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Category: Blog

What Does Recognition and Respect for Family Child Care Providers Really Mean?

Family child care providers value licensing systems because of how these systems provide accountability and incentivize quaity care, while recognizing them as child care professionals. What providers want is simple — inclusion and representation in the decision-making bodies that regulate their work. In this blog, FCC providers share why they value and respect licensing systems and how that respect can be reciprocated through better representation of providers in those systems. Read the blog post here.

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Student Loan Debt is a Critical Factor in the Early Educator Compensation Crisis 

Home-based providers earn the lowest wages in the child care system, with many making just $10,000 per year, while continuing to serve underserved families. Despite their essential role, they are often left out of policy discussions and loan forgiveness programs, contributing to ongoing financial strain. This new fact sheet sheds light on the earning challenges for family child care providers.

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Home-based Child Care Providers Share Reflections on Their Hispanic Heritage

In the United States, immigrant stories can start differently but eventually resemble each other. Leticia Barcenas and Claudia Valentín live in diagonally opposite corners of the country—Portland, Oregon, and New Orleans, Louisiana, respectively—they come from different countries—Mexico and Honduras—and began their American Dream with different plans—Leticia wanted to work to make money and support her family; Claudia looked for ways to educate young people in the diaspora—but they eventually discovered that their destiny was inevitably tied to the success of child care in their communities.

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Home Grown’s Statement on the Council of Economic Advisers Brief : Child Care Is Infrastructure —Evidence from Universal Pre-K

Home Grown celebrates the new Council of Economic Advisers brief, Child Care Is Infrastructure: Evidence from Universal Pre-K. For over 3 years we have invested in co-funding research that highlights the importance of including Family Child Care (FCC) in public pre-K systems and are excited to be working with NIEER this fall to support a cohort of public pre-K systems with targeted TA and evidence-based tools to modify their pre-K systems to include FCC.

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A Love Letter to FFN Caregivers

From presidential candidate Kamala Harris to Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren, many leaders credit home-based child care providers with raising them up and saving their careers. In celebration of FFN Appreciation Week, we spoke with three distinguished leaders in the child care sector to hear how their experiences with FFN care shaped who they are today.

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Caring for Kids and Empowering Communities: Grandmothers Make the World a Better Place

Deborah Young, a grandmother from Boulder, Colorado, has spent decades caring for children and empowering communities. Through her experience as a single mother and educator, she has supported immigrant and refugee women, helping them turn caregiving into sustainable businesses. Her community-driven approach focuses on connection, trust, and collective wisdom to nurture both children and communities. Young’s lifelong mission exemplifies the power of home-based child care in transforming lives.

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Announcing the Enriching Public Pre-K Through Inclusion of Family Child Care (EPIC FCC) initiative

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. Learn more and apply.

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