Earlier today, President Barack Obama released his final budget request to Congress for the upcoming Fiscal Year 2017. As he did with last year’s request, President Obama’s budget reaffirms his commitment to help families gain access to high-quality child care and early education.

Today, the Senate Agriculture Committee held a hearing to markup the “Improving Child Nutrition Integrity and Access Act of 2016” a bill that reauthorizes and amends the child nutrition portion of the National School Lunch Act (NSLA).

Last week, the Department of Labor announced a new $25 million grant program to support job training and access to quality child care.

Today, the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) published the much anticipated proposed rule-making on the Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF).

This proposed rule will make changes to CCDF in order to comply with the 2014 CCDBG law. ACF is seeking comments from the public through February 24.

Late last night, House Speaker, Paul Ryan (R-WI) announced that a deal was reached on the FY 2016 budget and unveiled a $1.15 trillion spending bill that would fund the government thru September 30, 2016. This bi-partisan bill includes very favorable funding levels for programs that support low-income children and their families and early education, including:

This morning, President Obama signed S. 1177 (Conference Report H 114-354), the “Every Student Succeeds Act,” into law at a bi-partisan ceremony at the White House. The President was joined by Education Secretary, Arne Duncan, along with Senators Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and Patty Murray (D-WA), the senior leaders on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, as well as Congressmen John Kline (R-MN) and Bobby Scott (D-VA) from the House Education and the Workforce Committee, and other key congressional members and advocates.