HARRISBURG, PA (July 11, 2024) – Today, the principal partners of the Pre-K for PA and Start Strong PA Campaigns issued the following statements regarding Senate Bill 1001 that awaits the expected signature of Governor Shapiro to become the enacted 2024-25 Pennsylvania state budget. 

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HARRISBURG, PA (February 6, 2024) - Today, the principal partners of Early Learning Pennsylvania (ELPA), a statewide coalition of advocates focused on supporting young Pennsylvanians from birth to age five, issued the following statements regarding Governor Josh Shapiro’s 2024-25 state budget proposal. ELPA operates four issue-based advocacy campaigns: Pre-K for PA, Start Strong PA, Childhood Begins at Home, and Thriving PA.

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HARRISBURG (January 2024) – A recent survey conducted by The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s Policy Lab on behalf of Start Strong PA demonstrates Pennsylvania’s ongoing child care crisis continues to threaten parents’ ability to work and the overall economy.  The survey, conducted between August 29, 2023 and September 21, 2023, details the child care staffing crisis in 762 of Pennsylvania’s child care programs and its effects on working families' ability to access care.

According to the survey:

●        Nearly 26,000 additional children could be served at child care programs’ sites if they were fully staffed.

●        Programs reported 2,395 open positions resulting in the closure of 934 classrooms.

●        Child care providers’ inability to recruit and retain staff is having a direct impact on the quality of their programming.

This historic shortage of child care workers is dramatically reducing the availability of care options for working families, and these incredible numbers are only those reported by a fraction of the total number of child care programs in the state.

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By Eric Scicchitano
The Tribune-Democrat

Advocates say that it’s not a cliff awaiting Pennsylvania’s child care providers when a federal financial relief program expires on Saturday.

Rather, they say, what lies ahead is the continued erosion of an industry already beset by low pay, an unstable labor pool and an inability to meet public demand.

“In the last two weeks, I know about five programs that are closing. It’s all about staffing. They can’t find staff,” said Diane Barber, executive director of the Pennsylvania Child Care Association. “It’s more about attrition than it is about sudden closure.”

By Megan Tomasic
The Pittsburgh Post Gazette

Shannon Veltre knew something had to change as she watched the staff members at her early learning center scurry around the facility over the past few years, anxious to ensure that each child was cared for. 

Staffing shortages caused timecards at the Forest Hills facility to reflect hours of overtime, hinting at the burnout staff were facing. New families hoping to grab a spot in the program were turned away because of a lack of workers while children already enrolled were shuffled around the facility to guarantee they received necessary services and attention. 

Alison McCook
The Philadelphia Inquirer

This week, we will reach the edge of the so-called childcare cliff, when the pandemic-driven infusion of federal funds to save the childcare industry runs out. An estimated one in three childcare programs in the country — or 70,000 — may have to close their doors.

In Pennsylvania alone, nearly 3,000 programs are set to shut down, leaving 150,000 kids with nowhere to go. For many families, this may not be a big deal — they make a few calls, find another nearby place that has space for a new child, and after an adjustment period, everyone settles in to a new routine.

By Sarah Mueller
Lehigh Valley News.com

BETHLEHEM, Pa. — Affordable child care could become further out of reach for more Lehigh Valley families if federal funding for day care centers and preschools expires at the end of the month.
Nearly $24 billion in pandemic dollars earmarked for day care centers and preschools nationwide will end on Sept. 30 unless Congress extends it.

Congresswoman Susan Wild said she is pushing for $16 million in additional federal funding over the next five years to help shore up day care centers and preschools in the Lehigh Valley and nationwide through the Child Care Stabilization Act, introduced this week. Wild is a co-sponsor of the measure.

The Editorial Board
The Philadelphia Inquirer

Without federal action, three million children in America could abruptly lose access to childcare at the end of the month, a development that could push many parents — including, experts say, a disproportionate number of women — out of the workforce.

Roughly $37 billion in pandemic-era stabilization grants — which have ensured financial access to childcare for families — will lapse on Sept. 30, leaving families with no guarantee of continued care.

MyChesCo

Principal partners of Early Learning Pennsylvania (ELPA) express disappointment over the failure to expand state-funded pre-K programs and address the child care crisis in the 2023-24 Pennsylvania state budget. They emphasize the importance of investing in early learning opportunities and stabilizing the child care workforce. Although there are increases in funding for early intervention programs and maternal health, ELPA is urging the Shapiro Administration to prioritize access and support for Pennsylvania’s youngest learners.

PA Senate Passes Budget with NO Funding to Address Early Learning Workforce Shortage

HARRISBURG, PA (June 30, 2023) — Today the Pennsylvania Senate passed its version of the state budget that fails to address the historic early learning workforce shortage. No new money was included for PA Pre-K Counts, Head Start Supplemental Assistance Program or efforts to stabilize the child care workforce. This means early learning providers will continue to lose teachers and close classrooms jeopardizing families’ ability to work.

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By Steven Laura
The Reading Eagle

My family has owned and managed The White House Day Care Center in Reading since our first location opened in 2006. Today we have two locations and Sen. Judy Schwank recently visited one to see the work we are doing with the United Way of Berks County.

I want to acknowledge the senator for all the work she has done for child care centers in Pennsylvania. During her visit, her kind words and clear enthusiasm for the job we are doing boosted morale, empowered our staff and gave us reassurance that we are doing the job right.

By Freda R. Savana
Bucks County Herald

Across Pennsylvania, early childhood educators are leaving the low-paying, high stress profession, causing a severe staffing shortage and long waiting lists for the quality childcare programs that remain open, according to several nonprofits studying the worrying trend and its economic cost.

Children First, joined Start Strong PA and the YMCA of Bucks and Hunterdon Counties in a recent presentation outlining the depth of the crisis and calling for action. All the nonprofits share a focus on improving the lives of children in the state.

By Colin Deppen & Tanisha Thomas
Spotlight PA

Child care costs are eating up a growing share of household incomes in Pennsylvania, Axios reports, leading some parents to exit the workforce.

A report from the Annie E. Casey Foundation released this week says the average cost of center-based daycare in Pennsylvania was $11,346 in 2020-2021, amounting to 10% of a married couple's median income and 35% of the median income for single parents. Experts say single working women, families of color, and immigrants are disproportionately impacted.

Eva Wood - Ligonier; Erin Schellenberger - Latrobe
Trib Review

The child care staffing crisis, caused by the sector’s low wages, is rapidly diminishing working families’ access to child care. Unfortunately, programs all across Pennsylvania are closing classrooms and further limiting families’ options as they look for a safe, high-quality learning environment for their child while they work.

Across Pennsylvania there are thousands of families sitting on waiting lists. This impacts the workforce in every other Pennsylvania industry. Child care teachers are the workforce behind the workforce, and we are failing them.

By Dan DeBone
The Philadelphia Citizen

Any family will tell you that balancing work and parenting is challenging in the best of times. With the parents of most young children in Pennsylvania working, child care is critical to supporting the Commonwealth’s labor force and employers.

When parents don’t get the help they need, it diminishes their work commitments, performance, and opportunities — costing Pennsylvania’s economy. This effect is the focus of a new study from the nonprofit ReadyNation and the Pennsylvania Early Learning Investment Commission. According to the study, gaps in Pennsylvania’s child care system are costing families, employers, and taxpayers about $6.65 billion annually in lost earnings, productivity, and tax revenue.

By Tom Waring
Northeast Times

In Philadelphia, early childhood education teachers make an average of $14.37 an hour on average. That pay doesn’t come close to matching the cost of living and the high cost of food, utilities, housing and insurance. Many early childhood educators are forced to sign up for food stamps and Medicaid. Others take jobs with better pay and benefits in fields outside education.

Providers in the city have more than 600 open positions, which, if filled, would get 2,800 children off waiting lists and into classrooms and their parents back to work.

The Sharon Herald

ALONG with being first lady, Jill Biden is also a teacher, and she once observed, “Teaching is not a job. It’s a lifestyle. It permeates your whole life.”

And it seems to be a lifestyle fewer and fewer young people are willing to adopt.

The United States is in the midst of a teacher shortage, and in Pennsylvania the situation has been described as “dire and worsening.”

There has been a 67% drop in the number of new educators who have become certified over the last decade, and in the 2020-21 school year the number of emergency permits issued to individuals to take teaching jobs exceeded the number of new teaching certifications from in-state programs.

HARRISBURG, PA (March 7, 2023) – Today, the principal partners of Early Learning Pennsylvania (ELPA), a statewide coalition of advocates focused on supporting young Pennsylvanians from birth to age five, issued the following statements regarding Governor Josh Shapiro’s 2023-24 state budget proposal. ELPA operates four issue-based advocacy campaigns: Start Strong PA, Pre-K for PA, Childhood Begins at Home and Thriving PA. 

Budget Proposal “Maintains” Child Care System in Crisis

“Governor Shapiro correctly emphasized the importance of high-quality child care for working families and the need to boost child care wages to get “more teachers and professionals on the job,” and eliminate growing wait lists. Unfortunately, the Administration's $66.7 million proposal merely maintains a system already in crisis.”

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By Brenda Castellano
Reading Eagle

It’s tough for smaller child care businesses such as mine to pay staff what larger organizations are paying. Trying to compete with these organizations hurts the centers and owners, and we make sacrifices. This is why we are advocating for our legislators to invest in our industry like they do in the agricultural and energy sectors.

By John L. Micek
Pennsylvania Capital-Star

With Gov. Josh Shapiro’s first budget address now less than a week away, a new poll underlines the staffing shortage facing Pennsylvania’s child care providers and, advocates say, the need for policymakers to step up to help them.

Eighty-five percent of provider respondents to the poll commissioned by the advocacy groups Start Strong PA and Pre-K for PA said they face staffing shortages, while 50 percent said they’ve shuttered at least one classroom in response to the staffing gap.

In the meantime, providers need to fill nearly 4,000 open staffing positions, with more than 38,000 children statewide now on waiting lists for child care placements, according to the poll.