EARLY LEARNING
Our Work
The first five years of a child’s life sets the foundation for their future well-being and success. When children participate in early learning and child care programs, they demonstrate academic success, greater social-emotional health, and economic prosperity later in their lives.
Children’s Alliance works to advance early learning programs and policies that increase access and affordability for families and provide our kids with what they need to thrive.
See our 2024 legislative agenda to learn about our early learning policy priorities in the upcoming legislative session.
Expanding High-Quality Early Learning
Building on the success of the Fair Start for Kids Act, which Children’s Alliance helped to pass in 2021, we continue to advocate for policies that expand access to high-quality early learning. A crucial aspect of this is to ensure that the child care workforce is fairly compensated.
Currently, earnings for early learning educators rank in the lowest 3% of all professions in our state, while engaged in work that is arguably the most impactful to our long term future. We must ensure that these educators are paid a wage that reflects the true value of their critical work. In doing so, we can retain and grow the workforce, and particularly invest in women of color, whose skills and expertise are heavily relied upon in the early learning sector.
Making Child Care More Affordable
Washington ranks in the top ten most expensive states for infant care, with annual costs higher than that of in-state college tuition. This is simply out of reach for many families and is reflected in recent data that shows 67% of families in our state do not have access to the child care they need. By investing in programs like Working Connections Child Care, lawmakers can help families — particularly those with low and middle incomes or experiencing homelessness — pay for child care. This will enable more Washingtonians to go to work and generate income to provide for their loved ones and contribute to the economy.
Early Learning Action Alliance
We don’t do this work alone. Children’s Alliance convenes the Early Learning Action Alliance (ELAA), a broad coalition of organizations representing a diverse array of Washington nonprofits, professional associations, businesses, and industries. Working together, we are able to amplify our voices and use our collective power to advance policies that positively impact Washington kids.