December 2, 2021·7 min read

While the investments in early care and education appear broadly safe, one unresolved design question concerns what should be required of child care programs operated by faith communities.

OPINION: Three Evidence-Based Ways to Support the Early Care and Education Workforce

JoAnn Hsueh·October 21, 2021·3 min read

The COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated inequities and fragilities inherent in existing child care markets and decimated the supply of child care...

Martha’s Vineyard: Child Care Solutions for a Picturesque Locale

Mark Swartz·October 20, 2021·4 min read

Martha’s Vineyard, an island south of Cape Cod, Mass., has long been known as a resort community for prosperous Black families as well as a gathering place for Democratic Party leaders and supporters. There’s more to the picture, however, than summertime wealth and power. A recent report based on the American Communities Survey described “a continuing housing crisis and some of the deeply ingrained inequality affecting the rest of the country.”

OPINION: Families Are in Crisis. Business, Government and Philanthropy All Need to Step Up

Antwanye Ford·October 19, 2021·3 min read

As anyone knows who reads Early Learning Nation, not to mention any major newspaper or magazine, child care has dangerously...