This week, Congress officially approved both federal funding for the remainder of FY2021 and COVID-19 relief, providing support to child care and other early learning programs.  

Funding for FY21 included:  

• $5.911 billion for the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG) – an $85 million increase from FY 2020; and  
• $10.748 billion for Head Start/Early Head Start – a $135 million increase from FY2020.  

The Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 combined full-year funding with relief in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The relief funding included $10 billion dedicated to child care, $250 million in support for Head Start, $284 billion in loans for small businesses through the Paycheck Protection Program, $166 billion in direct payment checks, and an extension of unemployment benefits.  

In response, Lynette M. Fraga, Ph.D., CEO of Child Care Aware® of America—the nation’s leading voice for child care—released the following statement: 

We are grateful that child care was one of the industries to receive targeted COVID-19 relief in the package. This critical funding will help providers address the financial burdens associated with increased operating costs and decreased enrollment during the pandemic. However, $10 billion is far from what the child care system needs to survive the pandemic. This will only provide short-term relief on the long road to recovery for child care. 

Child Care Aware® of America (CCAoA) today announced that Mario Cardona is joining CCAoA on January 4, 2021, as its new Chief of Policy and Practice.  

Child Care Aware® of America (CCAoA) welcomes five new Board members and four new Board officers who will assume their positions in January 2021.    

This week, President-elect Joe Biden announced the nomination of California Attorney General Xavier Becerra to serve as Secretary of Health and Human Services. Lynette M. Fraga, Ph.D., CEO of Child Care Aware® of America—the nation’s leading voice for child care—released the following statement: 

Child Care Aware® of America is pleased to see California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, a leader with a track record in support of child care and early learning, nominated to be Secretary of Health and Human Services. If confirmed, he would be the first Latino to lead the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. We look forward to more closely examining his record and urge the Senate to quickly consider his nomination to ensure that the country has a leader at the helm of one of our most critical agencies during this time of crisis. 

Associated Press

“Prior to the pandemic, the child care system was fractured,” said Lynette Fraga, CEO of Child Care Aware of America. “Now, it’s shattered.”

Even before the coronavirus, many parents already faced an impossible choice — caring for their children or earning a living. But COVID-19′s impact on the system has worsened that, Fraga says, and its effects risk creating “child care deserts,” leaving parents unable to return to work, reducing incomes and taking away early education opportunities crucial for a child’s development.

The U.S. child care industry has long relied on Black and Latina women, with women of color making up 40% of its workforce, according to the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment. These women have been disproportionately affected by COVID-19. A July survey from the National Association for the Education of Young Children stated half of minority-owned child care businesses expect to close permanently without additional assistance.

“The pandemic has unveiled how little access to support many of these women have,” Fraga said. “It’s exacerbated and spotlighted the inequities we’ve always known existed here.”

Read the full article.

New York Times

In a report of U.S. child care facilities released on Sept. 24, Child Care Aware of America, a nonprofit advocacy group for providers, found that nationwide, 35 percent of nonresidential child care centers and 21 percent of in-home child care facilities that had been open before the pandemic had closed by July.

According to the largest study of its kind, published in the journal Pediatrics, researchers from Yale and Columbia surveyed more than 57,000 child care providers across 50 states plus Washington, D.C. and Puerto Rico between May and June. They found no relationship between working in day cares and contracting or being hospitalized for Covid-19, regardless of race, ethnicity or other factors.

“Child care providers who reported to work during the first three months of the pandemic were no more likely to contract Covid-19 than those who did not report to work,” said Walter Gilliam, a psychologist and early childhood and education policy researcher at the Yale Child Study Center, who led the study. Most facilities in the study followed careful safety protocols.

But, he added, “If the transmission rate is high in your community, of course it’s going to get into your child care program.”

Read the full article.

Cheddar

First large-scale study finds child care is not associated with the spread of Covid-19. Cheddar's Hena Doba is joined by Yale University Professor and lead on the study, Walter Gilliam, and Child Care Aware of America CEO Lynette Fraga.

Watch the interview.

SiriusXM, Press Pool with Julie Mason

Lynette M. Fraga, Ph.D., CEO of Child Care Aware of America, discusses the Yale study and the heroic efforts of child care providers to prevent the spread of COVID-19.

Listen to the interview.

Wall Street Journal

Children in daycare programs present virtually no risk of transmitting Covid-19 to adults, according to a new Yale University study of more than 57,000 U.S. child-care providers. 

The study, believed to be the largest of its kind, indicated that keeping child-care centers open doesn’t contribute to transmission of the disease caused by the new coronavirus, as long as they hew to sanitary guidelines like hand washing, small group sizes and staff wearing face coverings. 

The research has broad implications for the U.S. economy, parents who depend on daycare centers and child-care workers. More than a third of child-care centers in the country closed between March and July, according to Child Care Aware, an advocacy group. 

Read more.

People.com