Home Grown is now accepting applications for the inaugural cohort of the Enriching Public Pre-K Through Inclusion of Family Child Care (EPIC FCC) initiative, facilitated by the National Institute of Early Education Research. The EPIC FCC initiative seeks to support state, city, county and tribal government leaders in expanding the participation of family child care (FCC) educators in their pre-K systems or engaging FCC educators in these pre-K systems for the first time. Home Grown is committed to ensuring that home-based child care providers can fully participate in well-resourced early childhood initiatives, including pre-K. To do this, we recognize that systems need to look and behave differently to appropriately include home-based child care providers and the families they serve.
Government partners participating in the Home Grown initiative are eligible for:
- Flexible planning grants of $25,000 to support implementation planning.
- Support of an expert Planning Navigator with experience in administration of early childhood systems from the National Institute on Early Education Research.
- Learning Community with fellow states and local government agencies on topics including:
- Program design and pre-K program standards
- Pre-K supports
- Equitable financing
- State/local public sector oversight and governance
- Access to guidance documents and resources, including implementation plans, compendium of programs and toolkit, and more.
Upon successful completion of the planning period, there may be an opportunity to apply for additional implementation funds.
The deadline to submit an application is Wednesday, August 21, 2024 at 4:00pm EST.
To learn more, please register for our upcoming information session on Wednesday, July 31st, 12:00pm-1:00 pm EST. This session will help government agencies and partners assess whether this initiative is a fit for them and to determine if they wish to apply and participate. Click here to register to attend.
