Staying prepared for emergency situations is vital to avoid the impact of the damage, it is very crucial in Childcare as their primary aspect is to ensure the safety and well-being of the children and families.

“Prevention is better than cure”
Desiderius Erasmus

As the famous saying by the Dutch philosopher Desiderius Erasmus states, the steps we take to face an emergency situation are far better than the solution after suffering. This blog explores the training, usage of resources, and importance of collaboration between educators and parents in emergency preparedness in Childcare.

Why emergency preparedness matters in childcare

Emergency Preparedness in childcare settings is essential to ensure the safety and well-being of children, foster a culture of safety, and ensure compliance with regulatory requirements.

Protecting Children and Staff

The main objective is to protect the health and safety of the children and staff members in childcare environments. Childcare centers implement comprehensive emergency plans to identify potential risks and establish protocols that mitigate these risks. This includes detailed procedures for various emergencies like severe weather, fire accidents, and medical crises. With clear guidelines for evacuation, communication, and roles during emergencies, childcare providers can minimize the possibility of injuries or fatalities, creating a safer environment for everyone involved.

Fostering a Culture of Safety

When emergency preparedness is followed in the daily operations of a center, it promotes an environment where all individuals are under their responsibilities during emergencies. The proactive approach of regular training sessions for children and staff with emergency procedures and knowledge allows them to stay prepared for likely situations. By integrating this practice into the culture of childcare programs, educators cultivate an atmosphere of readiness that benefits a lot.

Compliance with Regulations in Missouri Childcare Centers

In Missouri, compliance with emergency preparedness regulations is a fundamental requirement for childcare centers. Missouri law mandates that childcare centers develop comprehensive written emergency preparedness plans. These written policies must outline specific procedures for responding to each type of emergency,

• Fire Accidents
• Floods
• Tornadoes
• Intruders
• Medical Crises

Compliance with state regulations also serves as a protective measure against potential legal liabilities. Inadequate preparedness can lead to severe consequences during an emergency.

Medical Emergency Protocols

• First Aid and CPR Training: This training equips educators with the skills to respond promptly to medical emergencies, such as choking, allergic reactions, or injuries.
• Plan for Medical Transport: A clear plan to know the fastest routes to nearby hospitals and have contact information for emergency services readily available.
• Emergency Medical Kit: An emergency medical kit should be well-stocked with essential supplies, such as bandages, antiseptics, EpiPens for allergic reactions, and other first aid items.
• Medical Records: These records should include allergies, chronic conditions, and emergency contacts. This information can be invaluable during a medical crisis, enabling responders to provide appropriate care quickly.

Emergency Training for Childcare Educators

Emergency and Disaster Preparedness Course

The Emergency and Disaster Preparedness course is designed specifically for childcare providers, equipping them with essential skills to respond effectively in crises. Participants will learn about various emergency protocols, evacuation procedures, and strategies to maintain calm during emergencies.

Key topics covered in this course include:

• Tornado Safety: Understanding the risks associated with tornadoes and learning how to implement safety measures to protect children.
• Winter Weather: Preparing for winter-related emergencies such as snowstorms and extreme cold, including how to keep children safe and warm.
• Fire Drills: Practicing evacuation routes and procedures to ensure swift action during a fire emergency.

Regular drills can reinforce emergency preparedness among childcare educators.

Respiratory Illnesses

There are more types of diseases roaming around us every second, in many dangerous diseases like Asthma, Cystic Fibrosis, Pneumonia, COVID-19, Human metapneumovirus (HMPV) and more are targeting the human lungs and respiratory system. Identifying common symptoms for all these diseases earlier can prevent their severe attack. Training can include,

• Preventative Measures: Understanding how to minimize exposure to allergens and pollutants within the childcare environment.
• First Aid for Breathing Difficulties: Techniques like the Heimlich maneuver for choking incidents and proper use of inhalers for asthmatic children.

Pandemics

The recent global experiences with pandemics have highlighted the importance of preparedness in childcare settings. Educators can go under the following training to stay prepared for such a pandemic in the future,

• Infection Control Practices: Implementing hygiene protocols, such as handwashing and sanitization procedures.
• Emergency Response Plans: Educators should develop a clear plan for communication with families and health authorities during a pandemic situation.

Educators must be equipped with prior knowledge of how to adapt their teaching environments to maintain safety while continuing educational activities during such crises.

Resources for emergency preparedness in childcare

Qualified and Trained Staff

• Early Childhood Educators: Educators should possess certifications in first aid, CPR, and emergency response protocols, ensuring they are equipped to handle emergencies effectively.
• Ongoing Professional Development: Regular training sessions and workshops should be conducted to keep staff updated on the latest emergency preparedness strategies and best practices.

Educational Materials and Curriculum

• Learning Resources: Childcare centers can provide educational resources like books, videos, and online courses that help staff understand how to implement safety protocols effectively.
• Curriculum: Incorporating emergency preparedness into the curriculum can help children learn about safety in a developmentally appropriate manner.
• Technology Tools: Utilizing technology tools like apps or social media platforms to enhance communication and planning for emergencies.

Safe and Stimulating Physical Environment

• Classroom Setup: Classrooms should have clear evacuation routes, accessible emergency supplies, and designated safe areas where children can gather during an emergency.
• Outdoor Play Area: Outdoor play areas should be under safety standards and follow clear procedures for evacuating children from outdoor spaces in case of an emergency.
• Safety Standards: Regular safety audits can help identify potential hazards and ensure that the environment remains safe for children.

Additional Resources

The Childcare educators can access various resources to enhance their emergency preparedness knowledge,

• Collaborative Workshops: Participating in workshops with local emergency management agencies can keep educators informed about community resources and best practices. Engaging with other childcare providers allows educators to share experiences and strategies related to emergency preparedness.
• Online Toolkits: Many organizations provide online toolkits that offer templates for emergency plans, checklists for supplies, and guidelines for conducting drills.

Collaboration Between Educators and Parents

Collaboration between educators and parents is essential for a child’s development in childcare centers. Regular updates through daily reports, weekly newsletters, or parent-teacher meetings keep parents informed about their child’s progress, activities, and any notable events. An open-door policy fosters communication, allowing parents to reach out with questions or concerns and ensuring a comfortable environment for ongoing discussions. Additionally, creating action plans for addressing challenges such as speech development or behavior helps maintain a consistent approach between home and the center.

To further strengthen the partnership, childcare centers can host parent education workshops on topics like child development, learning strategies, and behavior management. These workshops equip parents with tools to support their child’s learning at home and promote a unified approach to the child’s growth. This collaboration ensures that both parents and educators work together to address developmental milestones and challenges effectively.

Conclusion

By implementing the plans to set up the required standards for Emergency Preparedness in Childcare, the Childcare Center can effectively manage emergencies while minimizing risks. These efforts go beyond compliance, building a resilient environment where children can learn, grow, and thrive securely. Together, with informed strategies and shared responsibility, educators and parents can ensure that every child is protected and cared for, no matter the circumstances.

For more practical tips and resources on emergency preparedness, visit Child Care Aware of Missouri and be prepared to handle any unexpected situation with confidence!

Many of us might have distant memories of when we were a little toddler, we might not remember it as learning, but we were doing something. Just running around, singing songs, playing around, sleeping. We might not have known the importance of it back then, but Early Childhood Education has played a crucial role more than we know.

95% of a child’s brain development occurs during the toddler stage. Everything the child sees brings forth interest and makes them learn about that. So, this education is very important for toddlers, and it might help them when they reach higher grades. This education is known as Early Child Education. The main goal of this program is to educate the child from infancy to early elementary so that they can get a good education at the beginning stage.

What Are the Key Stages of the Early Childhood Education Pathway?

1. Infancy (0-2 Years)

• Focus: Sensory and motor development, attachment formation, basic communication.
  During infancy, children begin to explore the world through their senses. They form secure attachments with caregivers, which are vital for emotional security. This stage is characterized by rapid brain development, motor skills like crawling and walking, and the beginnings of language acquisition.

2. Toddlerhood (2-3 Years)

• Focus: Language development, social interaction, autonomy.
  As toddlers, children become more mobile and start to develop language skills. They engage in more complex social interactions and begin to assert their independence. This stage is crucial for developing self-concept and early social skills, such as sharing and cooperating with peers.

3. Preschool (3-5 Years)

• Focus: Cognitive development, socialization, early literacy and numeracy.
  The preschool years are marked by a significant increase in cognitive abilities. Children begin to engage in more structured learning activities, develop problem-solving skills, and enhance their understanding of concepts like numbers, shapes, and colors. Socialization becomes more complex, with children learning to navigate friendships and group dynamics.

4. Kindergarten (5-6 Years)

• Focus: Formal education, literacy and numeracy, social-emotional development.
  Kindergarten serves as the bridge between early childhood education and formal schooling. Children start to engage in more structured academic learning, particularly in literacy and numeracy. Social-emotional development remains critical, as children learn to regulate their emotions, follow instructions, and work collaboratively in a classroom setting.

5. Early Elementary (6-8 Years)

• Focus: Academic skills, critical thinking, independent learning.
  In the early elementary years, children build on the foundational skills acquired in kindergarten. They develop more advanced reading, writing, and mathematical skills. Critical thinking and problem-solving become more prominent, and children are encouraged to take on more independent learning tasks. Social relationships and self-esteem continue to develop, influencing their academic and personal growth.

The Role Of Parents In Their Child’s Early Childhood Education Pathway:

The early childhood education pathway ensures that a child gets the fundamentals that will be helpful for their academic and personal growth. However, to get that education, they should be enrolled in a school appropriate to their level of development. The child can’t choose their school, it is up to the parent to find the right school for their kid, that allows them to play, learn, and develop the qualities to be a good citizen. Here are some ways, parents can support their child’s journey:

Choosing the Right Early Childhood Program

Selecting the right early childhood program is a vital decision for parents. A high-quality program can establish a nurturing environment that supports social, emotional, and cognitive development.
Parents should look for programs with a comprehensive curriculum, competent and caring teachers, and a safe and enriching setting. It’s also significant to consider the school’s principles and whether they are in line with those of the family. Visiting the program, talking to other parents, and inquiring about the daily schedule, teacher-to-student ratio, and how the program meets individual needs can all aid in making a well-informed decision.

Engaging in Early Learning Activities at Home

Learning doesn’t stop at school; it continues at home. Parents can support their children’s learning by engaging in activities that reinforce what they are learning in their early childhood program. Reading together daily, playing educational games, and encouraging creative play can help build a strong foundation for literacy, numeracy, and problem-solving skills. Simple activities like cooking together, exploring nature, or even discussing the day’s events can stimulate a child’s curiosity and enhance their cognitive abilities.

Monitoring Developmental Milestones

Understanding and monitoring developmental milestones is essential in supporting a child’s growth. Parents should be aware of the typical milestones in areas such as language, motor skills, social interaction, and cognitive development. Regularly observing and noting their child’s progress can help identify areas where they may need additional support or enrichment. If there are concerns about a child’s development, early intervention is key. Parents can consult with pediatricians, educators, or child development specialists to get guidance on how to address any issues.

Long-Term Benefits of the Early Childhood Education Pathway:

Enhanced Cognitive Development:

Early childhood education lays a strong foundation for cognitive development, fostering critical thinking, problem-solving skills, and creativity. Children exposed to structured learning environments during their formative years are more likely to excel academically in later stages of education.

Improved Social and Emotional Skills:

Early education helps children develop essential social and emotional skills, such as communication, empathy, and self-regulation. These skills are crucial for forming healthy relationships, resolving conflicts, and adapting to different social settings throughout life.

Better Academic Performance:

Studies show that children who participate in early childhood education programs are more likely to perform better academically in their primary and secondary school years. This early start often leads to higher graduation rates and a greater likelihood of pursuing higher education.

Long-Term Economic Benefits:

Investing in early childhood education has long-term economic benefits for both individuals and society. Children who receive quality early education are more likely to secure stable employment, earn higher wages, and contribute positively to the economy. Additionally, early intervention can reduce the need for remedial education and social services later in life.

Conclusion:

The early childhood education pathway plays a crucial role in shaping a child’s development by providing them with a solid foundation in essential skills and knowledge. Beyond purely academic pursuits, this program instills values such as discipline, respect for peers, and responsibility for their environment. Through consistent participation, children gain practical experience that prepares them for the challenges of school life, nurturing them into responsible, well-rounded adults.

Frequently Asked Questions

How can parents support their child’s Early Childhood Education journey?

Parents can support their child’s Early Childhood Education journey by engaging in learning activities at home, such as reading together, playing educational games, and exploring new things.

What qualifications should early childhood educators have?

Early childhood educators should ideally have a degree in Early Childhood Education or a related field, along with relevant state or national certification. Practical experience working with young children is essential, as are soft skills like patience, creativity, and good communication.

How do I choose the right Early Childhood Education program?

When choosing the right Early Childhood Education program, it’s important to check that the curriculum is balanced and age-appropriate. Visiting the program to tour the facility and speak with teachers can provide valuable insight. Make sure the program is accredited and licensed, and consider the class size, as a lower teacher-to-child ratio is generally better.

How can I track my child’s progress in the Early Childhood Education Pathway?

To track a child’s progress in the Early Childhood Education pathway, parents should maintain regular communication with teachers and review any progress reports provided by the school.

Observing the child’s skills and behavior at home is another way to monitor development.

Are there financial assistance options for Early Childhood Education?

Yes, there are several financial assistance options available for Early Childhood Education. Government programs like Head Start and state-funded Pre-K can provide free or reduced-cost education.

How does Early Childhood Education impact future academic success?

Early Childhood Education has a significant impact on a child’s future academic success. It builds a strong foundation by helping children develop important skills in reading, math, and problem-solving.

Finding the right child care in Missouri can be a daunting task for parents. With numerous options available out here, it’s essential to evaluate them thoroughly to ensure your child’s safety and well-being.

To help you clear all your doubts, in this guide, we’ll help you understand the process of selecting the right child care, guiding state regulations, and assuring you make the best choice for your family.

Understanding Your Needs

Consider Your Child

When looking for childcare options in Missouri, your child’s needs should be at the forefront. Think about their age, personality, and specific requirements. Infants and toddlers need a different environment compared to preschoolers.
Some children may thrive in a structured setting, while others do better in a more relaxed, home-like environment. So, take a good at your children’s personality and match it with the child care that considers these.

Consider Your Family’s Needs

Your family’s schedule, location, and budget are critical factors in choosing the right childcare. Consider the proximity of the childcare facility to your home or workplace.

Also, evaluate the hours of operation to ensure they align with your work schedule. Budget constraints are also significant. So, understanding what you can afford will help narrow down your options.

How Do I Verify If a Child Care Provider Is Licensed in Missouri?

To ensure the safety and quality of care, verify if a childcare provider is licensed in Missouri. The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS) maintains a database of licensed childcare providers.

You can access this information from us to confirm the status of a provider. Licensed providers meet state regulations and standards, which is crucial for your child’s well-being.

What Should I Look For When Visiting a Potential Child Care Provider?

Facility and Environment

When visiting a childcare facility, observe the environment. The space should be clean, safe, and well-organized. Look for secure entrances and exits, child-proofed areas, and appropriate safety measures like fire extinguishers and first aid kits. The facility should also have ample outdoor space for physical activities.

Curriculum and Activities

A quality childcare provider will have a structured curriculum that promotes learning and development. Ask about the daily schedule and types of activities offered. The curriculum should include a mix of educational and recreational activities tailored to different age groups. Look for programs that foster social, emotional, and cognitive development.

Staff Qualifications and Interaction

The qualifications and demeanor of the staff are crucial indicators of a quality childcare provider. Ensure the staff have relevant certifications and training in early childhood education. Observe how they interact with the children. They should be patient, attentive, and nurturing, providing a supportive and engaging environment.

Making Your Decision

After visiting potential childcare providers, take the time to review your findings. Compare the facilities, curriculums, and interactions you observed. Consider how each option aligns with your child’s needs and your family’s requirements. Then choose a provider where you feel your child will be safe, happy, and well-cared for.

What Financial Assistance Is Available for Child Care in Missouri?

Missouri offers various financial assistance programs to help families afford quality child care. The Child Care Subsidy Program provides financial aid to eligible low-income families.

Additionally, there are tax credits and deductions available, such as the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit. You can reach out to us for more information on available programs and eligibility requirements.

Choosing the right child care providers in Missouri involves careful consideration and thorough research.
Finding the right child care in Missouri takes time and effort, but by following these guidelines, you can ensure a positive and enriching experience for your child.

To simplify these processes and save your time we can help you narrow down the choices with our Child Care Concierge Referral Services.

Frequently Asked Questions

1) How do I verify if a child care provider is licensed in Missouri?

To know if the provider is licensed, you can visit the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS) website and search their database of licensed providers.

2) What should I look for when visiting a potential child care provider?

When visiting a child care provider, look for a clean and safe environment, a structured curriculum, and qualified, attentive staff.

3) What financial assistance is available for child care in Missouri?

Missouri offers the Child Care Subsidy Program for low-income families, as well as tax credits and deductions like the Child and Dependent Care Tax Credit.

4) How do I know if a child care provider is a good fit for my child?

A good fit for your child will be a provider that meets their specific needs, aligns with your family’s schedule and budget, and where the environment feels safe and nurturing.

5) What questions should I ask a potential child care provider?

Ask about licensing, staff qualifications, safety measures, curriculum, daily schedules, and how they handle emergencies. Additionally, inquire about their policies on discipline, nutrition, and parent communication.

Introduction

Children are naturally curious and eager to learn about the world around them. Parents need to provide children to fulfill those curiosities. However, busier parents might find it increasingly difficult to spend time with their children and contribute to their early growth and development. This is where Child Care providers can play a vital role.

The goal of childcare facilities is to provide children with a safe and nurturing environment to play, learn, and grow. However, starting a childcare facility involves following specific laws and obtaining the necessary licenses. In this article, we will outline the essential steps to becoming licensed childcare assistance providers in Missouri.

Why You Should Get a License for Your Child Care Business in Missouri?

Obtaining a license for your child care business in Missouri is crucial for several reasons. Firstly, it ensures compliance with state regulations, providing a safe and healthy environment for the children under your care. Licensed facilities are regularly inspected, ensuring that high standards are consistently met. This not only protects the children but also builds trust with parents, who are assured of the quality and reliability of your services.
Additionally, having a license can open up opportunities for funding and grants, which are often available only to licensed providers. It also enhances your reputation and credibility in the community, potentially attracting more clients and allowing your business to grow.

How Do I Apply For a Childcare License in Missouri?

If you’re considering opening a childcare facility in Missouri, obtaining the appropriate license is a crucial step. Here’s a comprehensive guide on the requirements, application process, licensing standards, and ongoing requirements to help you navigate the process.

Initial Requirements

Before you begin the application process, ensure you meet the initial requirements set by the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS):

1. Age: You must be at least 18 years old.
2. Background Check: All applicants and employees must undergo a comprehensive background check.
3. Education and Training: Some level of early childhood education or relevant training may be required depending on the type of childcare facility.
4. Facility Preparation: Ensure your facility complies with local zoning laws and is equipped to meet health and safety standards.

Licensing Application Process

The process of applying for a childcare license in Missouri involves several steps:

Pre-Application Orientation:

Attend a mandatory orientation session provided by the Department of Health and Social Services (DHSS). This session is designed to give you a comprehensive overview of the regulations and requirements involved in operating a childcare facility.

Complete the Application:

Access and fill out the application form, which is available on the DHSS website. Be thorough and precise in providing all necessary details about your facility. This includes the exact location, the planned capacity (number of children you intend to accommodate), and the specific types of childcare services you will offer (e.g., infant care, preschool programs, after-school care).

Submit Documentation:

Compile and submit all required documentation along with your completed application form. Essential documents typically include background check results for all individuals involved in the childcare operation, proof of completed training courses relevant to childcare, and detailed facility plans (e.g., floor plans, safety measures, and equipment lists).

Inspection:

Once your application is reviewed, schedule an inspection of your facility with a licensing representative from DHSS. The representative will visit your site to conduct a thorough evaluation, ensuring that your facility complies with all health, safety, and zoning requirements.

Approval:

If your application meets all requirements and your facility passes the inspection, you will receive official approval from DHSS. Upon approval, you will be issued your childcare license, authorizing you to legally operate your childcare facility.

What are the Licensing Standards for Child Care License?

To become a licensed childcare provider in Missouri, your facility must meet several standards. Here are some of the Missouri Child Care Center licensing regulations you should follow:

1. Staff Qualifications and Training

Staff members must have appropriate qualifications and training, which may include:

• Minimum educational requirements in early childhood education.
• Ongoing professional development and training sessions.
• Certification in CPR and first aid.

2. Child-to-Staff Ratios

Maintaining appropriate child-to-staff ratios is essential to ensure adequate supervision and quality care. The specific ratios vary depending on the age of the children:

• Infants (6 weeks to 12 months): 1 staff to 4 infants.
• Toddlers (13 to 24 months): 1 staff to 8 toddlers.
• Preschoolers (25 months to 5 years): 1 staff to 10 children.

3. Health, Safety, and Sanitation Requirements for Facilities

Your facility must adhere to strict health, safety, and sanitation standards:

• Clean and sanitized environments.
• Safe indoor and outdoor play areas.
• Adequate heating, cooling, and ventilation systems.
• Procedures for handling emergencies and illnesses.

4. Curriculum and Development Activities

Implementing a developmentally appropriate curriculum is crucial for the growth and learning of children:

• Structured daily schedules with a balance of activities.
• Age-appropriate educational materials and toys.
• Activities that promote cognitive, social, emotional, and physical development.

Are There Ongoing Requirements To Maintain A Child Care License In Missouri?

Once you have obtained your childcare license, there are ongoing requirements to maintain it:

1. Annual Renewal: Each year, it is necessary to renew your childcare license. This process entails completing a thorough renewal application and facilitating another meticulous inspection of your facilities to ensure they meet current standards and safety protocols.
2. Continued Training: Ongoing professional development and training for your staff are essential. These sessions are designed to keep them abreast of the latest childcare practices and regulatory updates, ensuring they provide high-quality care and maintain compliance with evolving standards.
3. Compliance with Regulations: Adherence to health, safety, and staffing regulations is a continuous requirement. Failure to comply could lead to significant consequences such as fines, penalties, or even the suspension or revocation of your childcare license, jeopardizing your ability to operate.
4. Record Keeping: Accurate and comprehensive record keeping is imperative. This includes maintaining detailed records of enrollment numbers, daily attendance, staff qualifications, ongoing training sessions attended, and the outcomes of health and safety inspections.

Starting a child care business involves adhering to a multitude of rules and regulations, particularly when dealing with the care of children. Different states in the USA have varying regulations in place before granting licenses for child care providers. The above article covers most of the rules and regulations that you should follow to become a licensed childcare assistance provider in Missouri. However, please meet with relevant authorities to ensure you cover all your bases.

Frequently Asked Questions:

Who is a licensed childcare provider?

A licensed childcare provider is an individual or organization that has met the requirements set by the Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services to legally operate a child care facility.

Why do I need a license to provide child care assistance in Missouri?

Licensing ensures that child care providers meet specific health, safety, and educational standards to protect the well-being of children in their care.

What types of child care facilities need to be licensed in Missouri?

Child care centers, group child care homes, and family child care homes typically require licensing. Certain exemptions may apply, such as care provided in the child’s own home or care provided for less than four unrelated children.

What documents do I need to submit with my application?

Documents typically include proof of identity, background check results, proof of training completion, and a health and safety plan for your facility.

How long does it take to get a child care license in Missouri?

The processing time can vary, but it generally takes several weeks to a few months, depending on the completeness of your application and the scheduling of inspections.

In today’s fast-evolving business environment, maintaining a dynamic and supportive workplace is more crucial than ever. At Child Care Aware of Missouri, we understand the challenges and aspirations of modern workforces and are dedicated to fostering family-friendly workplaces that support both business success and employee satisfaction.

The Modern Workforce and Family-Friendly Policies

The concept of work-life balance is rapidly transforming into work-life integration, reflecting a deeper understanding of the interconnectedness of our professional and personal lives. Modern employees value flexibility and support from their employers, especially when it comes to balancing family responsibilities. Implementing family-friendly policies isn’t just a perk—it’s becoming a strategic advantage. According to a survey by the Society for Human Resource Management, companies with strong family-friendly policies report higher employee retention and satisfaction rates.

Why Child Care is Essential for Your Business

Offering child care solutions isn’t just about helping employees; it’s a strategic business decision with measurable benefits:

• Retention and Recruitment: Access to reliable child care is a significant factor for many job seekers, especially in industries competing for top talent.
• Reputation: Companies known for their supportive environments are more attractive, not only to potential employees but also to customers and partners who prioritize corporate responsibility.

Understanding Work-Life Integration

Unlike the old paradigm of work-life balance, which often involved a rigid separation of roles, work-life integration acknowledges that employee needs flow between their professional and personal lives. For example, a developer might need to start late so they can drop their child at day care. Providing solutions that acknowledge and support these needs can lead to a more productive and satisfied workforce.

The Role and Impact of Child Care Support

Integrating child care into your business model can dramatically ease the daily stress experienced by parent employees. This support translates into tangible benefits:

• Reduced Stress and Enhanced Productivity: Employees with access to child care spend less time worrying about their children during work hours, which can significantly boost their concentration and efficiency.
• Lower Absenteeism: Reliable child care reduces last-minute scrambles and unexpected days off when child care falls through.

How Child Care Aware of Missouri Can Help

We offer comprehensive solutions designed to support businesses in creating a family-friendly workplace:

• Online Child Care Search Portal: Easily find reliable child care options in your area.
• Child Care Concierge Referral Service: Personalized assistance to help your employees find suitable child care.
• Child Care Capacity Building Services: Support for local child care providers to expand their services and improve quality.
• Consulting and Presentations: Expert advice on integrating child care solutions into your business model.
• Family-Friendly Workplace Culture Services: Strategies to enhance your workplace environment for all employees.

Are you ready to transform your business into a thriving, family-friendly environment? Contact Child Care Aware of Missouri today to learn how we can help you implement effective child care solutions that benefit your employees and your bottom line.

Creating a family-friendly workplace is an investment in your company’s future. By supporting your employees in all aspects of their lives, you foster a workplace culture that values and promotes well-being and productivity. Let Child Care Aware of Missouri guide you in making this transformative change. Together, we can create workplaces where families thrive and businesses succeed.

Child Care Aware of Missouri is here to help you navigate the journey toward a more inclusive and supportive work environment. Reach out to us, and let’s make your workplace a model for success in today’s competitive business landscape.

Welcome to the Child Care Aware of Missouri blog, where we explore essential topics in child care and family-friendly business practices. Today, we’re delving into the heart of what makes businesses stand out in our modern, family-centric society.

Understanding the Family-Friendly Business Concept

What exactly is a ‘Family Friendly Business’? In simple terms, it’s a business that goes above and beyond to accommodate the needs of families — both in its consumer practices and its treatment of employees. In today’s fast-paced world, where work-life balance is more important than ever, adopting family-friendly policies isn’t just nice to have; it’s a strategic necessity.

Did you know that companies with family-friendly policies often see higher levels of employee satisfaction and lower turnover rates? That’s right! According to a 2023 survey by the Family and Work Institute, companies with strong family-friendly policies reported a 25% lower employee turnover rate compared to their counterparts.

But what does this look like in practice? Let’s dive in.

Policies That Make Your Business Family-Friendly

There’s a wide array of strategies businesses can adopt to be more family-friendly. Here are some top picks:

Flexible Working Hours: Let’s face it, the 9-5 schedule doesn’t work for everyone. Offering flexible hours or remote work options can be a game-changer for parents juggling childcare.

Parental Leave: This is a big one. Generous parental leave policies show that you value your employees’ family time, leading to happier, more loyal staff.

On-site Childcare: Imagine the relief of employees who can bring their children to a safe, nurturing environment right at their workplace. It’s a win-win.

Family Health and Wellness Programs: These can range from comprehensive health insurance to mental health support and wellness initiatives.

Family Events and Activities: Organize family-friendly events or activities. It’s a great way to build a community within your workplace.

The Impact of Family-Friendly Policies

Now, let’s talk results. We’ve seen firsthand at Child Care Aware of Missouri how businesses transform after implementing these policies. There’s a palpable shift in the workplace atmosphere — employees are happier, more engaged, and incredibly loyal. Moreover, these companies often become more attractive to top talent looking for an employer that values work-life balance.

Getting Started – Steps for Businesses

Ready to make a change? Here’s how you can start:

Assess Your Current Policies: Take a close look at what you’re already doing and where there’s room for improvement.

Listen to Your Employees: They’re the best resource for understanding what changes would make the most significant impact.

Plan Gradually: Don’t try to do everything at once. Start with one or two policies and build from there.

Seek Resources and Support: Organizations like Child Care Aware of Missouri are here to help with guidance and resources.

Creating a family-friendly business isn’t just about ticking boxes; it’s about building a culture that genuinely values and supports families. At Child Care Aware of Missouri, we’re committed to helping businesses achieve this goal. Whether you’re just starting or looking to enhance your existing policies, we’re here to guide you every step of the way.

Ready to transform your business into a family-friendly haven? Get in touch with us at Child Care Aware of Missouri, and let’s make a difference together.

Welcome to Child Care Aware of Missouri, where our mission is to transform the landscape of child care into a thriving community resource. In this blog, we dive into the heart of ‘Building Child Care Partnerships’ — a cornerstone for fostering a supportive environment for our children. Imagine a world where every child flourishes in a nurturing and collaborative space. That’s the world we’re striving to build, one partnership at a time.

Understanding the Value of Child Care Partnerships

Child care partnerships are not just agreements; they’re bridges connecting families, caregivers, community leaders, and businesses towards a shared goal – the well-being and development of our children. These partnerships enrich our communities by:

• Enhancing the Quality of Child Care: When diverse groups work together, they bring varied perspectives and resources, leading to innovative and high-quality child care solutions.
• Supporting Families: They provide parents with peace of mind, knowing their children are in a safe, nurturing environment.
• Economic Growth: Strong child care systems attract businesses and support working parents, fueling the local economy.

Consider the story of the Springfield Daycare Center, which partnered with local businesses to provide educational materials and healthy meals. This collaboration not only elevated the daycare’s offerings but also forged a stronger community bond.

Key Elements of Successful Child Care Partnerships

Building a successful partnership is like cultivating a garden; it requires patience, care, and the right conditions. Here are some vital elements:

• Open Communication: Frequent, honest dialogues ensure that every partner’s voice is heard and valued.
• Shared Goals: A clear, mutual understanding of the partnership’s objectives keeps everyone aligned and moving forward.
• Mutual Respect: Recognizing and appreciating each partner’s contribution fosters a positive and productive environment.

Steps to Building Effective Child Care Partnerships

• Identify Potential Partners: Look for local businesses, educational institutions, and community groups that share your vision.
• Set Clear Objectives: Define what you want to achieve through this partnership.
• Establish Roles and Responsibilities: Clear expectations prevent misunderstandings.
• Regularly Review and Adapt: Be open to feedback and willing to adjust strategies for continuous improvement.

Success Stories from Missouri

In St. Louis, a unique partnership between a local library and a child care center resulted in a weekly story-time program, enhancing literacy and social skills among children. This is just one of the many success stories catalyzed by partnership and collaboration in our state.

Resources and Support from Child Care Aware of Missouri

We at Child Care Aware of Missouri are committed to supporting these partnerships. Whether you’re a child care provider, a parent, or a local business, we have resources and expertise to help you contribute meaningfully to this mission. Visit our Partnership Resources page for more information.

As we wrap up, remember that building child care partnerships isn’t just about creating a network; it’s about weaving a tapestry of support that uplifts every child and family. We invite you to join us in this endeavor. Together, we can create a brighter future for our children and our communities.

Are you ready to be a part of this transformative journey? Contact us at Child Care Aware of Missouri to start building impactful child care partnerships. Let’s collaborate, innovate, and grow together for the betterment of our children and our future.

Imagine living in a beautiful, serene rural area of Missouri, surrounded by nature’s tranquility. However, as a parent in such an idyllic setting, you face a unique challenge: finding reliable, quality child care. It’s a common story in rural Missouri, where child care options are often scarce. This guide is dedicated to the resilient parents navigating the rural child care landscape. Here, we’ll explore practical solutions, valuable resources, and the supportive role of Child Care Aware of Missouri in this vital journey.

Understanding the Landscape of Rural Child Care in Missouri

Rural Missouri, known for its rolling hills and vibrant communities, unfortunately, lags in accessible child care options. A recent survey indicates that rural areas have 30% fewer child care centers than urban regions. Parents often travel long distances or juggle unorthodox schedules to secure child care. Understanding these challenges is the first step in finding a solution.

Challenges and Solutions

Limited options in rural areas mean thinking creatively. Some families opt for shared nanny arrangements, dividing the cost and time amongst several families. Others turn to local community centers or churches that occasionally offer child care services, providing a safe and familiar environment for children.

Key Resources for Rural Families

Child Care Aware of Missouri stands as a beacon of hope in this challenging landscape. Offering a database of licensed child care providers, this organization helps parents find reliable options. Their website mochildcareaware.org serves as a gateway to resources, offering guidance on choosing the best child care to fit individual family needs.

Creative Solutions for Rural Child Care

Innovation thrives in the face of challenges. In some Missouri communities, parents and caregivers have formed co-op child care models. These cooperatives operate on parents taking turns caring for a group of children, creating a close-knit, communal child care system.

Real Stories, Real Solutions

Take Sarah, a mother from a small Missouri town, who formed a child care sharing group with neighboring families. This arrangement not only solved her child care dilemma but also fostered a strong sense of community and mutual support.

Financial Assistance and Support Programs

Understanding the financial burden of child care, various state and local programs offer aid. The Missouri Child Care Subsidy Program provides assistance to eligible families, helping to lessen the financial load. Details on these programs can be found on the Department of Social Services website.

The Role of Technology in Rural Child Care

In today’s digital age, technology bridges many gaps. Virtual learning platforms and online forums provide rural families with access to educational resources and community support they might otherwise lack. Child Care Aware of Missouri’s website is a hub for such digital resources, offering a lifeline to rural families.

Advocacy and Future Directions

The road to improving rural child care in Missouri is ongoing. Advocacy and community involvement play crucial roles. By voicing concerns and participating in local initiatives, parents can help shape the future of rural child care.

Conclusion

As we navigate the complexities of rural child care in Missouri, remember, you are not alone. With organizations like Child Care Aware of Missouri, innovative community solutions, and supportive resources, the journey becomes less daunting. We encourage you to reach out, connect, and explore the options available. Together, we can create a brighter future for our children and our communities.

A Guide on How to Obtain Assistance from MO Family Services

Whether you’re a parent, a grandparent, or a guardian, navigating the Missouri Family Services resources can be a challenging task. With so many different programs and services to choose from, it can be hard to know where to begin. 

From finding the right childcare for your children to understanding the eligibility requirements and financial assistance programs, there is a lot to consider, and a lot riding on your decisions, which can make it hard to settle on a final decision. 

Fortunately, there are support services available to help you better understand the offerings available from MO Family Services, such as Child Care Aware^® of Missouri.   

This guide will provide an overview of MO Family Services, including what Child Care Aware is and how they fit into your journey, eligibility requirements, how to apply, and the different types of services available.

Introduction to Missouri Family Services

MO Family Services is a state-run, statewide program that provides resources, services, and assistance to families in need with children. These services include financial assistance, in-home services, parental support services, and resource and referral services which we will dive into more detail about a bit later on in this article.  

MO family services is part of the Missouri Department of Social Services (DSS), is funded by the federal government, and works in partnership with local agencies and organizations to help families in crisis who meet the specific eligibility requirements for their chosen program. 

The goal of MO family services is to help families with low incomes access and utilize the services they need to provide for their children while their mission is to help families build strength and stability, while supporting the development and well-being of children across the state. 

MFS has a wide range of offerings, so it can be difficult for families to know where to start. This is where Child Care Aware can help.

What is Child Care Aware?

Child Care Aware is a non-profit organization within Missouri Family Services that provides financial assistance that works to improve the quality of child care for all families.  

Child Care Aware also helps families navigate MO Family Services offerings by providing information and resources on the various services available and assisting you in making the best decision for your family.

We aim to help low-income families access quality child care anywhere in the state of Missouri.    The program is designed to help parents understand the importance of child care as well as introduce them to the resources available to them through Missouri Family Services. 

Child Care Aware has a team of dedicated staff that are available to answer any and all question your family may have.  We provide resources on eligibility requirements, how to apply, types of services available, and more.   No question is too much for us to handle, and we pride ourselves with being on the front lines in assisting families in need.  Additionally, we a are here to help families understand the financial assistance programs and in-home services offered by Missouri Family Services.

Additional Resources for Families other than Child Care Aware^® of Missouri

There are a multitude of options out there in addition to Child Care Aware^® of Missouri who will be happy to assist you with your journey through MO Family Services. 

Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education

The office of childhood includes programs related to child care, home visiting, early learning, and early intervention for children birth to age five, as well as afterschool programs for school-age children. 

The Office of Childhood also covers the following sectors: 

• Child Care Compliance Section
• Regulation Section
• Early Intervention Section ( who administers the Missouri First Steps Program)
• Outreach section
• Child Care Subsidy Section
• Quality Programs Section
• Child Care Relief Funds section 
• Childhood Finance section

You can navigate to view any of the above listed portions covered by the Missouri Office of Childhood by following this link.

Missouri Department of Social Services  

The Missouri Department of Social Services assists families in affording quality child care through their subsidy program.  

They also help families to understand how to continue to receive their assistance, and how to locate the right childcare for their family’s unique needs.  Missouri Family Services is administered by the DSS, which means that you can locate assistance and gain insights into things such as childcare, child support, and adoption by visiting their website. 

Eligibility Requirements for MO Family Services

Before you can access Missouri Family Services, you must meet the eligibility requirements. The eligibility requirements are based on a variety of factors, such as income, age, family size, and more. 

To qualify for Missouri Family Services, families must meet the following criteria:

The eligibility requirements for MFS vary based on the type of service you are seeking.

If you’re looking for financial assistance programs, you must meet certain income requirements. For example, you must make less than 200% of the federal poverty level, and a resident of Missouri as well as a US citizen or legal resident to be eligible for assistance. 

If you’re looking for in-home services, such as parental support services, you must meet certain criteria. For example, you must be a parent, guardian, or grandparent of a child under the age of 18 as well as having household income that is at or below the federal poverty level.

How to Apply for Missouri Family Services

Once you’ve determined that you meet the eligibility requirements, you can apply for Missouri Family Services. The application process is relatively straightforward. You can apply online or in person at your local MO Family Services office.

When you apply online, you’ll need to fill out an application form and provide all the required information. 

The form will ask for information such as your name, address, and other personal information. 

You will also need to provide information about your financial situation and any other relevant information. Once your application is complete, you will submit it for review.

If you choose to apply in person, you’ll need to make an appointment at your local Missouri Family Services office. 

At the appointment, you’ll fill out an application and provide the necessary information and documents. Once your application is reviewed, you will be notified of your eligibility status.

Types of Services Available

Once you’ve been approved for Missouri Family Services, you can access the various services that are offered. The types of services available vary based on your needs and the programs you are eligible for.

Missouri Family Services offers a variety of services to families with children. These services can be broken down into four main categories: 

• financial assistance programs
• in-home services
• parental support services
• Referral and Resource services 

Financial Assistance Programs

Financial assistance programs are one of the most used services offered by Missouri Family Services. These programs provide assistance with basic needs, such as housing, food, and medical care. They can also aid with childcare, transportation, and other needs.

To be eligible for financial assistance programs, you must meet certain eligibility requirements. These requirements vary based on the type of program you’re applying for. Generally, you must make less than 200% of the federal poverty level to be eligible.

When you apply for a financial assistance program, you will need to provide information about your financial situation, such as your income, assets, and expenses. You will also need to provide information about your family size and other relevant information.

Once your application is reviewed, you will be notified of your eligibility status. If you’re approved, you can receive financial assistance in the form of cash, vouchers, or other forms of payment.

Missouri Family Services also offers grants for families to purchase educational materials and supplies for their children.

In-Home Services

In-home services are designed to support families in their homes and are designed to help families with their everyday needs. 

These services can include parenting classes, counseling, and other resources that can help parents with their parenting journey.  They can also provide aid with childcare, such as finding childcare providers and helping families understand the different types of childcare available.

In-home services are available to families who meet certain eligibility requirements. Generally, you must be a parent, guardian, or grandparent of a child under the age of 18, as well as a household income that is at or below the federal poverty level.

When you apply for in-home services, you will need to provide information about your family size and other relevant information. You will also need to provide information about your financial situation, such as your income, assets, and expenses.

These services include home visits, parenting classes, and home-based family counseling. These services are designed to help families create a safe and supportive environment for their children.

Parental Support Services

Parental support services are designed to provide support for parents. These services can include mentoring, support groups, and other resources that can help parents with their parenting journey.

Generally, the eligibility requirements for parental support services are like that of in-home services, where you must be a parent, guardian, or grandparent of a child under the age of 18 as well as a household income that is at or below the federal poverty level.

Also, much like applying for in-home services, you will need to provide information about your family size and other relevant information like assets, expenses, and total monthly income. 

Resource and Referral Services

Resource and referral services are designed to help families find the resources they need. These services can connect families with organizations that can provide families with information about child care options, assistance in finding child care providers, and referrals to community organizations. They can also provide information about different types of resources, such as childcare, mental health services, and more.

To be eligible for resource and referral services, you must meet certain eligibility requirements, as with all other previously mentioned services.  Generally, for Resource and Referral services you must only be a resident of Missouri and a US citizen or legal resident to receive assistance. 

Navigating Missouri Family Services may at first appear to be quite the task, but it doesn’t have to be.  It’s helpful to remember that Missouri Family Services, while confusing at first, has helped hundreds and thousands of families in the state to get their children the education they deserve.  They understand and will help to guide you as you proceed along your journey in finding quality, affordable childcare in Missouri.  

With the help of Child Care Aware, you can better understand the services available, and the eligibility requirements required by Missouri Family Services so that you can obtain the resources your family requires. Child Care Aware can also provide assistance with applying for services and finding the resources you need.

If you’re looking for assistance with navigating Missouri Family Services, contact Child Care Aware today. They can provide you with the information and resources you need to make the most out of MO Family Services offerings. Contact Child Care Aware for more information on navigating the Missouri Family Services offerings today.

It can be a difficult undertaking to find the right childcare in Springfield, MO, for your family.

You want a facility that is affordable, safe, and will provide a suitable environment for your children to learn and grow.

Luckily, Springfield, MO, has many great daycare options available. This article will discuss how to locate and enroll in the best daycares in Springfield, MO.

We will also provide helpful tips on what to look for in a quality daycare facility, questions to ask during your daycare interview, and ways that Child Care Aware^® of Missouri is here to help assist your family during the daycare selection process.

Researching Childcare in the Springfield, MO, Area, and Scheduling Daycare Interviews

Childcare can be an essential factor when it comes to choosing the right home for your family. Before making any decisions, it is critical to consider researching daycares in Springfield, MO.

Read Reviews About the Childcare in Springfield, MO

One way to do this is by reading online reviews from current or past facility users. This will give you a genuine opinion about the services provided and the safety measures put in place at each daycare.

A few places to find reviews on a childcare would be yelp.com, Google reviews, and the Child Care Aware^® of Missouri website, where you will be able to find additional information on each childcare as well as reviews.

Ask Locals About Childcare in Springfield, MO

You can also ask around town for others’ experience with specific daycares in Springfield, MO and make sure that the information you are gathering on the facilities in the area is validated and accurate. This is an especially important task to undertake if you’re new to the area, or are unfamiliar with your regions school systems.

Taking this extra step of the research will give you peace of mind knowing that your children’s needs have been considered and help ensure they will have positive experiences while being away from home during the day.

Often, any facility you visit will be on best behavior during potential client tours.  It’s for this reason it’s always a solid plan to get feedback from people who have first-hand experienced with what the childcare in Springfield, MO, is like and how it operates.

Other Online Resources for Locating Daycares in Springfield, MO

Research can be challenging; start by gathering information on different services offered in the area and comparing them. You can find much of this information on the Child Care Aware^® of Missouri Website.

Childcare facilities range from home-based care to larger centers with various extracurricular activities and educational programs, so there really is something for every family, no matter what setting your child learns in best.

Once you’ve narrowed down your list to a few daycares in Springfield, MO, that look promising, make sure to call and schedule a day to visit them in person to get a feel for the environment, meet the staff, and get insight into each center has to offer.

Selecting and narrowing down your list is something which will be unique to every family but be sure to take your time and never rush.  All your effort and patience will pay off in the long run with your children attending the best daycares in Springfield, MO.

What Should You Ask During Daycare Interviews?

When you visit a daycare in Springfield, MO, it’s essential to have some questions prepared.  While you may think you have all your questions planned out in your head, a daycare can be a slightly hectic place!

For this reason, we recommend having your questions written down on a piece of paper or your phone, as your in-person interview is your chance to ask as many questions as you’d like to!

Here are some key questions that should be asked during any daycare interviews:

• What is the cost of childcare?
• What type of curriculum do you use?
• Are meals and snacks provided?
• How often do children go outside for free play and physical activity?
• Is there an age-appropriate ratio between staff and children?
• How does your facility handle discipline issues?

Additionally, look at the facility’s safety measures, including fire alarms, locking systems, cleaning protocols, etc. This is by no means an exhaustive list.  All these concerns can help you understand if this daycare is the right fit for your family.

Let’s investigate each of these categories a bit further.

Cost of Childcare in Springfield, MO

If you are a family who requires assistance for the cost of childcare, you can locate more information on subsides and grants for families by heading over to the Child Care Aware^® of Missouri website.

There you will find information on sliding fees, which are based off the number of people in a household, the income level, and the number of hours per day a child is in care.  Also, you will find explanations on co-payments, your portion of the remaining childcare tuition after the sliding fee and state payments.

Lastly, you will be able to learn more about income-based payments, multiple child discounts, scholarships, and military assistance.  Should you have further questions regarding the cost of childcare in Springfield, MO, or the subsidy programs, please contact Child Care Aware^® of Missouri and one of our staff members will gladly assist you.

Curriculum at Daycares in Springfield, MO

When looking into childcare in Springfield, MO, asking about the facility’s curriculum is an important first step.

The type of curriculum will depend on many factors such as the size of the childcare center, the age of the children being minded, how the age groups are split up, and more.

Ensure that the daycares you select align with where you child is at developmentally as well as their values aligning with your own value system as a family.

Meals and Snacks

Due to the cost of daycare, often this is a make-or-break question.  While some daycares in Springfield, MO, will offer breakfast, lunch, and snacks, others may not offer any school lunch, or only a snack mid-day.

If a school is just outside your budget range, but they include meals with their plans, then it’s possible you may be able to fit the school into your budget.  For this reason, asking about the type of food served by the school is crucial.

How Often are the Children Allowed Outdoor Time?

With the latest research showing how important getting ample outside time is for children, many schools offer multiple recess times and even bring the classroom outdoors to help the children learn about nature, bugs, animals and the like.

Other childcare in Springfield, MO, may take a more traditional approach with the children at desks, learning indoors, and only going out for a brief play period after lunch.

Really, this is something that depends on each families’ desires and what is important to them as far as their child’s education.  If being outdoors is important to you, you should ensure you ask about their playground policies.

Getting a Feel for the Daycare Staff

Making sure you feel comfortable with the Childcare Program staff is essential when searching for the right Daycare in Springfield, MO.  Take notice of how many teachers there are per student, and if this seems similar across the board, or if one age group may be short-staffed.

It’s important to ask questions and observe how the staff handle their interactions with the children.  Pay attention to their body language and tone of voice, as these can give you a sense of their personality and commitment to providing quality care for your children.

Also, be sure to find out about any extra activities the daycare offers that could benefit your children’s development such as language or physical fitness programs.

Child Placement at Daycares in Springfield, MO

It’s also critical to take the time to ask the daycare what type of placement your child will have.

Many of the best daycares in Springfield will have age-based classrooms tailored to specific age groups. This ensures that everyone gets an optimal educational experience.

Asking questions about these settings is a great way to ensure that you choose the right place for your child.

Waitlists and Deposits for Enrollment

After you have researched potential daycare facilities, interviewed staff, and looked at their safety measures, it’s time to decide which facility is best suited for your child(ren).

Often there will be waitlists or deposits needed to secure placement at certain daycares, so before enrolling your child in a particular Childcare Program, always consider asking about enrollment requirements and whether there is a waiting list.

Different childcare facilities have different policies; some may even offer priority waitlist enrollment if you commit to attending before spots run out.

Don’t forget to inquire about any discounts or subsidies available for families. Many daycare centers offer reduced rates for siblings and/or military personnel.

It’s critical to plan ahead with these processes, as it can take some time before getting approval and securing placement, otherwise, your child may be on multiple wait lists, increasing your out-of-pocket cost and decreasing your chances at getting into your ideal school.

Knowing the childcare facility’s policies upfront will help you make the best decision for you and your child.

Fill Out the Necessary Paperwork and Pay Any Required Fees

Once you have decided on the right daycare in Springfield, MO, for your family, it’s time to fill out those long forms and complete any necessary fees.

Don’t worry; careful planning will make the process smoother than expected!

What Paperwork May be Required for Daycare in Springfield, MO?

The paperwork required for daycare in Springfield, MO, may vary depending on the facility. Generally, most centers will request a registration fee, medical records, and proof of immunizations when enrolling your child.

Additionally, many facilities require parents to submit completed forms regarding their income and financial information that may be used to determine eligibility for subsidies or discounts.

It is always important to check with each childcare center to find out what documents are necessary before enrollment.

Completing the Enrollment Process and Starting at a Childcare in Springfield, MO.

Now that you know how to research and choose a quality daycare in Springfield, MO, it’s time to start the process!  Be sure to leave yourself ample time before the end of the registration periods to contact and interview each school on your list.

Read online reviews, tour the facilities in person, and ask about enrollment requirements and fees. Once you’ve decided on a daycare, complete all the necessary paperwork, and pay any required fees. Once you’ve done all these things, your child will be ready to start at the daycare in Springfield, MO, of your choice.

If you have additional questions about enrolling your child in a childcare in Springfield, MO, contact Child Care Aware^® of Missouri today. Our friendly staff will be happy to answer all your questions, and point you in the right direction to get you on track to enrolling your child(ren) at the best daycares in Springfield, MO.

Are you a family on the hunt for child care in Chesterfield, MO.? Are you unsure of where to start?  Are you new to the area and unsure of what location would best suit your family?

If you answered “yes” to any of these questions, you’ve come to the right place to find everything you need to know about Chesterfield, MO daycare facilities.

Locating a Chesterfield, MO. Daycare doesn’t need to be a daunting task!

In this article, we will discuss financial assistance for child care in Chesterfield, MO, what questions to ask while interviewing daycare centers you’re interested in, what type of child care centers you will find in Chesterfield, MO, and more.

All the advice contained within this article is geared toward helping parents in the process of enrolling a child in a Chesterfield, MO daycare, especially for first-time parents!

Where Should I Start When Looking for Child Care Centers in Chesterfield, MO?

The hardest part of most things is taking the first step, and finding a reputable Chesterfield, MO daycare is no different.

Starting off with the Child Care Aware^® of Missouri Child Care Resource and Referral System is an excellent option.

Prepare a Child Care Checklist for Potential Chesterfield, MO Daycares

A child care resource and referral system (CCR&R) is an organization that serves as a resource hub for families, child care professionals and communities.

CCR&R’s increase access to high-quality, affordable child care by providing services dependent upon where your family lives, including:

• Helping families find child care
• Providing support, education, and resources to child care providers
• Gathering research on child care needs and trends to inform community members and policy makers.

CCR&R’s also help you select child care in Chesterfield, MO with ease by providing:

• Referrals to local child care providers.
• Information on state licensing requirements.
• Information on where to get help with the financial side of child care.

Start your search by first locating your local CCR&R agency and contact them to request a list of providers who offer child care in Chesterfield, MO that you can contact, based off your particular needs.

What Questions Should I ask When Calling My CCR&R Agency?

When speaking on the phone to your CCR&R agency, you should ensure you ask the following questions:

1. What are the child care licensing requirements in my area?
2. How can I find a copy of the health and safety inspection report?
3. Is there a quality rating and improvement system (QRIS) in my area, and which providers have joined? What do the different levels on QRIS mean?
4. What does it mean when a provider is nationally accredited? Which Chesterfield, MO daycare centers meet this standard?
5. What kinds of questions should I pose to the child care providers during my tour?
6. How can I find out if my family qualifies for any child care financial assistance programs?

Do Your Research on Your Chosen Chesterfield, MO Daycare Facilities

Before you call or visit any facilities for child care in Chesterfield, MO, be sure you investigate each provider thoroughly.

Look for, or ask about if it’s not easily found, the following information to understand the standards each child care in Chesterfield, MO are following.

Licensing Report and Health and Safety Inspections

Prior to visiting any child care in Chesterfield, MO or anywhere, always check the health and safety inspection reports.

These reports will tell you when the child care provider was visited by a state licensing agent, the types of health and safety violations the program was cited for, and how those violations were rectified.

Your local CCR&R agency will be able to help you decipher the information contained within the reports, should you require it.

Quality Rating and Improvement System (QRIS) Rating

QRIS ratings are another tool in your arsenal when selecting a child care in Chesterfield, MO.

An initial QRIS rating is earned when a program meets certain quality standards.  Programs will then continue to earn higher ratings as they meet more quality standards.

Some states require QRIS for any licensed child care providers or programs that receive state subsidies, while in other states, QRIS is entirely voluntary.  Check out the State by State Resource Map to see where Chesterfield, MO daycares fall.

National Accreditation Information

Some of the child care in Chesterfield, MO has programs which reach higher quality standards by becoming accredited by a national accrediting body.

This accreditation process is entirely voluntary for all child care providers.

Child care programs that choose to become accredited have to show they met licensing requirements that go above and beyond that at the state level.

Call Around to Your Short List of Chesterfield, MO Daycares

After narrowing down your list of possible options for child care in Chesterfield, MO, you will then want to call each provider you’re looking to visit and make an appointment.

Ask pre-screening questions prior to your visit to ensure you’re visiting providers that meet your needs, in turn, saving you valuable time.

Logistical Considerations When Considering Child Care in Chesterfield, MO

Often, when we find a child care provider we have fallen in love with, we may not always remember to think about all the logistical concerns that you will need to address before enrolling your child.

It’s important you remember to ask yourself the following about every daycare that you’re considering, to ensure your chosen provider is affordable and accessible for your family:

• Does the daycare have space for my child?
• What are the provider’s hours of operation?
• Is the provider’s location convenient for me?
• What are the program costs?
• Are there any discounts or scholarships available?
• Does the provider participate in a child care assistance program?

Touring Your Chosen Chesterfield, MO Daycare

At long last! You’re ready to tour the facility of the child care in Chesterfield, MO you feel will best fit your family.

Be sure to go into your tour prepared.  Bring a checklist with you to help you ask the right questions, so you can make the best choices for your family.

Don’t hesitate to ask the child care provider for references, as well as asking questions about other families’ experiences with their program.

Utilize Your Five Senses During Your Tour at the Child Care in Chesterfield, MO’s Facility

As with most things, it’s important to be fully present during your tour of the potential child care facility you have chosen for your family.

Ensure you use all five of your senses to help you scope out the facility, the staff, and the overall feel of the school to decide if it’s the right child care in Chesterfield, MO for you or not.

1. Visually, when you look around, do you see providers engaged with children? Are children actively playing with each other and the provider? Do you see any health or safety concerns? Does there seem to be enough materials for all the children to play and complete projects?  If a school looks understaffed, underfunded, or disengaged, that’s a major red flag.
2. Listen closely during your tour, do you hear a “buzz” in the child care facility? Were the teachers there speaking in a warm, positive tone to the children?  Do you hear providers using respectful and encouraging language?  It’s important to listen to hear how the children and staff interact with one another, as well as how the staff chooses to resolve conflict.
3. Be sure to ask about the lunch program. If they will allow you, see if you can sample the food.  How does it taste?  Does it look visually appealing when being served to the children?  Ensuring your child will eat the food provided to them and that the school lunches are nutritionally sound is of the utmost importance.
4. Do you notice any type of positive touch between students and caregivers, such as hugging, pats on the head, or children sitting on providers laps? Keep an eye out for appropriate, teacher-student type of affection, and be wary of anything that makes you feel uncomfortable.
5. What does the facility smell like? Is it a pleasant, clean smell in the child care setting?  Is there a total lack of smell?  Do you smell anything unhealthy such as perfumes, smokes, or any other odor that could be potentially harmful or unpleasant for your child?

Being sure to pay attention and use all five of your senses while on your school tour is of the utmost importance.

All schools will be on best behavior while they have someone touring, so it’s important to ask the right questions and to keep your eyes peeled for anything that could stand out as a potential red flag.

If you happen to see any red flags, be sure to ask for clarification on them before leaving the school tour, so you are better able to come to a clear decision after the tour has ended.

Special Considerations When Seeking Child Care in Chesterfield, MO

Every family’s situation is unique.  For this reason, there are additional resources to assist you along your journey to finding the best Chesterfield, MO daycare for your family.

Financial Assistance for Child Care in Chesterfield, MO

While there are multiple ways to find and apply for child care assistance, the Missouri Child Care Subsidy Program is an excellent place to start.

This program provides financial assistance for families that qualify.  You may be eligible for help if you are the parent or guardian of a child under the age of 13 (or a child with special needs) and you are:

• Qualify as Low-Income.
• Employed, or searching for work.
• Attending School.
• Participating in a job training or placement program.
• Receiving services from the Children’s Division.

Another option if you’re the parent of a child under the age of 3 is the Early Head Start (EHS) program, which provides continuous, intensive, and comprehensive child development programs for family’s at or below the poverty line.

In addition to the Early Head Start program, the Missouri Head Start Program continues the work of EHS, but for older children.

Assistance for Families of Children with Special Needs

If you are the parent of a special needs student in Missouri, there are multiple programs to assist you on your search for a Chesterfield, MO daycare.

One of the most highly recommended resources is United 4 Children, who provide support and resources to both families as well as the child care program caring for your special needs child.

Assistance for Children Over the Age of Three

If you have a child or children who are over the age of three, but still require assistance, then the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education should be your first stop.

The Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education provide resources to families looking for a Chesterfield, MO daycare, as well as information on assistance for children from birth to age 21.

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri – Helping You Locate the Best Child Care in Chesterfield, MO.

In this article, we have outlined how to get started locating a quality Chesterfield, MO daycare, what questions to ask, where to find assistance and much more.

We encourage you to take to the Child Care Aware^® of Missouri website for any further information you may require to help you during your hunt for top quality child care in Chesterfield, MO.

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri believes that every child deserves the highest quality child care services available and is why we work so hard in helping families find the resources they need to help their children attain their dreams.

If you need more assistance in locating child care in Chesterfield, MO or anywhere else in the state, please do not hesitate to contact Child Care Aware for further assistance.

We are happy to point you in the right direction and provide you with all the resources that we have available to us.

Are you looking for help paying for child care?  Not sure where to start? You’re in luck, considering there are multiple options for families to receive Missouri child care assistance.

But where should you start, and what is involved in receiving help for child services in Missouri?

In this article we’ll walk you through the different types of Missouri child care assistance you may be eligible for, where you need to go to apply for those resources and respond to frequently asked questions regarding child services in Missouri.

What Types of Missouri Child Care Assistance Programs Are Available?

The child services in Missouri you’re eligible for may depend on your personal situation, job, and income.

Here are some vetted Missouri child care assistance programs you may be eligible to apply for assistance through:

1. Subsidy

The Missouri Subsidy Assistance System works to provide Missouri child care assistance to families, enabling them to afford child services in Missouri. Eligibility for the subsidy program will depend on your family’s size and income.

1. Sliding Scale – Within the subsidy system, the portion of the child care that your family will be responsible for paying is determined by the sliding scale, which is based on family size and income.
2. Co-Payment – The co-payment is the remainder of the cost of care after the subsidy payment and sliding fee are applied.  Families are responsible for paying a copay if the cost of care exceeds the total of the subsidy payment and sliding fee.
3. Multi-Child Discount – Some child care programs offer discounts if your family has more than one child enrolled in their program.

2. Income-Based Payment

Income-based Missouri child care assistance programs charge families based on their income. This means that the individual program works with families to determine what they can pay based on their income.

3. Scholarships

Some Missouri child care assistance programs have the funding to offer scholarships for children. Eligibility is determined by each individual program.

4. Military Family Resources

There are financial options available for military families and programs in place to assist kids and families of active-duty members and veterans. For more information contact Child Care Aware of America.

5. State Payment Assistance

Visit Missouri Department of Social Services to check the eligibility of your family for Missouri child care assistance, or to apply for assistance.

In addition to these resources, we will also provide five more methods of receiving Missouri child care assistance that include ways in which you can obtain assistance with food costs, home energy payments, and other necessities to help you and your children receive the schooling, healthy meals, and life that you deserve a bit later in this article.

Subsidy Assistance for Child Services in Missouri – More Information and Steps to Apply

The Missouri Department of Social Services offers a subsidy program to help families offset the cost of child care.

The DSS of Missouri can help you pay for child care that works with your schedule, morning, noon, night, and even weekends, giving you the freedom to focus on supporting your family’s needs.

Who is Eligible for Subsidy Assistance for Child Services?

To be eligible to apply for Missouri child care assistance through the subsidy program if you are the parent or guardian of a child under the age of 13, or of a child who has special needs.

Some of the requirements required to be accepted into the program are:

• You are a Low-Income Family (Under 85% of the State Median Income)
• Employed or seeking out employment
• Attending School or Job Training (If not employed)
• Disabled
• Living in a state of homelessness
• Participating in Job Training or are in a placement program
• Receiving Services from the Children’s division

How to Apply for Missouri Child Care Assistance Subsidy Program through the DSS

It only takes three steps to apply for subsidy assistance for child care in Missouri.

You can apply online by navigating to the “Apply for Child Care” page on the DSS website, or, alternatively, print and complete your paper application.

Next, submit your completed application for Missouri child care assistance either:

Online: Complete and submit your forms online via mydssupload.mo.gov

Mail: Send your completed application through regular post to:

Family Support Division

615 E. 13^th St.

Kansas City, MO 64106

Fax: You can also submit your completed application via facsimile at 573-526-9400.

What Verification Documents Must You Submit for Missouri Child Care Assistance?

The Family Support Division (FSD) may ask you to verify your information to help you get the help paying for child services in Missouri that you need.

Documentation types required will be dependent upon the benefit you are either applying for initially or to maintain.

For child services in Missouri, the following documentation is accepted as valid for verification purposes:

• Work or school schedule
• Pay stubs
• Letter from employer
• Letter from enrolled school
• Letter from training program
• Letter from medical/professional stating why the disabled child/parent needs child care

After submitting your completed application along with all required supporting documentation, the family support division will process your entire submission as soon as it is received.

Once your application is processed, you will receive a letter within fifteen days notifying you of your eligibility for Missouri child care assistance, or of your ineligibility for help with child services, as well as an explanation for the rejection.

What Happens Next if I am Approved for Missouri Child Care Assistance?

After receiving your approval letter in the mail, you still have a few more tasks that are required to receive assistance for child services in Missouri.

After being approved for the Child Care Subsidy Program, you must complete the following steps to guarantee you receive the Missouri child care assistance, otherwise you may lose your funding.

1. Choose a Child Care Provider

Before child care payments can begin, you must select a quality child care provider who is authorized.

For help locating a child care provider near you, please contact Child Care Aware^® of Missouri or perform a “Show Me Child Care Providers” search.

After selecting a center for child services in Missouri, to get the facility of your choice, you are able to get the child services authorized in three ways.

• Online: Use the online form to authorize your child services subsidy provider
• In person: Visit your local FSD Resource Center
• Call: 855-473-3646 to speak with a member of staff directly

2. Provide Your Schedule

Your schedule is utilized to determine the number of days and time of days your child can receive care each month.

Child care payments cannot be made prior to the submission of your schedule.

3. Pay Your Portion

You may be required to pay on a sliding fee and/or have a co-payment. The approval letter that you receive should tell you what, if any, portion of payment that you are responsible for.

How Long Will I Receive Missouri Child Care Assistance?

The same approval letter which will inform you of any portion of payment you may be responsible for will also notify you of when your Missouri child care assistance for child services in Missouri will start, and when it will end.

If you find yourself nearing the end of our subsidy duration and you are still requiring financial assistance with child services in Missouri, you will need to reapply.

Please note, that if you do not reapply before the date your eligibility ends, you may be no longer eligible for Missouri child care assistance benefits.

If, for some reason, you do not receive your reapplication packet 30 days before the end of your eligibility period, please contact us to request another.

How to Navigate a Change in Circumstance During Your Missouri Child Care Assistance Eligibility Period

If you happen to have a change in your circumstances during the middle of your eligibility period, you should contact the Family Support Division immediately. These conditions include if you:

• Switch to a new child care provider
• Get a new home address or telephone number
• Welcome a new member into your household
• Have a change in income
• Change your work or training hours

You can make these changes online, in person, or via telephone as previously outlined in this article, but it is imperative that you notify the Family Support Division immediately to inform them of the change, so you can take the necessary steps to maintain your Missouri child care assistance.

Change in Income Status

If your income goes above 85% of the State Median Income for child care subsidy, you are required to report the pay increase.

Despite this increase in salary, you may still be eligible to have Missouri child care assistance for child services in Missouri through Transitional Child Care, which is a program designed to help ease you into making payments on your own, without assistance from the subsidy.

Much like applying for Missouri child care assistance through the subsidy, you will need to apply through the Family Support Division, which will notify you if you qualify for Transitional Child Care via letter.

If you are accepted into the Transitional Child Care program, you will be notified by letter. This letter will also explain what your payment schedule will be like so you can continue receiving your Missouri child care assistance.

Additional Methods of Assistance for Missouri Families

Now that you understand all the ins and outs of receiving Missouri child care assistance, let’s discuss briefly the other programs offered in partnership with Child Care Aware^® of Missouri.

All the programs we will discuss are designed to alleviate the strain on low-income families to pay for child services in Missouri as well as other day to day essentials.

Missouri Head Start

Missouri Head Start is a federal assistance program that promotes school readiness of children from birth to five years of age for low-income families.

Women, Infants and Children (WIC)

WIC is a program which offers supplemental foods, health care referrals, and nutrition information to low-income women who are pregnant and/or have children aged birth through five.

Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF)

TANF provides cash assistance designed to help low-income families achieve their own self-sufficiency.

Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program (formerly known as Food Stamps)

The Supplemental Nutritional Assistance Program is a federal nutrition program aimed at providing every family in need with the means to supply their family with healthy meals.

Low Income Energy Assistance Program

The low-income energy assistance program helps low-income households in meeting their immediate home energy needs, which can be a lifesaving option for those who hit hard times during the hot summers, or cold winters.

Missouri Child Care Assistance for Child Services in Missouri – Getting Your Family on the Right Track

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri is here to help Missouri families every step of the way in finding reputable, affordable child services in Missouri.

We pride ourselves in providing services and assistance that low-income families need to see their children receive the highest quality early childhood education possible.

We realize that trying to find suitable child care that is convenient for you and is accepted for Missouri child care assistance can be a daunting task.

It’s for this reason we compile the information and resources we do, as well as offer the help of our trained staff.

We encourage you to also utilize our website, as it is a wealth of resources for parents seeking our Missouri child care assistance.

If you have questions in regard to attaining assistance for your children to attend school for early childhood education in Missouri, contact the team at Child Care Aware^® of Missouri today, and we will get you on the right path to receiving the help you need to provide your children the highest-quality education possible.

Interviewing daycares is not a task any parent undertakes lightly. It can be a confusing and challenging time for families as they try to decipher between the different types of facilities, payment assistance options, and learning modalities that each facility offers.

Whether you’re looking for a daycare in Ballwin, MO, a St. Louis County daycare, or a child care facility anywhere in the state, we’re here with you to find the perfect early childhood learning center for your child.

We emphasize parental choice and use our referral service to help connect families to the services they need, where they need them, and when they need them. 

Between our on-the-ground community outreach programs and our resource-filled online repository, you are sure to find the information you need to become a smart child care consumer.

Here we will discuss how to find the right daycare for your family using our website and resources. 

Child Care Aware – Who We Are

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, a member of the Child Care Aware® of America network. We focus on delivering services that improve the experience and environment of children in their first 2,000 days. 

We work for four main groups throughout the State of Missouri:

1.       Families
2.       Child Care Professionals
3.       Businesses
4.       Community Stakeholders

Daycares that Work for Families in St. Louis County, Missouri, and Other Municipalities

When it comes to child care, parental choice is of the utmost importance to us. 

We work diligently to connect families to child care via our referral service.

It’s our goal to ensure you can find daycare services in Ballwin, MO, early elementary education in St. Louis County, Missouri, or whatever specific care service you need, where you need it, when you need it.

In this article, we will discuss portions of our resource-rich website that will assist you in your search for the perfect child care facility for your family.

Our Impact on Child Care Programs

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri works with child care businesses and daycares in Ballwin, Missouri, as we do throughout the state. We assist them in accessing resources, attaining professional development opportunities, and aid them with additional knowledge to help improve their interaction with, and in turn, the development of, your children. 

Child Care Solutions for the Workforce

We are a leading partner of Missouri’s Child Care Professional Development System. We provide training to the staff at St. Louis County daycares and at child care facilities in all other counties in the state. 

We also manage the T.E.A.C.H. Missouri scholarship program and implement health and wellness practices within the early childhood education setting. 

We are a champion for enhanced professional development, with your child’s best interest as the desired outcome from these trainings.

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri is a Collaborative Community Partner

We engage with legislative and business leaders and community stakeholders to help attain the highest quality early education for young children possible. 

Types of Licensures for St. Louis County Daycares

The sheer volume of daycare types alone is enough to make parents want to recoil with fear.  Not to worry, Child Care Aware^® of Missouri will help you find the perfect daycare in Ballwin, MO, or any other town or county in the state. 

Licensed Child Care Center

A licensed child care center is a group of more than 20 children who are cared for at a separate facility. Often, this type of center has children grouped in classrooms by age.  

Licensed Group Child Care

These daycares are groups of 11-20 children either in a separate facility or an area separate from the educator’s living quarters.

Licensed Family Child Care Home

A licensed family child care home of up to 10 children, cared for in the child care educator’s own home. 

License-Exempt

A religious organization runs many of these programs. Preschool programs operate no more than 4 hours per day.

Exempt

Exempt status is for summer camps, schools, and day programs, among others. When six or fewer children are cared for in the child care educator’s own home, the program is also exempt. 

The Difference Between Licensed Programs, License-Exempt Programs, and Exempt Daycares in St. Louis County and all of Missouri

It’s great knowing what each type of daycare center is, but what exactly does all this mean?

Let’s briefly walk through the difference between types of licensure for daycares in Ballwin, Missouri, and the rest of the state.

You can also find all licensing reports for all Child Care Aware^® of Missouri referrals, including daycares in St. Louis County and daycares in Ballwin, Missouri.

Licensed Programs

These daycares have routine fire, sanitation, and health inspections, ensuring that the daycare in Ballwin, MO, that you find will always be up to snuff.

Licensed programs also require a licensing inspection and are required to follow Missouri’s child care licensing rules that regard ratios, group sizes, and training.

License-Exempt Programs

These daycares in St. Louis County and elsewhere in Missouri have a routine fire, sanitation, and health inspections (learn more here), but they do not require a licensure inspection.

Additionally, they are not required to follow licensing rules as previously discussed, including ratio, group size, and staff training. 

Exempt Programs

These daycares in Ballwin, Missouri, and the rest of the state, do not have a fire, sanitation, or health inspections overseen by the state. They do not have licensing inspections typically not included in the Child Care Aware databases. 

You will only see Exempt Programs listed in our database if they have met Child Care Aware^® of Missouri’s listing standards, including health and safety certification, agreement to use safe sleep practices, and a Family Care Safety Registry background check. 

How Child Care Aware^® of Missouri Can Assist You in Finding Quality Daycare in St. Louis County

Finding affordable, reputable child care is a daunting task for any parent or guardian. Ensuring that our children are in safe, capable hands while you are not with them is of the utmost importance. 

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri is here to help. We have positively impacted over 10,000 families, 8,000 early childhood educators, and 138,000 children in 2020 alone, making us a distinguished member of Missouri’s early childhood education sector.  

From locating a suitable daycare in St. Louis County to finding resources to assist with payment to questions to ask potential daycares, Child Care Aware^® of Missouri has you covered from start to finish.

Resources Child Care Aware^® of Missouri Offers

When you navigate our website, you can see how many resource options we offer for finding a daycare in Ballwin, Mo., St. Louis County, or in the entire state of Missouri itself.

In addition to the navigation feature, which we will discuss shortly, we offer a robust online resource center to answer any questions you may have, day or night. 

Child Care Terms

To make an intelligent decision on the right daycare in Ballwin, Missouri, or any other town in Missouri, for your family, you need to know what each daycare offers and what those specific offerings mean. 

We offer users a glossary of sorts on this portion of the site to help parents and caregivers understand the difference between licensure types, child care payment assistance information, child care types, and much more.

If you need to understand what a specific St. Louis County daycare or child care facility anywhere in the state offers but are unsure of the technical jargon, this is where you should check first. 

Child Care Financial Assistance

We include various financial assistance options that you can select from and see if you qualify for, along with the description of each type of assistance option and what it entails. 

You can also click the link to follow and complete your application to see if you qualify.

There is also a link here to reach your D.S.S. Profile Access and links to Military Family Resources and State Payment Assistance.

For example, if you find a daycare in Ballwin, MO, that you’ve fallen in love with but are unsure how to swing the payments, start here first.

Community Resources

Search by category or county, or both! Locate early child care resources, basic essentials, family resources, and more. Start here if you’re new to the area and looking to understand the ins and outs of daycares in St. Louis County, Missouri. 

Explaining Financial Assistance for Daycares in St. Louis County, Missouri

It’s no secret that finding a good daycare in Ballwin, Missouri, or any other town or city in the country is at an all-time high right now. The good news is that Child Care Aware^® of Missouri is here to help you understand your financial options.

Parents are often faced with a double-edged sword when it comes to child care. You need to work, so you need to send your child to a daycare, but at the same time, most of your paycheck goes towards those services each week.

Let’s explain what financial options exist and how to determine your eligibility.

1.     Subsidy

The Missouri Subsidy Assistance System works with Missouri families across the State to help them afford child care. Eligibility is dependent upon family size and income.  Learn more about subsidy assistance in Missouri here.

2.      Sliding Scale

A sliding scale system is utilized within the subsidy system to determine the expense families will pay for St. Louis County daycare (or whichever municipality you reside in), based on family size and income.

3.      Copayment

The Copayment (or co-pay) is the remaining cost of care due to the parents or guardians after subsidy payment and sliding fees are applied. This method of financial assistance is similar to how your co-pay at a doctor’s office works after your insurance pays its portion.

4.      Multi-Child Discount

Not all daycares and child care programs offer a multi-child discount. Still, some daycares in Ballwin, Missouri, St. Louis County, Missouri, and other municipalities will offer a discount for enrolling more than one child — so it’s always worth it to ask!

5.      Income-Based Payment

Some daycares in St. Louis County, Missouri, and elsewhere charge families based on their income. In this method, the individual daycare works with families to determine what they can pay based on income.

6.      Scholarships

Some child care programs have the funding to offer scholarships to children. Eligibility is based on the individual daycare or child care program.

7.      Military Family Resources

For St. Louis County daycares and other counties in the state, there are financial options available to military families and programs to assist children and families of active-duty members and veterans. To learn more about this resource, please call us at 1-800-424-2246 or email us at [email protected].

8.      State Payment Assistance

Visit the Missouri Department of Social Services to check your family’s eligibility and/or apply for financial assistance for daycare in Ballwin, Missouri, daycares in St. Louis County, Missouri, or any other daycare facility that suits your family’s needs.

9.      DSS Profile Access

Click HERE to access your DSS Profile. You can check your subsidy application and case status through this link, update a DVN, and make all other changes to your account. 

Making a Difference in the Early Childhood of Missouri’s Next Generation

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri has a special responsibility. We are tasked with educating and building awareness in families, educators, community stakeholders, and local businesses about early childhood learning and best practices. 

For the year 2022, we have four main focus areas for our advocacy which we will briefly discuss below. We encourage parents and guardians of children in daycares in St. Louis County, Missouri, daycares in Ballwin, Missouri, or daycares anywhere else in this great state to learn more about our child care ambassador program!

1.      To Assist Families and Educators in Advocating on Their Own Behalf

We want to spread knowledge to families across the State of Missouri that gives them the power to speak up for themselves when they know something isn’t right. We offer access to our advocacy toolkit, which helps your understanding of what we are speaking up for.

2.      To Engage and Mobilize Key Legislators Who Will Champion Affordable and Accessible Child Care for Families and a Significant Wage Increase for Educators

Our aim here is to advocate for increasing access to early care and education for parents and children. Another key goal is to inform key legislators and policymakers on the importance of increasing workforce compensation and increasing the capacity of daycares in Ballwin, MO, and all other regions of the State. Lastly, we aim to highlight policies and processes to ease the financial burden of child care on families.

3.      To Reduce the Stigma Associated with the Early Childhood Profession

We plan to create and sustain access for early childhood educators to higher education through the T.E.A.C.H. MISSOURI scholarship program and the C.D.A. scholarship program. 

Secondly, we aim to maintain the involvement of decision-makers by elevating the public profile of the child care workforce and wage compensation by disseminating information on the achievements of the early childhood workforce.

4.      To Support the Early Social and Emotional Development of Young Children

We plan to attain this goal by advocating for ongoing financial support and access to higher education and training regarding child safety, health, and well-being.

To address trauma and crisis, we will also increase the awareness of the need for social support networks for children, families, and educators in daycares in St. Louis County, Missouri, and the remainder of the state.

Lastly, we plan to advocate for the physical, social, and emotional well-being of children while under the supervision of child care educators.

Further Information or Assistance in Locating the Perfect Daycare in Ballwin, MO, St. Louis County, MO, or any other Location in the State

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri is always available to families for anything they need assistance with.

If you’d like to find more information on our events or donate to Child Care Aware^® of Missouri, you can find more information here.

We genuinely hope this article has helped shed some light on the multiple ways Child Care Aware^® of Missouri assists families in finding suitable daycare in St. Louis County, Missouri and Ballwin, Missouri. We also hope this has helped you know you’re not in this search alone.

We are here to help you every step of the way. We encourage you to take a look through the links included in this article and our website. For more information, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us at any time, and one of our knowledgeable team members will return your message as soon as possible.

Early childhood instructors are so important to our society. Missouri early childhood instructors cultivate ingenuity, knowledge, and sharing in the littlest pupils. Early childhood education programs equip prospective teachers with the skills to do that. Unfortunately, degree and diploma programs on early childhood education in Missouri aren’t cheap. The good news is there are many child development scholarship options available for people who are looking to get started in that field. If you’re considering entering the Missouri early childhood industry to become a preschool instructor or a childcare maven, here are pertinent child development scholarship opportunities to consider.

State-Sponsored Organizations

Missouri has dozens of government-approved and certified educational facilities that offer favorable and comfortable learning environments for preschool educators and childcare personnel. Learners can earn certificates as well as degrees, and many state-endorsed organizations offer financial support to students.

Missouri is among the 21 U.S. states enthusiastically partaking in Teacher Education and Compensation Helps (T.E.A.C.H.), which is a national organization created with the goal to deliver fairly compensated, expert, and polished early childhood educators. T.E.A.C.H. Missouri seeks to address two main concerns with Missouri early childhood education: High turnover rates and low wages for child care providers. It attempts to help solve these issues through increasing compensation and training for those providers, helping them achieve a higher level of job satisfaction and status. The project was launched precisely to help lift the excellence of training those undertaking child care curriculums get.

The scholarship is an agreement between T.E.A.C.H. Missouri, the Missouri early childhood learner, and the sponsor. This organization offers a few different kinds of child development scholarship opportunities. So, you can find the right program for you depending on the type of degree or program you’re pursuing.

Although the exact offerings will differ between the different programs, the T.E.A.C.H. Missouri will offer a bonus of $450 upon completion of most of them. That sounds pretty nice, right? The child development scholarship program’s goal is simply to support and advance early childhood education. The Missouri early childhood T.E.A.C.H. program also enhances retention rates for early childhood teachers.

The Federal Government

The United States Federal Government also has several financial aid programs designed to cater to the needs of students attending career schools and colleges. While every U.S. student is eligible for these programs, specific criteria are followed to choose suitable candidates for the loans. There are hundreds of government-approved loan and aid solutions provided by the Federal Government, which are easily accessible on the Federal Student Aid website.

The first type of financial support offered by the United States federal government is grants. There are a variety of grants offered by the government, including Federal Supplemental Educational Opportunity Grants, Pell Grants, and Iraq and Afghanistan Service Grants. Grants don’t need to be paid as they’re offered freely to qualifying candidates. That makes them one of the more appealing options when it comes to federal financial aid.

If you’re already in college, you should also look into work-study opportunities on campus. Among the many federal government scholarships available for aspiring Missouri early childhood educators are the federal work-study program, which lets you get a part-time job to help pay for your expenses.

Working students or learners furthering their early childhood education career can also get child development scholarships in the form of student loans. It’s super important to fully understand what you’re getting into when you take out a loan. You’ll need to pay it back with interest once you’ve completed your degree. Federal student loans tend to have a lower interest rate than private ones. Depending on the specific scholarship you apply for, the dispensed loan amount caters to costs such as transportation, tuition and fees, supplies and books, and room.

Colleges

Missouri has hundreds of colleges and universities that offer child development scholarship programs. However, the type of scholarships provided by different Missouri colleges and universities differ between institutions. You won’t find as many universities offering specific Missouri early childhood scholarships, but many of their more generic offerings can be used toward an early childhood-related degree. You can compare dozens of scholarship opportunities at the student’s disposal to decide which one to select.

If you’re embarking on a college or university education, then you should definitely inquire about your scholarship options at all the different institutions you’re considering. Many of them will have merit-based child development scholarship programs. The Missouri early childhood scholarships that are available to you will likely differ depending on whether you’re pursuing an undergraduate or a graduate degree. Know your options.

The selection of Missouri early childhood scholarships to compare before deciding which to choose include, but are not limited to, Dean’s scholarships, transfer scholarships, regents scholarships, and trustees transfer scholarships. Many of these types of scholarships are offered to learners, including prospective Missouri early childhood educators, automatically or after applying for the programs. Don’t leave money on the table — make sure you thoroughly investigate all your options at your specific school

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri

Child Care Aware^® of Missouri is a branch of a national organization that seeks to advance the child care industry in a variety of ways. Whether that’s connecting families to the right resources for their children or getting child care professionals in touch with helpful resources like child development scholarship opportunities, Child Care Aware^® of Missouri aims to make sure everyone has what they need for our children to succeed.

One of the child development scholarship programs it helps administer has to do with the Child Development Associate (CDA) credential. This well-known credential has been widely recognized for its ability to help willing Missouri early childhood tutors and students to advance their knowledge and career. The program empowers you professionally and personally, ensuring you can meet all the job requirements in modern markets.

By advancing your Missouri early childhood training with this program, your career options will increase. To qualify to apply for the CDA credential, you’ll first need to acquire a high school diploma, or you can be a high school junior or senior in a related Career and Technical Program. Then, you need to complete 120 hours of education in the eight different CDA subject areas as well as 480 hours of experience working with young children. Lastly, you’ll need to put together your professional portfolio.

CCAMO’s CDA Scholarship

The child development scholarship is something every child care specialist looking to advance their skills and knowledge in that field should consider. If you’re trying to earn your CDA credential through clock hours rather than college credit hours, this is the program for you. You can check out the requirements for that here. 

As long as you’re eligible and you go through all the necessary steps in the program, this scholarship program will pay for your application fee with the Council for Professional Recognition. Then, once you earn your CDA credential, the organization will give you $215. But that’s not all! If you stay at your original child care program for another six months, you’ll receive another $215.

Professional Associations

Several trusted professional associations have networked to push child development education further in Missouri. These professional groups include qualified teaching experts that network online or meet in person to discuss pertinent issues and support each other professionally and financially. Some associations meet and interact through networking events, conferences, live stream interviews, and online courses. In other associations, there are monthly meetings, job boards, industry blogs, and community activities.

These associations aren’t only made to discuss pertinent issues and push education a notch higher but also help you grow your resume and strengthen your profile. With these organizations, members learn more about the best job opportunities, strengthen their recommendation letters, and keep track of the latest trends in this field. Other top-leading Missouri early childhood professional associations provide scholarships.

For example, check out the American Montessori Society. It’s a leading non-profit organization with the goal to encourage using the Montessori teaching method. The association connects members looking to enhance the quality of education in early childhood schools through research and professional public policy. If you’re interested in this method of teaching and looking to attend one of the Society’s affiliated teacher education programs, then you could qualify for one of the child development scholarship opportunities they offer.

Rethink Scholarships

When you imagine a child development scholarship, you might only be thinking of help paying for university programs or other big, long education projects. However, when it comes to Missouri early childhood education, even short workshops or seminars can make a big difference. Look into your options in that department. When you belong to a professional organization, you might get free or discounted access to those sorts of learning events, as well as a whole host of other materials that can help you further your expertise in your chosen field.

This kind of financial help can be a good fit because of its specificity. Plus, you don’t have to commit to years of schooling to get a little boost in knowledge. If you’re already part of some national or Missouri early childhood professional organizations, of if you’re considering joining, definitely make yourself aware of any financial help they offer for any form of continuing education.

Business Early Childhood Scholarships

Established businesses have also started investing in advancing the quality of education provided in early childhood learning facilities. Businesses need top talent to push their growth a notch higher and increase their annual profits. Recent years have seen many businesses chipping in to provide scholarships to enable learners to further their education. Some businesses train learners and incorporate them into their operations after they are done with school life. Other businesses offer scholarships to support the education of early childhood tutors.

Athletic Scholarships

For those who are attending a college or university to earn a degree in a child care-related field, athletic scholarships might be a possibility. These kinds of future Missouri early childhood professionals that have a knack for sports can also get sponsored to further their education. Scholarships under the athletic category are numerous, and the amounts you can get to support your education are vast, as well. There are dozens of websites and online tools that allow you to search for athletic scholarships. The athletic scholarships cater to the financial needs of learners good at synchronized swimming, basketball, football, and most other sports, as well.

It’s good to understand that most athletic scholarships are made for students experienced and talented in certain sports. Besides, the scholarships are only applicable in specific colleges and universities. The scholarships can cover expenses such as food, tuition, board, and room costs.

Employer-Based Scholarships

Another common type of scholarship early childhood educators can get to pay for their learning costs is the employer-specific scholarship. These types of scholarships are made specifically for students of employees serving certain companies or organizations. The awards and the financial support awarded to the tutors depend on the employer and the needs of the employee’s children. There are many certified and credible organizations and employers all through Missouri that provide scholarships to their workers.

Check with your current employer to see if they have any programs along these lines. They might have a tuition reimbursement program or other type of child development scholarship offerings for you to take advantage of.

Find the right child development scholarships for you.

As an early childhood teacher or child care specialist in Missouri, it’s not always easy or cheap to further your education. Even if you’re not financially stable, you’ve got many child development scholarship opportunities to compare and decide between. You are in a better position to win higher and better scholarships if you’re talented in a specific area. The athletic-based or employee-based scholarships are pretty popular and reliable today. However, state-sponsored and nonprofit organizational scholarships in Missouri are also valid options. These are offered by a variety of well-known and credible state and non-profit organizations. Likewise, there are many professional associations in Missouri that offer scholarships to support the continuing education of early childhood professionals.

It’s no easy feat to find the right kind of care for your child when you’re not around. We may all want to be the one watching them and nurturing them all the time, but that’s simply not feasible when we have jobs to do and life to live. Or, maybe you run some kind of child care facility and you’re looking to become a DSS approved daycare. You’re sure your practices are great and up to date, and you’re looking for official recognition of how well you do your job.

We’re here to give you some insight. Whether you’re looking for a DSS approved daycare to send your children to or you’re just trying to find some information on how to comply with state guidelines, we’ve got the information you need, and if not, we can always point you in the right direction. After all, the Child Care Aware phone number is just one call away — but more on that later. Here, we’re going to talk about all the different aspects of what you might be looking for if you’re searching for DSS approved daycare. Spoiler alert: Everything is not what it seems, and we’ll have to cover a lot of different topics to try to get at the root of what you need.

Before we get into that, though, we need to make sure everyone’s on the same page. Let’s define some important terms.

What is DSS?

You can’t find DSS approved daycare if you don’t know what DSS means. So, we figured this is as good a place as any to start. You might decide to dial to the Child Care Aware phone number for more information, or you could just read on.

DSS stands for Department of Social Services. This is a government department within the state of Missouri that handles, you guessed it, social services. Those types of things include public assistance, health care coverage, child welfare services, and specialized assistance to troubled youth. Part of providing those services includes combating fraud, waste, and abuse within those programs. Audits of Medicaid and compliance initiatives are both parts of that secondary mission, as is supporting law enforcement efforts to protect children. 

If you’re curious about how DSS is set up and organized, we have answers for you, too. There’s a governor-appointed and state senate-approved director. The director is in charge of choosing division directors to work with them.

This is all true for the state of Missouri and not necessarily anywhere else. If you’re looking for an equivalent at the federal level, you’d be looking for the Administration for Children and Families, which is within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

Note that we haven’t listed DSS approved daycare anywhere in our list of what they do. There’s a reason for that. Read on to find out if DSS approved daycare is even something you should be looking for. And if you need more information than we end up providing here, you can always call the Child Care Aware phone number or do some more digging on our site.

Where can I find a DSS approved daycare in Missouri?

Now that we all understand what the DSS is, we can talk about the central question at hand. As it turns out, there isn’t a list of DSS approved daycares in the state. In fact, the licensing procedures go through the Office of Childhood, which lives within the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, not the Department of Social Services. Tricky, we know. 

So, while it might seem like the Department of Social Services is the place to go for DSS approved daycare, there’s no official channel for them to confer that designation. This means that if you see a child care facility claiming to be a DSS approved daycare, they’re not being completely truthful. Find the Child Care Aware phone number and see if they can help you find a reputable facility instead.

Two forms of child services that definitely fall under DSS approved daycare, though, are the Head Start and Early Head Start programs. We’ll go over both of those in the next section.

Head Start and Early Head Start

These programs might count as DSS approved daycare, but they are so much more than that. They are federal programs aiming to improve the lives of children who might not have as many resources. Since they’re federally run, they’re not technically something DSS approves either, but they do fall under the Administration for Children and Families, which we mentioned earlier. 

Head Start tends to be a little more well-known than Early Head Start. If you’ve heard of it, then you don’t need the Child Care Aware phone number to call and ask what it is — you already know that it’s a program offering free preschool and other support for families that fall at or below the federal poverty line. Early Head Start is very similar. It serves infants and children up to age 3. 

Head Start and Early Head Start programs aren’t only child care programs. They endeavor to help the entire family. They offer home visits and all kinds of other services that go beyond the other kinds of child care we’ll discuss in later sections. 

If you think you might qualify for one of these programs, you’ll want to check them out. Your local Child Care Aware phone number might be a good place to start calling — their goal is to connect you with any resources you might need, and these programs definitely fall under that umbrella. If you’d rather skip the step of dialing the Child Care Aware phone number, you can see a list of all Missouri Head Start locations here.

If there aren’t DSS approved daycare facilities, where can I find reputable child care?

There are different resources out there for finding the right child care facility for your family. One of them is Child Care Aware^® of Missouri. You can peruse our website for a directory of child care facilities within the state that meet our requirements. Find your local Child Care Aware phone number and give us a call if that’s giving you trouble.

Of course, if you’re not looking for child care within the state of Missouri, you can find the Child Care Aware phone number for the branch that’s in your neck of the woods. You can also find their website if you’re more digitally inclined. They should have much the same resources available for you, and if they don’t, they should be able to refer you to somewhere that does. 

If it’s not through DSS, how does the state approve child care facilities?

As we mentioned earlier, licensing child care facilities goes through the Department of Elementary and Secondary Education, or DESE. The requirements depend on the type of child care program that’s being considered for licensing, and not all facilities need a license. The license-exempt child care facilities include religious preschools and non-religious programs that run for four hours or fewer per day. 

These kinds of programs need to have regular fire, sanitation, and health inspections by the state, and fully exempt programs (like summer camps or programs run by school systems) aren’t required to have any inspections. All other types of child care settings need to be licensed by DESE in the Show Me State, and if you call up the Child Care Aware phone number or visit our website, we have a directory of them. Here are the different categories those facilities might fall under and the requirements for each.

Family Child Care Home

This kind of program can only accommodate a maximum of ten children at a time. As the name suggests, these programs are run in the educator’s own home. Family child care homes need to be licensed by the state, which means they need to go through regular safety and licensing inspections. Those licensing inspections are there to make sure the program is following all the rules set out by the state, which includes stipulations like the number of children in the program at any given time as well as general safety concerns. The full list of rules is pretty extensive, so we won’t list them all here. Suffice it to say that family child care homes are held to fairly high standards, as are the remaining child care settings on this list.

Like the other kinds of child care we’ll cover in the next sections, if you’re interested in enrolling your child in a family child care home, you can look through databases or find the Child Care Aware phone number and give them a call. They’ll be able to point you in the right direction.

Group Child Care Home

At first glance, this category of child care settings might not seem any different from family child care homes, which we just went over. However, group child care homes are held to different standards than family child care homes, even though they must also be licensed by the state. 

To be considered a group child care home, there needs to be separation between the educator’s living quarters and the area where they run the child care program. That might just be a separate wing of their home, or it might be in a completely different facility. Unlike family child care homes, group child care homes can accommodate up to 20 children at a time. 

There are specific requirements for the physical area where the children are cared for, like any licensed child care facility. There are also specific stipulations on ratios of staff to children as well as other concerns. We’ve already suggested calling your local Child Care Aware phone number for more information on any of this, and that stands for group child care homes, as well.

Child Care Center

This is the largest kind of licensed child care facility. They can accommodate more than 20 children (sometimes a lot more than that), and they are always run in a facility that doesn’t double as the main educator’s home. The children participating in one of these types of programs are typically separated into different classes or rooms according to their age.

The licensing rules governing child care centers are actually much the same as those for group child care homes. There are some differences, like the number of children that can be in the facility, but most of the other requirements are the same. 

If you have any more questions about the differences between your options for licensed child care facilities in the state of Missouri, the Child Care Aware phone number would be a great place to turn. We’ll be able to provide you with some relevant resources. 

So, this has been your basic primer on the licensed child care facilities in the state of Missouri.

You may have started out looking for DSS approved daycare, but now that you’ve reached the bottom of this piece, you know that DSS approved daycare is not even something you can ever attain — at least within the state of Missouri. The moral of the story is that you need to look elsewhere to find licensed child care programs in the state, and even more than that, you need to look at other considerations other than just licensure to make sure you’re sending your children to a reputable facility. If you’re on the other side of things as a child care worker, then you need to know that it usually takes more than just the bare minimum licensing requirements to run the best child care program possible, and that you shouldn’t look to DSS for those but rather DESE. It’s a similar acronym, but they’re two completely different departments. 

We want to leave you with a few calls to action. If you’re in search of more information or assistance, find your local Child Care Aware phone number and give them a call. They’ll be able to help. And if you’re on the child care provider side of things, the Child Care Aware phone number works just the same for you. The goal of the organization is to connect both parents and child care workers with the resources they need.

Starting your search for child care centers in St. Louis, MO can be daunting! Maybe you’re new to the area, perhaps you’ve made the decision to get back into the workforce, or maybe your work arrangements have changed and you need to start going back into the office after working from home for a while. Whatever the reason, beginning the search for child care can be intimidating and scary. But, never fear! Our team of experts is here to help! 

Finding child care centers in St. Louis, MO might seem like too difficult a task to even start, but that’s where we come in. It may feel overwhelming if it’s the first time you’ve started to look. It can be an emotional time looking for care for your child, as it may even be the first time that someone other than you or a family member might be looking after them. Our goal is to help you find the right fit for your family and connect you to resources to assist you along the way in this process.

Different types of Child Care Centers

The best place to begin with any search is first to identify what options are available in your area. One of the first differences to be aware of is that child care centers in St. Louis, MO and beyond can be licensed or licensed-exempt. That said, most child care centers will be licensed. 

Licensed Child Care Centers

Licensed child care programs have to pass regular fire, sanitation, and health inspections for their facilities as mandated by the state. They also have inspections by the Section for Child Care Regulation each year. The child care license should be displayed close to the facility entrance and available for all parents and guardians to view.

There are different types of licensed child care programs: licensed family child care home, licensed group child care home, and licensed child care center. Licensed family child care home programs are for up to ten children, who are not related to the family child care business owner, in the provider’s home. 

Licensed group child care home is a medium-sized program for between 11 and 20 children not related to the business owner. These programs can be attached to the owner’s home or in a different location. 

Licensed child care centers are facilities for more than 20 children and must be separate from the owner’s home. All of these programs follow certain rules depending on the number of children to caregivers. Licensed child care centers must follow these specific rules:

• Birth to two years of age: 1 adult to every 4 children;  
• Two-year-olds: 1 adult to every 8 children;  
• Three to five-year-olds (not in school): 1 adult to every 10 children; and  
• Five years of age and up (in school): 1 adult to every 16 children.

Licensing reports can be viewed by the public and shows how well a program meets child care licensing standards.

Licensed child care centers in St. Louis, MO also require that employees pass a background check. You want to keep your child as safe as possible and background checks ensure that everyone interacting with your child and others has nothing questionable in their history. Background checks must be completed before the candidate is hired at the facility and must be done every five years.

License-Exempt Child Care Centers

These child care centers do not need to be licensed by the state but do need to follow some of the same regulations as licensed centers. License-exempt child care centers are programs run by a religious organization or programs for preschool children that are open no more than four (4) hours per child per day. These programs must follow health, sanitation, and safety rules and requirements but are exempt from the requirements for the number of caregivers based on the ages and number of children in care, discipline practices, and staff training.

How to Find Quality Child Care Centers

Now that you have a better understanding of what type of child care center you’re looking for for your family, let’s discuss how to find the perfect child care centers in St. Louis, MO. The first step would be searching Missouri’s database of child care providers here.

If you know the specific name of a child care center you’re interested in, you can search directly for their records. You can also search for a particular location using a specific city, zip code, or county. This search also allows you to narrow down your search depending on the type of program you’re most interested in, such as licensed or license-exempt care facilities. These results will let you view the most recent inspections of each facility. You’ll also be able to see if there are any pending violations and the nature of any of those issues. 

Once you’ve narrowed down your search and selected a handful of child care centers in St. Louis, MO that fit your criteria, you’re ready to begin the process of really getting to know these facilities and their staff. This will be the time to reach out to ask any specific questions you may have and potentially schedule a tour to view the facility in action.

Things to Look for in Your Child Care Search

Every family has different needs for their child care program. You’ll need to be sure that any child care centers in St. Louis, MO you select are a perfect fit for your family and the only way to be sure is to ask plenty of questions. Here’s our list of important items to consider.

Family Involvement

Great child care centers in St. Louis, MO will have an open-door policy with family members. A program that encourages open communication and family involvement is always a good sign. It shows they are open and have nothing to hide.

Group Size and Ratios

In a licensed child care facility, the size and ratio of children and caregivers are mandated by the state. For child care centers in St. Louis, MO, the ratio specifics are mentioned just above in this article. When there are groups of mixed ages, these guidelines become a bit more complicated. To learn about these regulations, you can read more here. 

Ideally, the lower the ratio, the better. Fewer children to caregivers allow for your child to receive personalized care and attention. A lower ratio means that your child won’t be lost in the hustle and bustle of a busy child care center. With licensed child care centers in St. Louis, MO, this won’t be a problem because they have to follow state regulations, but it’s great to know the specifics of each facility you’re interested in.

Staff Training and Credentials

It’s important for child care programs to have their staff stay up to date with the ever-changing child care industry. With licensed child care centers, employees are required to earn 12 hours of clock hours of training a year. Often caregivers will attend more than 12 and some even earn college credits to continue their education.

Another item to consider with staffing is a program’s turnover rate. A high-quality, well-run facility will often have employees that want to stick around for the long haul. Low turnover can be indicative of a supportive and positive work environment and allows for caregivers to bond with the children in their care. Employees typically want to stick around if they feel appreciated and valued.

Other things to consider might be how a facility disciplines a child when they’re in trouble and how they are comforted if they’re upset. It’s good to know that a child care center aligns with your discipline and comfort practices and whether or not it agrees with your parenting style and philosophies.

Health and Safety

With the ever-changing health landscape in this day and age, it’s important to know what precautions that the child care centers in St. Louis, MO you’re interested in are taking to ensure your child’s health and your family’s. Important things to also know about would be how often a facility cleans and sanitizes, what procedures are followed if a child gets sick and what the criteria are to send a child home, field trip safety, or how allergies are handled.

Accreditation

Child care centers in St. Louis, MO that are accredited will meet the standard state requirements and usually go above and beyond these regulations. Accreditations from organizations like the National Association for the Education of Young Children, the National Accreditation Commission for Early Care and Education Programs, or the National Early Childhood Program Accreditation are a great place to start. Ask your chosen child care centers in St. Louis, MO what accreditations they have if any. They’ll be glad to tell you all about them!

Specific Needs of Your Family

While the above items are very important to consider, every family has specific needs and requirements for their child. Make a list of important items or practices you need in child care centers in St. Louis, MO and be sure to include these things in your checklists as you begin your visits. Your family’s needs may differ and a great child care program will be able to fit those needs exactly. You want to make sure its a great fit!

Additional Things to Consider for Infants

When looking for child care centers in St. Louis, MO for infants and toddlers, there are certain items to ask a program about. Does the staff have training related to safe sleep practices? Are there daily logs regarding feedings, diaper changes, and naps? Are all feeding choices accommodated and respected?

Additional Things to Consider for School-Age Children

Similarly, there are certain items to consider for school-age children as well. Are there plenty of reading materials and educational games? Is there transportation to and from school available? Is care available during school vacations or days when school is not in session?

Still have trouble finding child care?

If you’re still having trouble finding the right child care centers in St. Louis, MO that fit your family’s needs, give the Child Care Aware phone number a call! Calling 1-866-892-3228 can connect you to one of our Resource Specialists who can help you find new options as they become available. You can also fill out one of our forms and a specialist can reach out to you. We want to make sure that the child care you choose is perfect for your family. Every family is different and child care centers in St. Louis, MO are also different.

Another option is to try searching in a different location. You might find there are great options near your work, school, or other places nearby to your day-to-day life. There might be some real gems just a touch outside of your search radius.

Open the conversation up! Talk to friends, family members, neighbors. Check-in with your local library or community center. They may know of child care options available in your area and connect you with them. Some may have recommendations for an excellent facility that you never even considered. Use your community to your advantage!

Be sure to get on any waiting list for any programs you think might work well for your family. It never hurts to cover all your bases and the worst that could happen is a spot doesn’t become available. If you never get on the list, then you would never know if something opens up! 

Let the hunt begin!

We’ve talked about different types of child care, how to find quality care centers, things to look for during your child care search, and how to troubleshoot if you’re still having difficulty finding the right fit. Now it’s time to get out there and see what works for your family. 

No matter how you go about your child care search, we’re always here to help. We want to make this as easy and pain-free as possible. With our team of Resource Specialists, we’ll be able to help you find the perfect fit for your family that works in every way imaginable. We know how important it is to feel comfortable with your child care provider, it’s a big deal!

There’s a huge demand for child care resources in this country. The need for high-quality child care as well as its benefit on society at large are well-documented, but it’s not always easy to find. Between the soaring costs of child care and the current climate changing the way we work, a child care resource and referral network can do all kinds of good. 

If you’re searching for some kind of family resources list, a child care resource and referral network is a great place to turn. Here, we’ll explain the work they do and how they might be helpful for you and your family. We’ll touch briefly on the other kinds of invested parties they serve, but we’ll mostly narrow our focus on families in search of child care and a family resources list. Before we get into all that, though, let’s define our terms.

What is a child care resource and referral network?

A child care resource and referral network is an organization that has a goal of connecting parents and child care providers to the resources they need to thrive. They’re also sometimes just called child care resource networks or CCR&R networks. No matter what they’re called, they strive to help this incredibly complicated field by making sure those who offer services and resources can reach the families who need them and vice versa.

For Child Care Providers

This is less relevant to our purposes here, but an important part of any child care resource and referral network’s work is to get child care providers in touch with the training they need to offer the best possible care. These include offerings like professional development opportunities and regular training courses as well as more formal education. They might point you in the right direction toward scholarships, information, and anything else pertinent about certain training programs.

For Parents

The more pertinent side of what child care resource and referral networks offer, though, is what they can do for families. Like we said earlier, these organizations are great places to find localized family resources lists. A child care resource and referral network is going to have plenty of information on what kinds of services are available to you, and if they don’t have what you’re looking for on hand, they’ll be able to link you up with an organization that does. We’re talking about help paying for child care, what to look for in a child care provider, and all kinds of other relevant tips regarding child care. We’ll get into the specifics in the following sections — after all, that’s what this blog post is all about! 

So, a child care resource and referral network is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. It’s an organization that’s a great first stop when you’re looking for anything in relation to the child care field. Now that we’ve got that baseline definition out of the way, let’s dive a little deeper into a family resources list. We’ll go over some of the different kinds of resources you can get in touch with through a child care resource and referral network.

What You Can Get at a Child Care Resource and Referral Network

Now that we’re aware of what a child care resource and referral network basically is, we can list what they offer in more detail. Keep in mind that they provide a whole lot more than this for different kinds of invested parties. And if you need something outside the scope of these services, go ahead and ask. The child care resource and referral network might be able to get you in touch with the right organization, even if they aren’t familiar with your specific need. No matter what item on your needed family resources list you’re looking for, these organizations can be a great place to start.

With all that said, here’s our non-comprehensive list of what a child care resource and referral network can help you with.

Referrals to Local Child Care Providers

This is probably the biggest ticket item on any family resources list. Parents want to know that they’re dropping their kids off at a reputable child care facility every day, but it can be hard to be sure of that. Any child care resource and referral network worth its salt is going to have some kind of way to search for local child care providers. They can give you the contact information for high-quality child care in your area, and you can take it from there. We’ll get deeper into what else they can do on the child care front in a later section, but for now, just know that these organizations are great places to start your child care search. 

Information on State Licensing Requirements

This kind of information is there to make you feel more equipped to make that all-important child care decision. By understanding the different types of child care facilities out there, you’re better able to make the right choice for your family. It’s great to find more localized organization to help you with research about this topic because the rules vary from state to state. So, if you can find an organization in your area with information about local guidelines, then you’re going to be sure you’re getting everything relevant to your state.

In Missouri, at least, there are four different types of child care operations when it comes to licensing: Licensed, license-exempt, exempt, and six or fewer. You can learn more about what each of those categories entails with the help of your local child care resource and referral agency. It might not be as vital to your day-to-day as a family resources list, but it’s still a helpful way to narrow your child care search.

Information on Where to Get Help Paying for Child Care

It’s a well-known fact that child care in this country is prohibitively expensive for many families. Finding places that will help you pay for that essential service is a great way to make use of your local resource and referral agency. Part of any good family resources list includes financial help, especially when it comes to child care. They’ll have ideas on where to go for assistance, both at the state level and at more localized organizations and opportunities. Definitely take advantage of the help you can get.

Some opportunities might be somewhat obvious, like getting a discount at a child care center for sending multiple children, but others are less advertised. A child care resource and referral agency can direct you toward assistance you might never have thought of otherwise. And even if you think you’ve exhausted your options, it doesn’t hurt to ask.

Community Resources

One of these agencies or networks in your area might allow you to search for the kind of community resource you need to build out your family resources list. Different categories you might be looking to fill could include safety, health, recreation, education, family supports, or any other kind of community resource that could help your children or your family. 

This is another benefit to seeking help from a local network. These community resources are based within the neighborhoods they serve, meaning they’re going to be dialed into the specific needs of the area. It takes a village, after all. Getting in contact with all the resources within that
“village” or community is a great way to fill out your family resources list. Put together all the different help you can get, and you’ve got a great start to a better life for your child. A child care resource and referral agency can help you do just that.

State and National Resources 

It’s true that we just touted the benefits of looking for very localized resources, down to the county or city level. That way, they’ll be more in tune with your specific community’s needs. However, there’s also a huge benefit to looking at the resources at broader levels, like state and national resources.

The items at this level on the family resources list aren’t just financial help or child care centers. They might include organizations, programs, or activities that help you find a job, housing, or other basic needs. If you can’t find enough assistance at the local level, go broader, and vice versa. A child care resource and referral network can help you find the right mix of support and solutions.

General Child Care Information

We’re talking about terms and definitions relevant to this complex field as well as tips and tricks of the trade. As we already mentioned, these agencies can help you learn about the different forms of licensing for child care providers in your area. They’re also a great resource on what to look for when you’re considering different places to send your children. They’ll have definitions on what each type of child care setting entails, and they might even have lists of things to look for and questions to ask when you’re contacting those different providers. 

If you’re looking for any type of general information about anything on your family resources list, one of these agencies or networks is a great place to start. They have a wealth of knowledge and experts backing them, and they should be able to answer your questions. If they can’t, they should be able to put you in contact with someone who can.

What You Can’t Get at a Child Care Resource and Referral Network

Given that we’ve already given a pretty expansive view on what you can get through a child care resource and referral network, it should already be pretty obvious what you can’t get. However, for the sake of completion, we’re going to clarify a few things in this section. We’ll start with the family side of things, since that’s been our main focus here, and then we’ll move into the topics more relevant to child care providers.

First of all, child care resource and referral networks do not actually care for children. They’ll give you all the information you need to find high-quality child care in your area and give you a family resources list, but they won’t take the kids themselves. The groups are mostly very localized, though, so they should have a good idea on what’s available near you. 

For any child care providers looking to get something other than a family resources list out of one of these organizations, know that they’re not handing out degrees or certifications. They don’t usually put on training events themselves. However, like we’ve already said, they’ll be more than happy to point you in the right direction. They might also offer their own programs to help you pay for certain kinds of trainings. But again, they’re usually not offering that education themselves.

You should also ensure that you’re reaching out to the right organization for the thing you need. For example, there are national networks and more local ones. You should be in contact with the child care resource and referral network in your specific area to get the best local recommendations. The national networks are generally more focused on policy advocacy.

Now you know what you can find through a child care resource and referral network.

With this wealth of information at your fingertips, you should be chomping at the bit to get in touch with a child care resource and referral network in your area. By now, you’ve got a good grip on all the different kinds of assistance one of these organizations can provide, and you’re also aware of the aspects of this field that they don’t touch. We covered all the different information that you can find with these sorts of agencies, and if anything rang true for you, you should definitely reach out.

If you’re looking for a place to start your search for a family resources list, you can always turn to us here at Child Care Aware^® of Missouri. We’re a local arm of Child Care Aware of America, one of the most well-recognized child care resource and referral networks in the country. Feel free to check out our website for some extra information, and if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to reach out here.

Embarking on a child care search is a daunting task. It’s a very complex field, and it’s hard to know what to look for in child care providers. Plus, emotions are running high. You’re looking for someone to take care of your child, which is pretty high stakes, and it might be the first time you’ve left them in the hands of someone you don’t know personally. If you’ve been having trusted family members watch out for your little ones when you can’t, making a change can be hard. A child care search has to take into consideration all these factors and more.

We’re here to make it easier for you. Here, we’re going to take you through all the things you need to look for in your child care search. Whether you’re looking for daycare in Columbia, MO, infant care in Springfield, or any other kind of child care anywhere else in the state, Child Care Aware^® of Missouri is here to help. Our goal is to connect you with the resources you need to make sure your child care search comes up with good results and you feel confident in leaving your children in capable hands. 

Now, let’s get into it. First, we’ll look at how to identify good candidates in the initial stage of your child care search.

Where to Find Good Child Care

You can look up Missouri’s database of child care providers here. You can search for the records regarding a specific child care facility you’re interested in, or you can search for a particular location and find a list of child care providers in that area. These geographical searches can be narrowed down to a specific city, zip code, or county. You can also narrow down your search depending on the type of facility you’re looking for. If, for example, you’re not comfortable with license exempt programs, you can exclude those from your search.

Then, you’ll get the results of your initial child care search. You can look at the results of their most recent inspections and check if they have any pending violations, and if so, the nature of those issues.

Once you’ve got a handful of facilities you’re interested in that are conveniently located, then you’re ready to reach out to them to ask some questions and potentially get a tour. That leads us to our next section.

Questions to Ask in Your Child Care Search

When you reach out to these child care providers, you’re going to have other things you need to know to make sure they’re a reputable place to entrust with your children. We’ve put together some of our most important questions to ask them.

1. Family Involvement

How involved are the families allowed to be? If spontaneous visits from parents aren’t allowed, that’s a potential red flag. You want to make sure there’s good communication between you and your child’s caregiver, and making sure the whole family can get involved is a good step in that direction.

2. Group Size and Ratios

In a licensed child care facility, the maximum group sizes and ratios of children to caregivers are mandated by the state. Check your local authorities for the rules where you live. In Missouri, there must be one adult for every four children under the age of two, one adult for every eight children who are two years old, one adult for every 10 children three through four years old, and one adult for every 16 children who are five and up. The rules are a little different and more complicated for groups of mixed ages, and if you’d like to read the whole guidelines, you can check them out here.

Obviously, the lower the ratio, the better. Especially if you’re looking at larger centers in your child care search, you’ll need some assurance that your child is getting individualized attention. You want to make sure that your child won’t get lost in the shuffle. As long as the facility is following the state’s regulations, it should be fine, but you should still ask to make sure!

3. Training and Staff Credentials

You might want to assume all the staff members at a reputable child care center are fully qualified for their jobs, but you should definitely double check. Ask what kind of training they receive on an ongoing basis and what their credentials are. You might be surprised. 

This is also the spot to point out that you need to be asking about staff turnover rate. If lots of the child care providers want to leave after a short time working there, it’s probably a good idea to move on with your child care search. A high turnover rate is often indicative of poor management — people tend to want to stay at well-run child care centers.

Most of these questions have been targeted toward bigger child care centers, but if you’re more interested in a family home or other small facility, you still need to do your due diligence. Ask how long they’ve been running their family child care home, and you can ask for references of other families who have been happy with their services.

4. Health and Safety

These questions to ask in your child care search are wide ranging. Let’s first focus on food. Ask what kinds of snacks they serve, if any. If your child has any allergies, you’ll definitely need to know how those will be accommodated. 

Also, are they planning any field trips? If they’re going to be taking your children anywhere, you need to know there are appropriate safety precautions in place when it comes to travel. If the facility offers any kind of transportation services, you need to know that safety is taken seriously while en route to the destination. Ask about all these things and any other safety concern that comes up.

5. Accreditation

You’ll need to find out if the program you’re interested in is accredited by a reputable organization. Look for accrediting bodies at the state or national level. These sorts of organizations hold child care programs to high standards, and they’ll check in periodically to renew those accreditations. You’re looking for accreditations from organizations like the National Association for the Education of Young Children, the National Accreditation Commission for Early Care and Education Programs, or the National Early Childhood Program Accreditation. You can also use their websites to begin your child care search. 

6. Unique Needs of Your Family

We’ve put forward what we think are the top five things to ask about in your child care search already, but we’re never going to know what your family needs as well as you do. You should take stock of what you’re really looking for in a child care provider and make sure anything we haven’t listed here are at the top of your list of questions. 

Daycare in Columbia, MO: An Example

Now, we want to move into a practical way to use this information about child care searches. Let’s take daycare in Columbia, MO, as an example. We’re going to compile all the child care search steps we’ve already identified in this piece and put them together in a hypothetical situation with a fictional parent looking for daycare in Columbia, MO. 

We’re choosing a search for daycare in Columbia, MO, because it’s a good size for comparison. If you’re looking for daycare in Columbia, MO, then you’ve got some options to choose from, but probably not as many as you would have in a bigger city. If you were conducting a child care search in a more rural area, then you might really have your work cut out for you. Plus, since we’re mainly focused on Missouri child care searches here, it’s centrally located. That combined with the fact that there are enough facilities providing daycare in Columbia, MO, make it a good example.

Daycare in Columbia, MO: Initial Child Care Search

So, imagine you’re a parent in Columbia. You’re ready to go back to work after welcoming your first child, and you need to find a reputable person or facility to care for them. How do you start your child care search?

Like anywhere else in Missouri, a great place to start looking for daycare in Columbia, MO, is the Missouri Department of Elementary and Secondary Education’s search engine. The parent in our example would select Columbia as the city, or they could put in a zip code or search all of Boone county, depending on how far away they’re willing to go for child care. They can also narrow their search according to the type of facility they’re interested in. Let’s say they’re looking for child care centers only. They would check that box and hit “search.” 

Daycare in Columbia, MO: Sifting Through Results

Then, they have a whole list of child care centers for our hypothetical parent to scroll through. You can see their hours as well as the ages of the children they serve right away. Since this parent has an infant, they’ll be looking for a daycare in Columbia, MO, that caters toward those youngest kids. They can quickly rule out any that only take care of older kids. They can also scan for the hours that work best for their schedule. Finally, they can make note of the addresses and telephone numbers of the options for daycare in Columbia, MO, that fit their needs.

You can also click on any child care centers that catch your eye and check to see how they fared in their most recent inspections. The state keeps records of any violations they uncovered and when those were resolved, if they were. This information can help you move to the next stage in the child care search process.

Daycare in Columbia, MO: Making Decisions

Now our imaginary parent has a short list of options from their initial child care search. It might be tempting to call the first one, enroll, and call it a day, but as you already know, there are other considerations in play.

Our example parent needs to reach out to the different child care centers on their short list and do some research to make sure all the questions we outlined are answered. Some might be addressed on their website, if they have one, but others will be more opaque. Our parent will need to give them a call and potentially schedule a tour of the facility. There are quite a few options to choose from when it comes to daycare in Columbia, MO, so these questions and criteria can be a good way to figure out which ones stand out from the rest in your child care search.

Finally, our hypothetical parent takes all those answers into consideration and chooses a child care center. Their child search for a daycare in Columbia, MO, is a success!

Now you’re prepared for your own child care search.

Hopefully, our little example paired with the rest of the information we’ve given you here is enough to get you started on your own child care search. You should be armed with a good place to start, whether that’s through the state’s database or on an accrediting organization’s website. 

Then, you’re ready to ask some questions. There are the basics you should always cover, like health, safety, and caregiver credentials, and then there are the qualities you’re looking for specific to your family. You might need specific hours, or you might prefer one kind of preschool philosophy over the others. Location and price are also considerations, as well as what type of child care facility you’d prefer. There are small, family-run child care operations that care for a handful of children in their home, and there are also big child care centers that employ many teachers and caregivers. There are also lots of options in between. You’ll need to consider the pros and cons of each style of child care before you choose one.

Now, you should have everything you need to find a reputable place to care for your children during the day. Whether you’re looking for daycare in Columbia, MO, or elsewhere in the state, you can check out Child Care Aware^® of Missouri for further resources. We’ve got lots of great information about child care where this blog post came from.

Okay, so maybe this seems like an easy question to answer. Child Care Aware of America sounds like fairly straightforward name. However, it’s really not as simple as it seems. The child care field can be incredibly complex, and understanding all the nuances of the important work Child Care Aware of America does can go a long way to illuminating that field. 

It’s no secret that good, affordable child care can be incredibly hard to come by, especially in certain regions. There’s a lot of good work going on from Child Care Aware of America and child care resource networks like it to combat those difficulties for working families, but if you don’t know that help is out there, you might flounder all on your own. So, it’s important to make yourself aware of your options.

Here, we’re going to take you through the core aspects of what makes this child care resource network tick. We’ll go over their main services, a little bit of their history, and how their work impacts families all across the nation. If you’re already familiar with a Child Care Aware affiliate in your neck of the woods, then you’re already probably pretty well-versed in what the national organization does, but there are some key differences. We’ll go over those a little bit later. Right up front, though, we just want to focus on the basics of the national arm of the organization and all the good work they do.

Let’s start at the very beginning.

So, what is Child Care Aware of America?

Founded in 1987, Child Care Aware of America takes on the important task of working to advance the child care field. In pursuit of that goal, they split their efforts up into several different areas. You can categorize those areas by who the organization is striving to serve. 

One of those groups is parents. They want to connect parents of young children with the highest quality services they can. Another group is child care providers — CCAoA works to make sure that those professionals have all the training and resources they need. The final group is all of society, really. They do that through their advocacy work, getting involved in the policies surrounding child care at the national level.

But the national arm of Child Care Aware doesn’t do this all on its own. Child Care Aware of America works with a whole host of child care resource and referral agencies — over 400 of them nationwide! These are the organizations that can connect parents with the best child care providers in their area, and they do more localized work.

The national organization is also membership-based. Individuals and organizations (like child care resource and referral agencies) can buy a CCAoA membership and receive access to additional resources. These benefits range from being the first to know about Child Care Aware of America’s annual reports to discounts on event registration and so much more. 

Child Care Aware of America also acts as one of the primary child care resource networks in the country. That brings us to the next logical question…

What’s a child care resource network?

A child care resource network is pretty much exactly what it sounds like. You might also hear them called child care resource and referral networks. Basically, one organization will connect parents and child care providers to different relevant resources. 

On the child care provider side, a child care resource network is going to link them up with training and professional development opportunities. They might offer scholarships for certain programs, and they’ll have more information about the regulations in their area of focus. Local child care resource networks are going to have all the information on what kinds of trainings you need to complete and what your options are for completing them. They’re plugged into their local community to get the right resources to the right people. 

On the parent side of things, a child care resource network also has a lot of information to offer. If you need assistance paying for child care, they can point you in the right direction. They can also give you good tips on what to look for in a child care provider, and they’ll also have tips on how to best care for your children yourself, or they’ll be able to guide you in the right direction to get that education. Child care providers aren’t the only ones who can benefit from child care trainings, and a child care resource network will be able to connect you with courses that might be helpful, like basic first aid.

Who does Child Care Aware of America serve?

As we stated in a previous section, this organization (like most child care resource networks) has three main areas of focus: Connecting parents with relevant resources, advancing child care providers’ careers, and advocating for better child care policy.

The organization’s main focus is on children up to 5 years old. It’s a well-known fact that the first five years of life are absolutely critical to brain development. The brain is developing rapidly, quicker than at any other point in our lives. Excess stress on children during this period can have long-lasting effects on their abilities to thrive later in life. Without high quality early childhood education and strong, responsive relationships with adults early on, children aren’t going to be as successful. This kind of good care can reduce the chance that children will have developmental delays. 

These are all reasons why Child Care Aware of America and its affiliates focus on childhood before kindergarten. With that in mind, the organization narrows its focus to families with children under 5, as well as child care providers who care for children before they hit kindergarten. Their advocacy and policy knowledge also focuses on pre-k children and child care systems. So, to answer the question of who the organization serves, it’s really anyone in the field who has an interest in bettering the conditions of children from birth to 5 years old.

Professional Development

A huge part of what this national child care resource network does is help child care providers hone their skills through different professional development programs. There are always new discoveries and advancements being made in the child care field, and keeping on top of them is no small task. It’s important to do, though, because it ensures that our youngest kids have the best possible care and therefore the best opportunities to succeed later in life.

Military Focus

Child Care Aware of America also does a lot of work with military families. The organization serves more than 10,000 military children each year. The specifics of the program will depend on which branch of the Armed Forces your family is part of, but no matter which one you fall under, you might be eligible for help with your child care costs if you don’t have access to an on-base child care provider. Those eligibility requirements will vary from branch to branch, so if you’re interested in one of these programs, definitely check for specifics. Child Care Aware of America is proud to help the families of those who serve our country, and they’d be happy to connect you with the right resources for your situation, if they can.

Advocacy

Another aspect of Child Care Aware of America that might not be immediately obvious is their advocacy. They want to make positive change to the child care field at the structural level, and that includes advocating for better resources from the government. They also have a lot of information for others to advocate on their own. Child Care Aware of America is a trusted source for how best to advance the child care field in this country. Their experts have a complete understanding of where child care policy has been in the past, and they use research and data to inform their ideas on how today’s policies can be improved.

They also have information and resources for individuals who would like to join their advocacy efforts. In the Advocacy section of their website, you can find all kinds of helpful resources, from sample social media posts on relevant topics to ways to contact your representatives and ideas of what to say when you do.

What doesn’t Child Care Aware of America do?

It should be pretty clear by now what Child Care Aware of America’s core services are. We’ve gone over them in several different sections, and we’ve also talked about who specifically the organization serves. Their main purpose should be pretty clear by now. However, we also wanted to make note of what the organization does not do, just so we’re all on the same page before we wrap this up. 

First of all, Child Care Aware of America doesn’t actually care for children. The organization (or one of its affiliates) can refer you to high-quality child care providers in your area, but they won’t take the tots in themselves. And while they can connect child care providers to resources and professional development opportunities, they’re not handing out degrees or anything like that themselves. As a child care resource network, they’re mostly just there to point you in the right direction for all your child care needs.

Also know that you’re often better off reaching out to your local child care resource network rather than going straight to the national branch. The national organization isn’t going to be up to date on all the goings on in your area, so keeping it local can help you get more specific information. That’s not to diminish how important the national organization is, but just keep in mind whether the information or resources you’re looking for is relevant to the whole country or just to your area.

Child Care Aware Near You

We’ve spoken about how Child Care Aware of America works with more local child care resource networks. You can find one through their website, but if you live in Missouri, we wanted to point you toward the Child Care Aware affiliate in your state. Child Care Aware^® of Missouri does a lot of the same work that we’ve discussed previously when it comes to child care resource networks, and they’ll be able to help you find the right resources in your area. Child Care Aware^® of Missouri serves families and child care providers statewide — check out some more specifics about them here.

This is just the start of what Child Care Aware of America is all about.

We’ve covered the core components of what makes this child care resource network so great, but that’s just the beginning. We couldn’t possibly get at every single detail of their organization in a single post. If you’re interested in learning more, you can check out their website for more information.

CCAoA is doing important work every single day, and no matter who you are, you have something to gain from their efforts. If you’re a parent, they can point you in the direction of helpful resources in your area. Whether you need help paying for child care or just need some ideas on what to look for in a child care provider, they can get you some answers or put you in touch with the right people. 

If you’re a child care provider, then you can get all sorts of resources for your profession through CCAoA. You might even join as a member, and then you’ll get all kinds of helpful information to increase your expertise. 

And if you don’t fit into either of those categories, know that Child Care Aware of America is working to better our whole society. In that way, you’ll still benefit from their work. When parents can access high quality child care, they’re more productive, and their children grow up to be more successful and productive members of society. So, we all have something to gain from the great work this child care resource network does, and now you know some of what that important work is.