Sharing Web Resources

Through exploring the Children’s Defense Fund website I have discovered a section called Policy priorities.  This section has information dealing with budget watch, children’s health, welfare, ending child poverty, elementary and secondary education, juvenile justice, projects for children in need, advocate and family resources.

In the early childhood education and care section issues addressed were the advantages of early childhood education, new data is out concerning early childhood education and care, increasing access to full-day kindergarten which is a strategy for boosting learning achievement gaps for children, and the President’s budget for fiscal year 2013 in early childhood education.  

The Children’s Defense Fund has Information concerning issues that are important to children in the 21st century, there are new common core standards that set high expectations for every child including kindergarteners. We need to prepare all of our children to compete in this global economy but for millions of children in the United States there is a missing half-step in their early learning years. Full–day kindergarten boosts children’s cognitive learning, creative problem-solving skills, and social competence.

Insight gained from the website about issues and trends concerning early childhood education include the President’s 2013 fiscal year budget proposal that would increase Head Start funding by $85 million over fiscal year 2012 funding levels. This would allow 962,000 children to participate in Head Start. These funds would also support the implementation of new regulations to strengthen the program by requiring low-performing grantees to compete for continued funding.

Provide an $825 million dollar increase in the Child Care and Development Block Grant which offers subsidized child care dollars to families who need it. These funds would include a $300 million investment for a new child care quality initiative that states would use to improve the services that children receive in child care settings by investing directly in programs and teachers. This increase would also ensure that more than 70,000 additional low-income children would be eligible to receive services.

Support programs that benefit families with infants and toddlers by providing a $20 million increase to Part C of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act, the section that provides grants for infants and toddlers with special needs. Provide a $50 million increase to evidence-based early childhood home visiting programs to improve health and developmental outcomes for families in at-risk communities. Also give a third round of Early Learning Challenge Grants to help states improve their early care and education systems through a portion of the $850 million investment in Race to the top funding.

This increase in the budget would give children and families the opportunity to be aware and have accessibility to attend these early childhood education programs and have a successful future.