Home-based Child Care

An Equity-Rooted Early Childhood Model

The pandemic accelerated many parents’ desire for alternatives to center-based child care while also underscoring the need for care that is flexible, conducive to nontraditional work hours, and culturally competent. As noted by Phase I Family Prosperity Partner Gina Adams, home-based care provides trusted spaces for many Indigenous families and families with low incomes in the US. It also represents a vital opportunity to increase equity among communities of color and provide important economic development for women-owned child care providers.

Within Family Prosperity, All Our Kin has developed a data-driven model for training, supporting, and sustaining family child care educators — home-based providers, most of whom are women of color and most likely to care for children aged 0 to 3. Drawing on lessons from partners, including Partnership for Community Action, NAEYC, and All Our Kin, Ascend recognizes an opportunity for the field to examine and accelerate home-based child care options as a key early childhood support and a lever for economic development and employment.

Paid Leave

Advancing adoption and implementation of state level paid leave programs

Recent efforts to enact a federal paid family and medical leave program (PFML) has notably shifted from a national campaign to state-level legislative opportunities, including stronger implementation of existing PFML programs. As noted by Family Prosperity Partners, 10 states, including Minnesota, New Mexico, Maine, and Pennsylvania, are primed to do this.

Ascend believes there is an opportunity for advocates, researchers, and practitioners to maximize the momentum of state PFML by convening and accelerating the leaders in states that are enacting their own paid leave bills in the absence of a federal effort. In Phase II, key partners and advisors on this issue included the American Enterprise Institute, Family Values @ Work, the National Partnership for Women and Families, Legal Aid at Work, and Family Prosperity Advisor Vicki Shabo, senior fellow at New America.

Employer Partnerships

Redesigning approaches to employee wellness and retention

A lesson from Phase I and II is the importance of employer leadership, awareness, and practice changes to support employees with low incomes who are caregiving or parenting. The sectors representing the highest numbers of low-wage workers include hospitality, service, retail, and manufacturing. In rural communities, the most common employers of lower-wage workers are school districts, hospitals or health systems, and Walmart — as noted in the Ascend Network composition and feedback (nearly 500 partners in all 50 states, DC, and Puerto Rico).

There is a clear need for intermediary organizations — community-based organizations, health providers, and advocacy groups, among others — to foster stronger partnerships among employers and those who can support employer policy and practice shifts to improve outcomes for families. There is an opportunity to draw from the lessons and insights of Family Prosperity Partners CrossPurpose, Partner4Work, and Baystate Health and develop a strategic communications plan to amplify employer partnership practices and models.