Research has shown that the first five years play an enormous role in a child’s ongoing development and future success. Since most kids are in a child care or preschool setting while their parents are at work, it’s critical that we invest in a high-quality early education system that provides the experiences kids need for healthy development.
The federal government has just approved the use of a supplemental $11 million to improve early learning and development in Wisconsin, on top of the initial grant of $22.7 million in 2012. The Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge grant is intended to help states build more efficient and effective early learning systems, with an...
Four-year-old kindergarten (4K) continues to grow in Wisconsin, as 11 more school districts have added 4K for the 2013-14 school year. The number of children served has more than tripled over the last decade, growing to 48,490 students served, compared to 16,051 in the 2002-03 school year, according to a DPI news release on 4K growth....
The Wisconsin Council on Children and Families has just completed a policy brief, YoungStar in Wisconsin: Analysis of Data as of July 2013. The YoungStar child care quality rating and improvement system (QRIS) is a breakthrough policy initiative that has great promise to transform child care in Wisconsin by helping parents make good...
It’s been a dizzying flurry in Washington- some good, some not so good. I thought this brief article from NIEER Online News might help: “Sequestration cutting early education slots. A prolonged federal government shutdown closing Head Start center doors and hurting families. A “state of emergency” in state-funded pre-K as enrollment...
This report is the fourth in a series of WCCF reports tracking the progress of
Wisconsin’s YoungStar program, a quality rating and improvement system
(QRIS) launched in 2011 to improve the quality of Wisconsin child care
programs. YoungStar focuses on children of low-income working families
receiving assistance from the Wisconsin Shares child care subsidy programs.
YoungStar rates the quality of child care programs on a 5-Star scale and is
administered in 6 regions of the state. The analysis in this report is based on
data as of the end of July 2013.
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