This story begins in 2008, with Romilia Schlueter—a respected leader in the Dane County, Wisconsin Latina/o community, with decades of experience in the family support and early childhood fields. At the time, she was working at a family resource center that was a member of Supporting Families Together Association (SFTA), Wisconsin’s statewide child care resource and referral agency. The center had a long list of Spanish-speaking families waiting to be accepted into their early childhood home visitation program. Seeing an opportunity to help meet that need, Romilia came up with the idea of delivering early childhood information to families and caregivers via a weekly Spanish-language radio program. Before long Romilia and La Movida, a popular Spanish radio station in Madison, launched Aprendiendo Juntos Fortalecemos la Familia (Learning Together We Strengthen the Family), with Romilia as the host. This initial program evolved into Apoyando Familias, Aprendiendo Juntos (Supporting Families, Learning Together) when Romilia took a position with SFTA in 2011. The radio program was reformatted and its website added a blog, where audio recordings and scripts of more than 300 programs are archived.

Para muchas familias que tienen niños más grandes, entre las edades de 9 y 12 años, llega un momento en que hay que decidir si el niño está listo para cuidarse solo. Mientras que algunos padres se van a su trabajo antes de que abra la escuela, otros terminan su trabajo mucho más tarde que la hora de cierre de la escuela. A esas horas no es común que haya personas para cuidar a los niños o programas para después de la escuela.

For many families with older children between the ages of 9 and 12, the time comes when you must decide if your child is ready to care for himself. While some parents leave for work before school opens, others finish work long after school is over. Often there are few sitters or after-school programs available at these times.

The Problem:

Working in child care can be stressful and take a toll on many facets of a providers’ health, including oral health. 

If you haven't had the pleasure of meeting Krista Scott, she is the senior director of child care health policy here at Child Care Aware® of America. And recently, we are proud to announce that she was appointed to the Division for Early Childhood (DEC) executive board as the Member-at-Large. 

In 2018, families joined Child Care Aware® of America in a shared mission to move the needle on quality and affordable child care forward. Several issues topped their list of concerns: