Quality early childhood education (ECE) is one of the most cost-effective and potent economic development tools available. The quality of early experiences has an enormous impact on the developing brain and mind. Investing in young children supports economic development by boosting the long-term productivity of the labor force and reducing public costs, as was confirmed by this recent study from the Wisconsin Policy Research Institute.

YoungStar, Wisconsin’s child care quality rating and improvement system, was created to help parents choose the best child care available for their children, and to provide assistance to child care providers to help them improve. Unfortunately, Wisconsin chose to scale back on the investment in YoungStar and the Wisconsin Shares child care subsidy program. Incentives for higher quality providers were either eliminated or significantly reduced. For example, a three-star (out of five) rated child care provider would receive no bonus payment at all, instead of the 5% increase that had been previously approved. (See http://dcf.wisconsin.gov/youngstar/providers.htm.)In addition, the Department of Children and Families (DCF) now has authority to implement more cost-cutting policy changes in the Wisconsin Shares program with little or no legislative oversight or public debate. With this new power, DCF has chosen to pay family child care providers based on the attendance of the child, instead of the scheduled time the child was authorized for. It is difficult for child care providers to maintain quality with such fluctuating revenue. These changes are in addition to six years of frozen payments to providers, leaving them struggling to keep up with increasing costs.

We don’t know what the next cost-cutting policy change from DCF will be. Any changes to eligibility rules and copay structures could result in many families losing their subsidies, as would establishing waiting lists for the first time in the program’s history.

Any short-term savings that undermine the ability of parents to place their kids in safe, nurturing, high-quality early learning environments are dwarfed by the long-term savings derived from investing in kids. Investing in early learning has been shown to yield enormous returns, both financially and socially. That’s why so many members of the business community support strong investment in early ECE. They understand that when you shortchange our children, you are shortchanging Wisconsin’s future. 

In the weeks and months ahead, Wisconsinites who care about providing high quality ECE to children should ask candidates for elected office where they stand on more investment. They should also let them know how the previous cuts to YoungStar and Shares reduce the quality of ECE for Wisconsin children.

Daithi Wolfe

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Over the past year, the Wisconsin state government has made a number of decisions that reflect a significant directional shift in our approach to the well-being of children and families. We have seen our public investments in education, environmental protection, and a variety of social services shrink dramatically. Our tax structure has shifted as well, providing more breaks for corporations and the wealthy at the same time as credits for lower-income residents have been scaled back. This is one in a series of blog posts examining some of those changes and the impact they are having on Wisconsin’s children and families. We hope voters will keep them in mind as they make their decisions this election season, and will urge candidates to talk more about these issues in the weeks leading up to the elections.