“It takes a village and our economy runs on child care,” BriTanya Brown, a childcare business owner in rural west Texas and Childcare Changemaker, shared at a private, virtual White House Caregivers event hosted by Community Change’s Childcare Changemakers and their grassroots partners.
The virtual event focused on bringing attention to the critical role of childcare workers and the need for continued policy support at the federal level. During the event, BriTanya Brown, Khulood Jamil, and Sarah Kazell, three passionate child care advocates, shared their personal stories and discussed recent policy victories and future solutions with Mario Cardona, Senior Advisor for Early Childhood Development and Education with the White House Domestic Policy Council.
As an administrative manager at my local child development center and caregiver myself, I was invited to join the call with 15 other child care advocates. It was important that we showed solidarity with one another and spotlighted the strength and size of our childcare movement while also emphasizing the importance of including childcare workers’ voices in policymaking to ensure that federal policies address the needs of this essential workforce.
On the call, BriTanya Brown shared her experience as one of two childcare providers in her small town, where she serves folks in and outside of her community due to lack of accessible care. With decades of underfunding for child care facilities and providers already affecting BriTanya’s childcare business, she spoke of the struggle to keep her business running after it caught on fire last year during a Texas summer and how they are still trying to recover today.
While BriTanya is opening up a larger center this year, she said, “Our village of educators and caregivers across the nation are carrying torches to keep hope alive that things will change, but their fires are burning low after decades of disregard and disrespect.”
She added that, “Without new funding the childcare industry cannot sustain and many providers like myself will have no choice but to make our graceful exit – leaving many children and families impacted.”
This event comes on the heels of significant milestones in advocacy efforts for childcare workers. In recent years, there have been notable policy wins at both state and federal levels. White House staff shared Biden’s efforts to strengthen and improve the early care and education system, demonstrated by his historic Executive Order on Care, which included several initiatives to improve the quality and affordability of child care.
The Biden-Harris administration is also working toward lowering the cost of child care, and bettering support for early educators. They hope to do this by capping co-payments for families, encouraging states to eliminate co-payments for families experiencing hardships, paying child care workers a fair wage on time, and making it easier for families to access the Child Care & Development Block Grant (CCDBG), a program that supports the families of over a million children with child care assistance every month.
While these efforts are steps in the right direction, there is still plenty of work to be done. Sarah Kazell, a Childcare Changemaker and early childhood educator from Wisconsin, expressed her passion for being an educator for over two decades. While this is a career she loves, it has come at the cost of her own financial stability. Sarah is one of many early childhood educators who has had to work two jobs to stay afloat as her low wages have prevented her from affording healthcare and saving for retirement.
Sarah shared how childcare professionals and educators sit at the bottom 2% of wage earners in America, and how “people who take care of dogs in Wisconsin actually take home higher pay” – a discrepancy that raises questions about societal priorities and the undervaluing of early childhood education.
Sarah also spoke about the lack of respect and recognition that early educators receive. She said, “Some of our state legislators view us as babysitters,” and tell educators that they should be, “doing it for the children, not the money.”
The notion that educators who spend just as much time with our children as we do, if not more, should have to sacrifice proper compensation for their passion further perpetuates the undervaluing of their profession. Their dedication regardless highlights both their love for the families they serve and the systemic issues plaguing the current state of the system.
Khulood Jamil, a family child care provider for nearly 30 years in the Bay Area, expressed, “It is crucial that providers have a seat at the table when decisions are made regarding childcare policies and funding. After all, we are the ones who spend countless hours nurturing and educating the future generations of this country.” Khulood shared how the children she has provided care for have made an impact on her life, and in return she has acted as a second parent to these children, nurturing them like one of her own.
These three women’s stories are just a few of thousands from around the country, and they shed light on the reality of being a child care provider, good and bad. It is evident from these stories that child care is not just a service – it is the backbone of our economy. Without it, millions of parents would struggle to remain in the workforce, causing our economic growth and stability to decline. As over two-thirds of our nation’s children have working parents, the impact of accessible child care has ripple effects that cause waves in the lives of many.
The White House Caregivers event took place just ahead of Community Change Action’s third annual national Day Without Child Care, a day of action where parents, educators, and supporters from across the country come together in solidarity to spotlight our childcare crisis, exacerbated by racial and gender inequity, unlivable wages for childcare providers, and unaffordable and inaccessible child care for families.
This year, the day of action featured over 85 events across 26 states and the District of Columbia. Over 1,300 providers and parents came together to bring awareness to these issues by closing their doors, calling out of work, or shutting down early to show that our communities, our economy, and our lives cannot function without child care.
Looking ahead, Childcare Changemakers and their partners are focusing on long-term solutions to improve compensation for childcare workers and create a more sustainable system for early childhood education that is also affordable for parents. These efforts are led by parents, childcare providers, and early educators, leaders, and organizers at state and federal levels. To help them address these issues, it is crucial to advocate for policy changes that prioritize fair wages and better working conditions for early childhood educators.
It is time the nation and its leaders recognize the importance of our early child caregivers and educators by giving them livable wages and treating them with the respect and dignity they deserve as the unsung heroes who nurture and educate the future of our world.
Their patience, dedication, and love truly shapes our leaders of tomorrow and despite facing challenges like low wages and lack of recognition, they continue to pour their hearts into their work because they know they are necessary to supporting our children, families, and economy. It is time we all give them the recognition – and compensation – they deserve!