As state officials work to help parents afford child care expenses, an education advocacy group argues the state’s approach is underfunded.
The state’s Purchase of Care program provides subsidies for low-income parents to help afford child care. The education non-profit Rodel, in a study released last week, says even though the new model based on the cost of care is more equitable, the state needs to spend more money to provide quality, or even basic, care.
According to the study, the state needs to boost its investment by up to 87% to fund basic child care under the model. To provide what the group characterizes as quality care, meaning better-qualified teachers and smaller class sizes, the state would need to spend as much as 143% more, depending on the age group.
Julie Bieber is the Director of Operations at Wilmington’s Kingswood Community Center.
“So if I want to run a quality of care program - $22,000 for a pre-K kid and I'm getting $11,000 from the state, so about half," she said.
Beiber explained that quality care means, "a program that follows Head Start standards, which means lower class sizes, a program that adds in money for professional development, a program that pays teachers closer to what a public school would pay teachers, so not minimum wage - significantly above," she said.
The state has generally determined subsidy rates based on the market value of child care, surveying providers across the state. The state then reimburses providers at 75% of that market rate. The new model being assessed would instead look at the actual cost to provide child care, a figure Rodel says is going to be higher.
