Marin Voice: With Week of the Young Child, county applies a needed focus

Monday kicks off the annual Week of the Young Child. This year, the Marin County Child Care Commission, in collaboration with Marin Child Care Council and First 5 Marin, celebrates our child care providers and highlights the needs of young children and their families in Marin county.

We would like to share a special thank you with Stephanie Moulton-Peters and Eric Lucan of the Marin County Board of Supervisors for declaring it the Week of the Young Child in Marin. With the supervisors’ support, Marin joins in celebrations that are happening nationwide.

The Week of the Young Child is part of a national campaign to celebrate the beautiful, complex and often overlooked collaboration between early childhood educators and the children in their care.

In Marin, we are fortunate to have a huge variety of programs and approaches for children – from birth through school age. The bracket for children under 8 years old has seen an increased amount of attention in recent years, due to both the incredible research supporting the work of high quality early childhood programs and the national dialogue on the accessibility and affordability of child care.

The celebration of the Week of The Young Child goes back to 1971, when the National Association for the Education of Young Children first drew attention to the needs of families and young children, as well as the influence that high-quality early learning can have on the rest of their lives.

“The Week of the Young Child is a time to recognize that children’s opportunities are our responsibilities,” NAEYC recently announced. “And to recommit ourselves to ensuring that each and every child experiences the type of early environment — at home, at child care, at school, and in the community — that will promote their early learning.”

It’s time to celebrate child care providers and the joyful work they do every day to improve the lives, both present and future, of our families and youngest children.

In the last year, Marin has increased the number of subsidized child care spaces and, with the rest of California, expanded its transitional kindergarten program to offer an additional option for group experiences for 4-year-old children, available through the public school system. These are the beginnings of huge victories for all residents who understand the benefit of early childhood education for children and the support it gives their families.

As we look to our neighbors in the Bay Area, we see an encouraging trend of investments in early childhood education funding both child care slots and fair compensation for early educators. In Marin County, the Child Care Commission is working closely with the Child Care Council to collect data on the state of child care providers in the county that will be used to inform countywide efforts in the years to come.

The Child Care Commission has also received a universal prekindergarten mixed delivery planning grant. This grant will bring together stakeholders from across Marin to develop a plan for a system that incorporates child care centers, transitional kindergarten and family child care providers. More information on applying for the work group and meeting dates will be available soon.

As we celebrate these exciting opportunities for Marin County, join us in daily activities and advocacy for the Week of the Young Child. Each day has a theme and the Marin Child Care Council has put together an activity and advocacy resource for each day: Music Monday, Tasty Tuesday, Work Together Wednesday, Artsy Thursday and Family Friday. You can find these resources on our Facebook page and our new website. Take a look at bit.ly/3lQ3Q2T.

Leah Catching is coordinator for the Marin County Child Care Commission, the local planning council dedicated to supporting child care in the county. Lizz Nolasco is a local preschool program director and member of commission.