The health, safety and well-being of children is of primary concern for child care providers. As trusted professionals, child care providers often serve as a resource for new parents and families. One of the ways that child care providers can help ensure that children are healthy is to encourage that families follow the childhood immunization schedule. Receiving timely and age-appropriate vaccines protects infants, children, and teens from harmful diseases.

Fireworks went off when I was born…or at least that is what my Mom told me. I think it was more like flares than fireworks.  You see I was born while my Dad was deployed to Vietnam. Apparently, nothing could keep my Mom, a very young mother, from calling her husband about his second-born daughter’s birth. Nothing. Despite his being in a war zone, on a mountain, in a tent, she demanded he know. She picked up the phone from her hospital room, dialed “0” and started from there.  My mom exemplified the type of scrappy determination military families cultivate as they regularly uproot their lives in service to their country and in support of their active duty spouses.

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Barb Sinner, Barb’s Daycare, West Fargo, ND

Today is Health Equity Day, an opportunity to explore how child care plays an instrumental role in ensuring that all are afforded the opportunity to attain their highest level of health. We know that children’s health is shaped by their environments—where they live, what they eat, how much they play, and if they have access to medical and dental care. We also know that not every child has the same opportunity to grow up healthy.

On Thursday, March 30, 2017, around 6 p.m., a fire was reported under a section of I-85 in Atlanta. The fire ultimately caused a section of the interstate to collapse around 7 p.m., stranding motorists for hours and creating a more than five mile backup of traffic. The mayor has described this event as a ‘transportation crisis’, and this section of the I-85 will remain closed for the foreseeable future. On Thursday evening Governor Nathan Deal declared a state of emergency and vowed to allocate resources aimed to reduce traffic disruption. Luckily no one was injured in the collapse, a testament to the great work of the fire and police departments who responded to the incident and quickly evacuated the area.

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Bring Out the Best in Your Children