Ensuring the early learning and development of our country’s youngest children is essential to Child Care Services Association’s (CCSA) work at the local, state and national level. Supporting the well-being of these young children and their families is an urgent task and one that is critical to improving the long-term educational outcomes of children nationwide.
Access to high-quality child care is key for working parents. It also helps support healthy child development, which is important for all children, but of critical importance to young children in families experiencing homelessness.
Families with jobs and secure housing access child care through our country’s Child Care Resource & Referral network, friends and family and the internet. Without child care, families experiencing homelessness struggle to secure housing. And yet, for these families, accessing child care offers two important benefits—the chance to be able to participate in job training, education and other programs essential to resolving their homelessness and the opportunity to have a safe setting for children to grow.
CCSA reviewed the FY2022-2024 Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) State Plans to examine policies and strategies across states to better support the needs of families with young children experiencing homelessness.
This review of the FY2022-2024 State Plans around homelessness services can be found here.
Has your state made progress in this area since the FY2019-2021 State Plans?
View other resources for early childhood homelessness on CCSA’s website.
