Build a stronger work force of early childhood

A growing number of states has invested in promoting the payment of early educators, recognizing that public funds are needed to close this salary gap. This includes efforts to create salary parity within and among publicly administered preschool initiatives together with investments to promote payment by the private workforce of child care more widely.

Alabama established the initial salary for all teachers in the State Pre-K program at the same level, regardless of whether they teach in public or private environments. As a resultMore teachers expressed interest in joining ECE workforce and teacher’s satisfaction increased.

In New York City, municipal leaders worked together with defenders and organized work to define new compensation scales that would take teachers in community environments to greater parity with public school teachers. While the complete parity has not yet been achieved, Thousands of educators saw their salary increase for 30 to 40 percent.

In Washington, DC, the Equity Fund of the Early Childhood educator increases the payment of child care workers by $ 5K- $ 14K Annual, depending on their role. Early findings They have been quite positive: employment in the child care sector increased by 7 percent, with 219 newer employees above the expected growth rates and two thirds of DC educators saying that they would continue working on early education plus time of expected.

The large -beginning compensation support program of Minnesota similarly provides a monthly payment to child care centers to transmit their employees in the form of higher salaries and benefits. The program is little over a year and was launched in part to support childcare suppliers with quality personnel and quality retention.

Even seemingly small investments can make a difference. A program funded by the Virginia preschool development subsidy gave the first random selected educators in Virginia a unique incentive of $ 1500 distributed for 8 months. The teacher’s billing in preschool classrooms fell into 11 percentage points with incentives, and the rotation of teachers in child care environments decreased to half.

Kentucky made the waves as the first state to ensure that child care workers access to child care subsidies, regardless of household income, a policy that has now been adopted and adapted by more than a dozen states and communities additional New research It shows a positive benefit in access to child care throughout the state as they remained in the workforce or were encouraged to enter it. This may be a useful example to observe jurisdictions that explore other benefits and support beyond the elevation of wages.

Some newer initiatives of early childhood have taken measures to bake the educator’s salary increases in the design of its program from the beginning. Multnomah County Preschool for all The program includes explicit investments in salaries, designed to guarantee parity among preschool teachers and increase opportunities for children’s teachers and young children. The newly approved early childhood initiative in Travis County, Texas, includes specific funds for child care workers.

All these efforts are encouraging, and sharing evidence of them can further inspire other policy formulators to make similar investments. But while increasing compensation for the first educators is an important first step, it is not enough. The fact is that many other sectors offer competitive salaries with less qualifications, and too often the field Lose teachers experienced by retail service, food service and other sectors. Children deserve high quality care, and that depends on suppliers and teachers who are well prepared to provide it, through formal education and work experience. The training of early childhood suppliers requires time and money, and work training does not occur overnight, but there are ways to minimize friction, move the most qualified educators and supported by the workforce more quickly . Connect early childhood programs and higher education programs that prepare workforce can help relieve tension.