early childhood education and careearly childhood education and care
California Advocates Want Newsom to Fulfill Promise to Fund Childcare Spaces
As Transitional Kindergarten Grows, Hundreds of Child Care Centers Close
Struggling Bay Area Schools Get New Life as Badly Needed Child Care Centers
Bay Area Nature Camp Wins Key Approval for New Home After Fighting ‘Bureaucracy and NIMBYism’
When Child Care Costs Half a Paycheck, Bay Area Parents Must Choose: Kids or Career
San Francisco Kids With Special Needs Get Delayed and Unequal Access to Services
California Invested Big in Transitional Kindergarten. How 1 School Is Making the Most of It
Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee Champions Free Diaper Campaign With an Early Learning Message
Lack of Approved Child Care Providers May Slow Rollout of San Francisco’s Expanded Subsidies
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"content": "\u003cp>On the ground floor of a new affordable housing complex in Redwood City, workers are in the middle of constructing a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/early-childhood-education-and-care\">childcare\u003c/a> center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Peninsula Family Service plans to enroll 36 infants and toddlers when the center is scheduled to open next year, using state funds awarded to the nonprofit to provide free or low-cost childcare to income-eligible families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the fate of that plan will depend on state budget negotiations over the next several weeks.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Earlier this year, Gov. Gavin Newsom proposed cutting funding for about 4,200 subsidized childcare spaces — money Peninsula Family Service will need to run the new center. The move would save $98 million, but advocates say it would roll back a pledge he made to expand access to childcare for working families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Newsom really championed and campaigned on being the early learning and care governor, and I think that there are many promises he made as part of that that have not been fulfilled,” said Nina Buthee, executive director of EveryChild California, which advocates for publicly funded childcare programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Newsom presented his spending plan for the next fiscal year in January, the state projected a nearly $3 billion shortfall. The Legislative Analyst’s Office \u003ca href=\"https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5168\">recommended\u003c/a> cutting funding for “general childcare” spaces because they hadn’t been spent yet and therefore won’t affect families currently receiving subsidized childcare.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12070630\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12070630\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260116-NewsomLuriePresser-32-BL_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260116-NewsomLuriePresser-32-BL_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260116-NewsomLuriePresser-32-BL_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260116-NewsomLuriePresser-32-BL_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during a press conference at the Friendship House Association of American Indians in San Francisco on Jan. 16, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But Buthee said at least 16 childcare providers across California haven’t spent the money because they’re still in the process of building or renovating facilities, but meeting state licensing standards and getting approval, especially for the care of infants and toddlers, takes time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Depending on where you are in California, licensing could take anywhere from a couple of weeks to up to six months or nine months,” she said. “Really, the state is not helping contractors expedite the process.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the affected contractors include Children’s Paradise, a childcare provider in San Diego County, which planned to open two locations in childcare “deserts” — areas where options are too few to meet the demand. The locations would have been large enough to serve 470 children, according to EveryChild California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Peninsula Family Service was awarded $2.7 million to serve nearly 80 children at two new centers, said its CEO, Heather Cleary. If funding from the state goes away, she said, the agency might have to consider charging private tuition.[aside postID=news_12082904 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05214-KQED.jpg']“That’s not our intent. We really want to do everything we can to bring a subsidized program to this county, and that involves the state,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Subsidized childcare slots were not mentioned in the proposed 2026-2027 state budget, known as the “May Revision,” Newsom released on Thursday. He said the plan would balance California’s budget for the next two years, long after he leaves office. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“We’re not going to walk away from this state and put the next Legislature and the next governor in a difficult spot,” he said. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Newsom’s updated plan will set off a busy period of negotiations leading to a final budget that the Legislature must pass by June 15. State Senate leaders have indicated they would not only reject cutting child care slots, but that they’d rather \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://democrats.senate.ca.gov/sites/democrats.senate.ca.gov/files/iu/FINAL-FFTF-Budget.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">increase\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> funding to subsidize 44,000 spaces. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2021, Newsom pledged to add more than 200,000 subsidized childcare slots, both in contracted centers and in the form of vouchers for low-income families. His administration has funded 130,000 of those slots while making other huge investments in early childhood education and care, like \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12082904/as-transitional-kindergarten-grows-hundreds-of-child-care-centers-close\">expanding access to transitional kindergarten\u003c/a> for all 4-year-old children and allowing in-home childcare providers who receive the subsidies to unionize. The move has led to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12051737/child-care-union-strikes-deal-to-preserve-benefits-bump-up-pay\">healthcare and retirement funds \u003c/a>for a workforce that has historically been underpaid, and the state is slowly working toward improving their wages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve had the most significant childcare expansion subsidies in the United States. Should be better known. It’s not,” Newsom told MSN in a January interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 2019 and 2024, enrollment in subsidized childcare programs grew by 63%, according to an analysis by the \u003ca href=\"https://calbudgetcenter.org/app/uploads/2026/04/2026-Child-Care-Chart-Book-Designed.pdf\">California Budget & Policy Center\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081820\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12081820 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-23-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-23-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-23-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-23-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Teacher Brianda Casillas works with children in a classroom at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo, on April 28, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Laura Pryor, a research director at the center, said while the Newsom administration deserves credit for making unprecedented investments in early childhood education, it has fallen short in some areas — like the slots.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She estimates that about 1.77 million children qualify for subsidized childcare, but are not enrolled in these programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For every individual that gets access to a space, it’s thousands and thousands of dollars saved that expands their budget,” Pryor said. “If our goal is to fund all children that are eligible, we are moving in the right direction.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If there’s this additional cut, we’re not only walking back on the progress, but walking back on this positive trend that we’ve been seeing in the past several years,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Newsom really championed and campaigned on being the early learning and care governor, and I think that there are many promises he made as part of that that have not been fulfilled,” said Nina Buthee, executive director of EveryChild California, which advocates for publicly funded childcare programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When Newsom presented his spending plan for the next fiscal year in January, the state projected a nearly $3 billion shortfall. The Legislative Analyst’s Office \u003ca href=\"https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/5168\">recommended\u003c/a> cutting funding for “general childcare” spaces because they hadn’t been spent yet and therefore won’t affect families currently receiving subsidized childcare.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12070630\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12070630\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260116-NewsomLuriePresser-32-BL_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260116-NewsomLuriePresser-32-BL_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260116-NewsomLuriePresser-32-BL_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260116-NewsomLuriePresser-32-BL_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks during a press conference at the Friendship House Association of American Indians in San Francisco on Jan. 16, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>But Buthee said at least 16 childcare providers across California haven’t spent the money because they’re still in the process of building or renovating facilities, but meeting state licensing standards and getting approval, especially for the care of infants and toddlers, takes time.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Depending on where you are in California, licensing could take anywhere from a couple of weeks to up to six months or nine months,” she said. “Really, the state is not helping contractors expedite the process.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some of the affected contractors include Children’s Paradise, a childcare provider in San Diego County, which planned to open two locations in childcare “deserts” — areas where options are too few to meet the demand. The locations would have been large enough to serve 470 children, according to EveryChild California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Peninsula Family Service was awarded $2.7 million to serve nearly 80 children at two new centers, said its CEO, Heather Cleary. If funding from the state goes away, she said, the agency might have to consider charging private tuition.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“That’s not our intent. We really want to do everything we can to bring a subsidized program to this county, and that involves the state,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> Subsidized childcare slots were not mentioned in the proposed 2026-2027 state budget, known as the “May Revision,” Newsom released on Thursday. He said the plan would balance California’s budget for the next two years, long after he leaves office. \u003c/span>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">“We’re not going to walk away from this state and put the next Legislature and the next governor in a difficult spot,” he said. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">Newsom’s updated plan will set off a busy period of negotiations leading to a final budget that the Legislature must pass by June 15. State Senate leaders have indicated they would not only reject cutting child care slots, but that they’d rather \u003c/span>\u003ca href=\"https://democrats.senate.ca.gov/sites/democrats.senate.ca.gov/files/iu/FINAL-FFTF-Budget.pdf\">\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\">increase\u003c/span>\u003c/a>\u003cspan style=\"font-weight: 400\"> funding to subsidize 44,000 spaces. \u003c/span>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In 2021, Newsom pledged to add more than 200,000 subsidized childcare slots, both in contracted centers and in the form of vouchers for low-income families. His administration has funded 130,000 of those slots while making other huge investments in early childhood education and care, like \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12082904/as-transitional-kindergarten-grows-hundreds-of-child-care-centers-close\">expanding access to transitional kindergarten\u003c/a> for all 4-year-old children and allowing in-home childcare providers who receive the subsidies to unionize. The move has led to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12051737/child-care-union-strikes-deal-to-preserve-benefits-bump-up-pay\">healthcare and retirement funds \u003c/a>for a workforce that has historically been underpaid, and the state is slowly working toward improving their wages.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve had the most significant childcare expansion subsidies in the United States. Should be better known. It’s not,” Newsom told MSN in a January interview.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 2019 and 2024, enrollment in subsidized childcare programs grew by 63%, according to an analysis by the \u003ca href=\"https://calbudgetcenter.org/app/uploads/2026/04/2026-Child-Care-Chart-Book-Designed.pdf\">California Budget & Policy Center\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081820\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12081820 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-23-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-23-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-23-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-23-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Teacher Brianda Casillas works with children in a classroom at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo, on April 28, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Laura Pryor, a research director at the center, said while the Newsom administration deserves credit for making unprecedented investments in early childhood education, it has fallen short in some areas — like the slots.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She estimates that about 1.77 million children qualify for subsidized childcare, but are not enrolled in these programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For every individual that gets access to a space, it’s thousands and thousands of dollars saved that expands their budget,” Pryor said. “If our goal is to fund all children that are eligible, we are moving in the right direction.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If there’s this additional cut, we’re not only walking back on the progress, but walking back on this positive trend that we’ve been seeing in the past several years,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"title": "As Transitional Kindergarten Grows, Hundreds of Child Care Centers Close",
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"content": "\u003cp>As public school enrollment \u003ca href=\"https://edsource.org/2026/declining-school-enrollment-california/756174\">continues\u003c/a> to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12041122/california-public-school-enrollment-continues-post-pandemic-decline\">decline across California\u003c/a>, a remarkable thing is happening in districts: More \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12052609/as-transitional-kindergarten-opens-to-all-4-year-olds-sf-parents-compete-for-seats\">students are entering\u003c/a> transitional kindergarten. But that growth has come at a cost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Community-based preschools across the state have struggled to compete with free TK, and many have shuttered — worsening the shortage of licensed child care spaces for children younger than 4 years old.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 2019 and 2025, around 1,100 preschools have closed their doors across California, representing just under 10% of the total, according to research published Monday by UC Berkeley’s Equity and Excellence in Early Childhood. They were licensed to serve around 32,000 young children, and experts say their closures will likely increase prices in a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12075761/when-child-care-costs-half-a-paycheck-bay-area-parents-must-choose-kids-or-career\">state where the average annual cost of infant care surpasses $20,000\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These centers are not coming back. We’re going to lose these places forever,” said Bruce Fuller, an education professor at UC Berkeley and co-author of the report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The closures were not what policymakers had in mind in 2021, when they decided to implement a four-year, multibillion-dollar plan to roll out the largest universal pre-kindergarten program in the nation. Enrollment grew from nearly 117,000 students in the 2022-23 school year to 213,000 students this year. State leaders had hoped the move would free up space in preschools for 3-year-olds and that centers would pivot to caring for more infants and toddlers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state is making progress, \u003ca href=\"https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/ca-universal-prek-expansion-enroll-brief\">though at a slower pace than TK\u003c/a>, in enrolling 3-year-olds into the California State Preschool Program, a subsidized program that can either be provided by school districts or community-based organizations for \u003ca href=\"https://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/cd/ci/mb2603.asp\">income-eligible families\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Fuller said fewer than one-third of 3-year-olds are enrolled in preschool of any kind, and he’s worried about their shrinking access to early education. Research shows that \u003ca href=\"https://nieer.org/research-library/new-jersey-abbott-preschool-program-longitudinal-effects-study-through-grade-10\">two years of high-quality preschool\u003c/a> is especially beneficial to children from low-income households.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12083046\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12083046 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05194-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05194-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05194-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05194-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Heather Posner (center), executive director of Carquinez Garden School, does arts and crafts with children in the school yard of Carquinez Garden School in Crockett on May 8, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Assemblymember Corey Jackson, a Democrat from Riverside County who chairs a state subcommittee on human services, said legislators are aware that TK pulled children from community-based programs and are trying to address the issue as they negotiate next year’s state budget.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have to recognize and learn from the lessons of the pandemic,” he said. “There may come a time where we might have to close our schools down again, so what happens when we have decimated our community infrastructure, when we still may need places for our children to go safely?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Community-based preschools \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11893791/why-californias-universal-transitional-kindergarten-plan-poses-a-threat-to-some-early-childhood-ed-providers\">had long warned they might not be able to survive financially\u003c/a> if they lose 4-year-olds to TK. Their business models are shaped by laws that mandate a ratio of one teacher for every four infants or toddlers, and one teacher for every dozen 4-year-olds. Tuition from the older children helps offset the more expensive care of children under 2.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A similar scenario bore out more than a dozen years ago in New York City, when it provided free preschool for 4-year-olds in a “mixed delivery system” that included public schools, private or community-based preschools. Many providers shifted to serving the older kids for the stable income it provided and \u003ca href=\"https://ideas.repec.org/p/pri/indrel/626.html\">cut back on infant and toddler care\u003c/a>.[aside postID=news_12070762 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/240911-CHILDCARE-REAX-MD-01_qed.jpg']“We have seen such large benefits of public pre-K that I think it should be a good investment, but you want to be aware of the unintended consequences on the ability to find care for those younger kids, and trying to make sure that the market can still sustain that and that it’s affordable for parents,” said Jessica H. Brown, an economist at the University of South Carolina who studied the impact of New York’s “Pre-K For All” initiative.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In California, community-based preschools or child care centers must reconfigure classrooms and meet higher fire safety standards, for example, to serve children younger than 2 years old. These \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12017819/huge-lack-of-communication-how-a-building-code-update-disrupted-child-care-centers-in-california\">regulatory and financial hurdles\u003c/a> often hinder their ability to shift to infant care, or even shift to providing after-school care, because the cost of transportation and insurance is often prohibitively expensive, said Erin Freschi, director of resource and referral at CoCo Kids, an agency that connects families to child care providers in Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of the response has been, ‘Oh, just serve infants and toddlers or just do after-school care,’ and it’s not that easy,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers at UC Berkeley found that community-based preschools most vulnerable to closure were based in churches, were small programs serving 30 to 50 children, or ones that relied on state and federal funds to provide subsidized care to lower-income families. Only about 15% made the transition lawmakers had initially envisioned and switched to serving infants and toddlers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We had expected that a lot of the closures were tuition-charging places in middle or upper middle-class communities, and that is true. Three in five of the places that closed were charging tuition, but two in five were actually publicly financed,” Fuller said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12083053\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12083053 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05237-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05237-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05237-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05237-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A class schedule written on a white board at Carquinez Garden School in Crockett on May 8, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Transitional kindergarten isn’t the only contributor to these programs’ demise. The pandemic, followed by rising costs of living, destabilized their operations. Centers that provide subsidized care are competing with increased state funding for vouchers, which allow low-income families to choose between licensed care or unlicensed care at home by a family, friend or neighbor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An analysis by the California Budget & Policy Center found that between 2021 and 2024, families increasingly chose unlicensed care, which grew by 110%.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No single program tells the whole story,” said Patricia Lozano, director of the advocacy group Early Edge California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She suggested giving public funds to help more community-based programs pivot to serving babies and toddlers “to make sure no one is left behind.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As budget negotiations get underway in Sacramento, there’s talk of moving some $120 million in funding from Prop 98, which guarantees a minimum funding level for public schools each year, to support community-based organizations in the California State Preschool Program and permanently fund seats for 2-year-olds in that program.[aside postID=news_12069711 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260115-SFCHILDCARESUBSIDIES00057_TV-KQED.jpg']“We are serious about child care, and we know it’s expensive, but that also means that more and more families need relief, and it’s a part of making California affordable again,” Jackson said. “We have to provide these services in order to be able to make sure families are able to make it here and thrive here in California.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A combination of these forces are playing out in preschools like Carquinez Garden School, the only licensed child care center in Crockett, a Bay Area community of 3,600. The school will close on June 12 after enrollment dwindled from more than 30 children two years ago to just 10 this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve lost essentially a class of kids every year to TK,” said Heather Posner, the school’s director.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said she expected to serve fewer 4-year-olds as TK rolled out, and that more 2-year-olds would take their spots. The preschool was in a so-called \u003ca href=\"https://www.americanprogress.org/feature/child-care-deserts/\">child care desert\u003c/a> with an insufficient supply of licensed care. The monthly cost for full-time care — $1,870 — didn’t seem to deter demand; the school had a waitlist and enrolled families who qualified for subsidies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But it seems like the low birth rate is causing a lot of schools to be underenrolled on both ends,” she said. “You’re not getting a lot of 2-year-olds and then you’re not getting any 4-year-olds … so with 10 kids, there’s just no way to really cover the overhead.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Trying to keep the school open felt like performing CPR on a patient, she said, and she barely broke even.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I basically have not paid myself in two years. Literally, I cannot pay my own salary,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fuller said researchers took California’s declining child population into account when they calculated the effect of TK expansion on thousands of communities. They concluded that for every 200 students who enrolled in public TK, there would be a reduction of 38 seats at community-based programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12083048\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12083048 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05201-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05201-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05201-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05201-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Grace Dare (center) supervises children digging in the dirt of a planter in the school yard of Carquinez Garden School in Crockett on May 8, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In Berkeley, a surge in public TK enrollment during the last four years caused The Berkeley School’s early childhood program to lose more than two-thirds of its students, dropping from 90 to about 25. It will close in July after serving local children for more than six decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a loss for our community, it’s a loss for our school as a whole,” said Mitch Bostian, head of the private school, which serves kids aged 4 to 14 and practices the Montessori philosophy of mixing children of different ages in the classroom so that younger children learn from observing older peers, and older students develop leadership skills by mentoring younger peers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That model unraveled when the local school district added more TK classrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Really what we saw was the bottom dropped out of our 4- and 5-year-olds,” Bostian said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said the school began enrolling younger children, including 2-year-olds, added year-round options and extended its hours to attract working families, but couldn’t bring enrollment up to a sustainable level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12083052\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12083052 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05235-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05235-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05235-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05235-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The interior of a classroom at Carquinez Garden School in Crockett on May 8, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For Posner, the shuttering of Carquinez Garden School represents the loss of a tight-knit community she formed with families. Every Friday, parents hang out in the yard when they come to pick up their children. Once a month, they gather for a potluck.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The school takes advantage of being right next to a regional park and lets children learn through playing outdoors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They’re running, they’re digging, they’re riding bikes, they’re hanging from the climbing structure, they’re being active, they’re using their brains and bodies and they’re with their friends,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Posner fears that when the kids enter TK, they’ll have less time to play outside and develop friendships.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everything’s truncated,” she said. “And I feel the gift that I can give them is just that languishing outside in the sunshine\u003cem>.\u003c/em>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Correction:\u003c/strong> An earlier version of this story misstated the date Carquinez Garden School will close. It is June 12, not July. The story has been updated.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>As public school enrollment \u003ca href=\"https://edsource.org/2026/declining-school-enrollment-california/756174\">continues\u003c/a> to \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12041122/california-public-school-enrollment-continues-post-pandemic-decline\">decline across California\u003c/a>, a remarkable thing is happening in districts: More \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12052609/as-transitional-kindergarten-opens-to-all-4-year-olds-sf-parents-compete-for-seats\">students are entering\u003c/a> transitional kindergarten. But that growth has come at a cost.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Community-based preschools across the state have struggled to compete with free TK, and many have shuttered — worsening the shortage of licensed child care spaces for children younger than 4 years old.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Between 2019 and 2025, around 1,100 preschools have closed their doors across California, representing just under 10% of the total, according to research published Monday by UC Berkeley’s Equity and Excellence in Early Childhood. They were licensed to serve around 32,000 young children, and experts say their closures will likely increase prices in a \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12075761/when-child-care-costs-half-a-paycheck-bay-area-parents-must-choose-kids-or-career\">state where the average annual cost of infant care surpasses $20,000\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“These centers are not coming back. We’re going to lose these places forever,” said Bruce Fuller, an education professor at UC Berkeley and co-author of the report.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The closures were not what policymakers had in mind in 2021, when they decided to implement a four-year, multibillion-dollar plan to roll out the largest universal pre-kindergarten program in the nation. Enrollment grew from nearly 117,000 students in the 2022-23 school year to 213,000 students this year. State leaders had hoped the move would free up space in preschools for 3-year-olds and that centers would pivot to caring for more infants and toddlers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The state is making progress, \u003ca href=\"https://learningpolicyinstitute.org/product/ca-universal-prek-expansion-enroll-brief\">though at a slower pace than TK\u003c/a>, in enrolling 3-year-olds into the California State Preschool Program, a subsidized program that can either be provided by school districts or community-based organizations for \u003ca href=\"https://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/cd/ci/mb2603.asp\">income-eligible families\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But Fuller said fewer than one-third of 3-year-olds are enrolled in preschool of any kind, and he’s worried about their shrinking access to early education. Research shows that \u003ca href=\"https://nieer.org/research-library/new-jersey-abbott-preschool-program-longitudinal-effects-study-through-grade-10\">two years of high-quality preschool\u003c/a> is especially beneficial to children from low-income households.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12083046\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12083046 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05194-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05194-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05194-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05194-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Heather Posner (center), executive director of Carquinez Garden School, does arts and crafts with children in the school yard of Carquinez Garden School in Crockett on May 8, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Assemblymember Corey Jackson, a Democrat from Riverside County who chairs a state subcommittee on human services, said legislators are aware that TK pulled children from community-based programs and are trying to address the issue as they negotiate next year’s state budget.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have to recognize and learn from the lessons of the pandemic,” he said. “There may come a time where we might have to close our schools down again, so what happens when we have decimated our community infrastructure, when we still may need places for our children to go safely?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Community-based preschools \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11893791/why-californias-universal-transitional-kindergarten-plan-poses-a-threat-to-some-early-childhood-ed-providers\">had long warned they might not be able to survive financially\u003c/a> if they lose 4-year-olds to TK. Their business models are shaped by laws that mandate a ratio of one teacher for every four infants or toddlers, and one teacher for every dozen 4-year-olds. Tuition from the older children helps offset the more expensive care of children under 2.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A similar scenario bore out more than a dozen years ago in New York City, when it provided free preschool for 4-year-olds in a “mixed delivery system” that included public schools, private or community-based preschools. Many providers shifted to serving the older kids for the stable income it provided and \u003ca href=\"https://ideas.repec.org/p/pri/indrel/626.html\">cut back on infant and toddler care\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“We have seen such large benefits of public pre-K that I think it should be a good investment, but you want to be aware of the unintended consequences on the ability to find care for those younger kids, and trying to make sure that the market can still sustain that and that it’s affordable for parents,” said Jessica H. Brown, an economist at the University of South Carolina who studied the impact of New York’s “Pre-K For All” initiative.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In California, community-based preschools or child care centers must reconfigure classrooms and meet higher fire safety standards, for example, to serve children younger than 2 years old. These \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12017819/huge-lack-of-communication-how-a-building-code-update-disrupted-child-care-centers-in-california\">regulatory and financial hurdles\u003c/a> often hinder their ability to shift to infant care, or even shift to providing after-school care, because the cost of transportation and insurance is often prohibitively expensive, said Erin Freschi, director of resource and referral at CoCo Kids, an agency that connects families to child care providers in Contra Costa County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of the response has been, ‘Oh, just serve infants and toddlers or just do after-school care,’ and it’s not that easy,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers at UC Berkeley found that community-based preschools most vulnerable to closure were based in churches, were small programs serving 30 to 50 children, or ones that relied on state and federal funds to provide subsidized care to lower-income families. Only about 15% made the transition lawmakers had initially envisioned and switched to serving infants and toddlers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We had expected that a lot of the closures were tuition-charging places in middle or upper middle-class communities, and that is true. Three in five of the places that closed were charging tuition, but two in five were actually publicly financed,” Fuller said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12083053\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12083053 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05237-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05237-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05237-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05237-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A class schedule written on a white board at Carquinez Garden School in Crockett on May 8, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Transitional kindergarten isn’t the only contributor to these programs’ demise. The pandemic, followed by rising costs of living, destabilized their operations. Centers that provide subsidized care are competing with increased state funding for vouchers, which allow low-income families to choose between licensed care or unlicensed care at home by a family, friend or neighbor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An analysis by the California Budget & Policy Center found that between 2021 and 2024, families increasingly chose unlicensed care, which grew by 110%.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“No single program tells the whole story,” said Patricia Lozano, director of the advocacy group Early Edge California.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She suggested giving public funds to help more community-based programs pivot to serving babies and toddlers “to make sure no one is left behind.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As budget negotiations get underway in Sacramento, there’s talk of moving some $120 million in funding from Prop 98, which guarantees a minimum funding level for public schools each year, to support community-based organizations in the California State Preschool Program and permanently fund seats for 2-year-olds in that program.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“We are serious about child care, and we know it’s expensive, but that also means that more and more families need relief, and it’s a part of making California affordable again,” Jackson said. “We have to provide these services in order to be able to make sure families are able to make it here and thrive here in California.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A combination of these forces are playing out in preschools like Carquinez Garden School, the only licensed child care center in Crockett, a Bay Area community of 3,600. The school will close on June 12 after enrollment dwindled from more than 30 children two years ago to just 10 this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’ve lost essentially a class of kids every year to TK,” said Heather Posner, the school’s director.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said she expected to serve fewer 4-year-olds as TK rolled out, and that more 2-year-olds would take their spots. The preschool was in a so-called \u003ca href=\"https://www.americanprogress.org/feature/child-care-deserts/\">child care desert\u003c/a> with an insufficient supply of licensed care. The monthly cost for full-time care — $1,870 — didn’t seem to deter demand; the school had a waitlist and enrolled families who qualified for subsidies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But it seems like the low birth rate is causing a lot of schools to be underenrolled on both ends,” she said. “You’re not getting a lot of 2-year-olds and then you’re not getting any 4-year-olds … so with 10 kids, there’s just no way to really cover the overhead.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Trying to keep the school open felt like performing CPR on a patient, she said, and she barely broke even.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I basically have not paid myself in two years. Literally, I cannot pay my own salary,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fuller said researchers took California’s declining child population into account when they calculated the effect of TK expansion on thousands of communities. They concluded that for every 200 students who enrolled in public TK, there would be a reduction of 38 seats at community-based programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12083048\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12083048 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05201-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05201-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05201-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05201-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Grace Dare (center) supervises children digging in the dirt of a planter in the school yard of Carquinez Garden School in Crockett on May 8, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>In Berkeley, a surge in public TK enrollment during the last four years caused The Berkeley School’s early childhood program to lose more than two-thirds of its students, dropping from 90 to about 25. It will close in July after serving local children for more than six decades.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a loss for our community, it’s a loss for our school as a whole,” said Mitch Bostian, head of the private school, which serves kids aged 4 to 14 and practices the Montessori philosophy of mixing children of different ages in the classroom so that younger children learn from observing older peers, and older students develop leadership skills by mentoring younger peers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>That model unraveled when the local school district added more TK classrooms.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Really what we saw was the bottom dropped out of our 4- and 5-year-olds,” Bostian said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said the school began enrolling younger children, including 2-year-olds, added year-round options and extended its hours to attract working families, but couldn’t bring enrollment up to a sustainable level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12083052\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12083052 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05235-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05235-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05235-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/05/260508-EXPANSIONCONSEQUENCE-TV-05235-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The interior of a classroom at Carquinez Garden School in Crockett on May 8, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For Posner, the shuttering of Carquinez Garden School represents the loss of a tight-knit community she formed with families. Every Friday, parents hang out in the yard when they come to pick up their children. Once a month, they gather for a potluck.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The school takes advantage of being right next to a regional park and lets children learn through playing outdoors.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They’re running, they’re digging, they’re riding bikes, they’re hanging from the climbing structure, they’re being active, they’re using their brains and bodies and they’re with their friends,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Posner fears that when the kids enter TK, they’ll have less time to play outside and develop friendships.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Everything’s truncated,” she said. “And I feel the gift that I can give them is just that languishing outside in the sunshine\u003cem>.\u003c/em>”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>\u003cstrong>Correction:\u003c/strong> An earlier version of this story misstated the date Carquinez Garden School will close. It is June 12, not July. The story has been updated.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "struggling-bay-area-schools-get-new-life-as-badly-needed-child-care-centers",
"title": "Struggling Bay Area Schools Get New Life as Badly Needed Child Care Centers",
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"content": "\u003cp>Over the past six years, a shuttered Vallejo elementary school stood vacant, serving as a visual reminder of the Bay Area city’s declining student population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Whenever a bell rings, residents around the former Beverly Hills Elementary School know that it isn’t the sound of classes starting, but of an alarm triggered by vandals breaking in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But starting earlier this month, a new sound could be heard in the neighborhood: preschoolers playing in the yard. After undergoing a major overhaul, the campus reopened as an early learning center for up to 200 young kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new \u003ca href=\"https://www.risevallejo.com/\">Rise Vallejo Early Education center\u003c/a> is the latest example of a school repurposed to provide child care, following similar moves in San Jose and Hayward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As California school districts continue to grapple with rising expenses and falling enrollment — with \u003ca href=\"https://edsource.org/2026/declining-school-enrollment-california/756174\">the sharpest drop since the pandemic \u003c/a>recorded this year — education leaders and child care providers say this kind of conversion could help revitalize communities and create sorely-needed child care spaces.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s definitely a project that is scalable in all communities that really want to help meet the need of providing child care,” said Juan Cisneros, executive director of Child Start Inc., which operates Head Start classrooms in the center alongside four other early childhood education and care programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just have to have the resources and the community will to do something like that,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081808\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081808\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-37-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-37-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-37-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-37-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Children play in an outdoor area at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Across the Bay Area, other school districts facing declining enrollment, such as Alum Rock and Berryessa Union school districts in San Jose and Hayward Unified School District, are leasing underutilized classrooms to child care operators and family resource centers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This summer, the child care organization Kidango plans to open an early learning center in partnership with the Ravenswood City School District in East Palo Alto.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And just last week, the education board of the\u003ca href=\"https://media.edlio.net/4e6ffa79/cb3c8c98/895cb4aa/fd33c949db26461d800dcfc3beb0d387?_=04-21-26RegBdOBpostRev.pdf\"> Los Angeles Unified School District approved\u003c/a> placing more preschool classrooms on elementary school campuses as part of an ambitious plan to open more space for infants and toddlers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The district saw the steepest decline in enrollment in California over the last year — 4.5% compared to 1.3% statewide — and is hoping that families who send their child to a publicly-subsidized preschool program will stay in the same campus when they begin elementary school.[aside postID=news_12075761 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00263_TV-KQED.jpg']But unlike these arrangements, Solano County transferred ownership of Vallejo Rise to Child Start, allowing the nonprofit to operate five classrooms and lease ten others to privately-owned child care providers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The $20 million project began in 2020, when Child Start needed to vacate a building it was leasing from the county. The agency had a tough time finding a facility in Vallejo that met the needs of its existing students, not to mention a space big enough to accommodate the long waitlist of families hoping to join.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Responding to the severe shortage of licensed child care spaces — which were only available for 23% of Solano County children, \u003ca href=\"https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/asr1451/viz/SolanoCountyCommunityIndicators/Home?publish=yes\">according to a 2023 study\u003c/a> — county leaders asked the Vallejo City Unified School District for a few spare rooms. As it happened, the district had an entire school available.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All over the state and nation, a declining birth rate and slowing immigration rates have contributed to enrollment loss. In Vallejo, \u003ca href=\"https://www.fcmat.org/PublicationsReports/Vallejo%20City%20FHRA%202025%20final.pdf#:~:text=Between%20the%202014%2D15%20and%202023%2D24%20school%20years%2C%20noncharter%20school%20enrollment%20decreased%20by%2031%25.\">school enrollment fell 30% \u003c/a>between the 2014-15 and 2023-24 school years. The plummeting enrollment fueled a fiscal crisis that has forced the district to downsize.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>First 5 Solano County, which distributes funds from a statewide tobacco tax to support local early childhood programs, worked with county leaders to buy the school for $2.8 million. Then, they pulled together county, state and federal dollars, along with private donations, to fund the rest of the redesign and renovation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Workers outfitted the classrooms with tiny toilets, sinks and kitchenettes, resurfaced the yards with artificial turf, and installed smaller-scale playgrounds and shade structures. In the hallways, new murals of animals greet the children at their eye level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081819\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081819\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-17-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-17-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-17-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-17-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A classroom at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. The center recently opened, repurposing a former elementary school into a campus with classrooms, outdoor areas, and childcare space specifically designed for young children. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It really makes sense to take a public asset, make a one-time investment and turn it into something that you know isn’t just sitting empty but can really feed the community,” said Michele Harris, executive director of First 5 Solano.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The providers don’t pay facility fees. Instead, they share the costs of utilities and staff to manage the day-to-day operations of the center, allowing them to run their businesses at about half the cost, Cisneros said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>It helps them expand their business, but it also builds the workforce,” he said. “People who want to teach in this environment now have this space to be able to do it, and it’s going to bring a lot of new jobs into this community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cisneros said Vallejo Rise is the only early learning center he knows of that houses multiple programs with their own early education philosophies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081818\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081818\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-28-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-28-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-28-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-28-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A classroom at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. The center recently opened, repurposing a former elementary school into a campus with classrooms, outdoor areas, and childcare space specifically designed for young children.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For Dionna Perkins, the new center is giving her a chance to grow her home-based Montessori preschool, Joyful Journeys, into something much bigger. She’s currently licensed to serve up to 14 children and often has a waitlist of seven to 10 families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s crazy because I get a lot of parents that [sign up] when their child is in the womb,” Perkins said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, she’ll have three classrooms that can serve up to 48 kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can happily say that we do have at least half available right now,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081809\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081809\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-36-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-36-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-36-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-36-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Janet Walton, known as Ms. Janet, holds a child at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. The center recently opened, repurposing a former elementary school into a campus with classrooms, outdoor areas, and childcare space specifically designed for young children. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The providers will share the cost of other resources, like the laundry machines, and save on big purchases, like cribs and classroom furniture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a huge benefit because if you’re expanding, you have to find all of the funds for that by yourself,” Perkins said. “And in this economy, it’s hard, you know?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fundraising is underway to build a family resource center near the parking lot for anyone in the community seeking child care, a food pantry, and social services. The county’s Office of Education will also provide on-site coaching to early childhood educators who might need help supporting a child with special needs or developmental concerns, Harris said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To have that professional development on site where [the coaches] can respond right away, it’s just such a tremendous difference than being in isolation by yourself all day, every day,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081812\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081812\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-43-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-43-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-43-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-43-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An aerial view of Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. The center recently opened, repurposing a former elementary school into a campus with classrooms, outdoor areas, and childcare space specifically designed for young children. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For Ruben Aurelio, the superintendent of Vallejo City Unified School District, the partnerships that were formed to create the center give him hope for the future of Vallejo. In its heyday, long before he led the district, more than 22,000 students were enrolled.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re currently sitting around 9,000 students,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The closure of Mare Island Naval Shipyard in 1996 devastated the local economy, and the 2008 financial crisis led the city to declare bankruptcy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A high crime rate, police misconduct scandals and neglected infrastructure gave Vallejo a bad reputation. Declining enrollment and overspending also brought the school district to the brink of bankruptcy. After receiving a $60 million bailout from the state, it lost local control for 20 years and is \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12046637/vallejo-city-unified-takes-back-local-control-of-schools-after-21-years\">emerging from state oversight\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081814\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12081814 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-12-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-12-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-12-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-12-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Students play at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Aurelio said the district will close three more elementary schools by the end of this school year as it seeks to “right-size” itself, and is looking at ways to reopen vacant or surplus facilities to benefit the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>We just don’t like seeing them sit empty,” he said. “That’s a blight on the community, and it diminishes that sort of pride that the community has.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After touring Rise Vallejo on its opening day celebration, Aurelio said he was heartened to see the school reimagined into something that brings value to the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, there’s another benefit, he said, “Those preschoolers will hopefully feed my schools one day.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"excerpt": "As school districts across California grapple with falling enrollment and rising expenses, experts say this kind of conversion could help revitalize communities and increase access to child care.",
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"title": "Struggling Bay Area Schools Get New Life as Badly Needed Child Care Centers | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Over the past six years, a shuttered Vallejo elementary school stood vacant, serving as a visual reminder of the Bay Area city’s declining student population.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Whenever a bell rings, residents around the former Beverly Hills Elementary School know that it isn’t the sound of classes starting, but of an alarm triggered by vandals breaking in.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But starting earlier this month, a new sound could be heard in the neighborhood: preschoolers playing in the yard. After undergoing a major overhaul, the campus reopened as an early learning center for up to 200 young kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The new \u003ca href=\"https://www.risevallejo.com/\">Rise Vallejo Early Education center\u003c/a> is the latest example of a school repurposed to provide child care, following similar moves in San Jose and Hayward.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As California school districts continue to grapple with rising expenses and falling enrollment — with \u003ca href=\"https://edsource.org/2026/declining-school-enrollment-california/756174\">the sharpest drop since the pandemic \u003c/a>recorded this year — education leaders and child care providers say this kind of conversion could help revitalize communities and create sorely-needed child care spaces.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s definitely a project that is scalable in all communities that really want to help meet the need of providing child care,” said Juan Cisneros, executive director of Child Start Inc., which operates Head Start classrooms in the center alongside four other early childhood education and care programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We just have to have the resources and the community will to do something like that,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081808\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081808\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-37-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-37-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-37-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-37-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Children play in an outdoor area at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Across the Bay Area, other school districts facing declining enrollment, such as Alum Rock and Berryessa Union school districts in San Jose and Hayward Unified School District, are leasing underutilized classrooms to child care operators and family resource centers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This summer, the child care organization Kidango plans to open an early learning center in partnership with the Ravenswood City School District in East Palo Alto.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>And just last week, the education board of the\u003ca href=\"https://media.edlio.net/4e6ffa79/cb3c8c98/895cb4aa/fd33c949db26461d800dcfc3beb0d387?_=04-21-26RegBdOBpostRev.pdf\"> Los Angeles Unified School District approved\u003c/a> placing more preschool classrooms on elementary school campuses as part of an ambitious plan to open more space for infants and toddlers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The district saw the steepest decline in enrollment in California over the last year — 4.5% compared to 1.3% statewide — and is hoping that families who send their child to a publicly-subsidized preschool program will stay in the same campus when they begin elementary school.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But unlike these arrangements, Solano County transferred ownership of Vallejo Rise to Child Start, allowing the nonprofit to operate five classrooms and lease ten others to privately-owned child care providers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The $20 million project began in 2020, when Child Start needed to vacate a building it was leasing from the county. The agency had a tough time finding a facility in Vallejo that met the needs of its existing students, not to mention a space big enough to accommodate the long waitlist of families hoping to join.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Responding to the severe shortage of licensed child care spaces — which were only available for 23% of Solano County children, \u003ca href=\"https://public.tableau.com/app/profile/asr1451/viz/SolanoCountyCommunityIndicators/Home?publish=yes\">according to a 2023 study\u003c/a> — county leaders asked the Vallejo City Unified School District for a few spare rooms. As it happened, the district had an entire school available.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>All over the state and nation, a declining birth rate and slowing immigration rates have contributed to enrollment loss. In Vallejo, \u003ca href=\"https://www.fcmat.org/PublicationsReports/Vallejo%20City%20FHRA%202025%20final.pdf#:~:text=Between%20the%202014%2D15%20and%202023%2D24%20school%20years%2C%20noncharter%20school%20enrollment%20decreased%20by%2031%25.\">school enrollment fell 30% \u003c/a>between the 2014-15 and 2023-24 school years. The plummeting enrollment fueled a fiscal crisis that has forced the district to downsize.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>First 5 Solano County, which distributes funds from a statewide tobacco tax to support local early childhood programs, worked with county leaders to buy the school for $2.8 million. Then, they pulled together county, state and federal dollars, along with private donations, to fund the rest of the redesign and renovation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Workers outfitted the classrooms with tiny toilets, sinks and kitchenettes, resurfaced the yards with artificial turf, and installed smaller-scale playgrounds and shade structures. In the hallways, new murals of animals greet the children at their eye level.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081819\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081819\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-17-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-17-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-17-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-17-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A classroom at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. The center recently opened, repurposing a former elementary school into a campus with classrooms, outdoor areas, and childcare space specifically designed for young children. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“It really makes sense to take a public asset, make a one-time investment and turn it into something that you know isn’t just sitting empty but can really feed the community,” said Michele Harris, executive director of First 5 Solano.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The providers don’t pay facility fees. Instead, they share the costs of utilities and staff to manage the day-to-day operations of the center, allowing them to run their businesses at about half the cost, Cisneros said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>It helps them expand their business, but it also builds the workforce,” he said. “People who want to teach in this environment now have this space to be able to do it, and it’s going to bring a lot of new jobs into this community.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Cisneros said Vallejo Rise is the only early learning center he knows of that houses multiple programs with their own early education philosophies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081818\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081818\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-28-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-28-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-28-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-28-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">A classroom at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. The center recently opened, repurposing a former elementary school into a campus with classrooms, outdoor areas, and childcare space specifically designed for young children.\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For Dionna Perkins, the new center is giving her a chance to grow her home-based Montessori preschool, Joyful Journeys, into something much bigger. She’s currently licensed to serve up to 14 children and often has a waitlist of seven to 10 families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s crazy because I get a lot of parents that [sign up] when their child is in the womb,” Perkins said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Now, she’ll have three classrooms that can serve up to 48 kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I can happily say that we do have at least half available right now,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081809\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081809\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-36-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-36-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-36-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-36-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Janet Walton, known as Ms. Janet, holds a child at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. The center recently opened, repurposing a former elementary school into a campus with classrooms, outdoor areas, and childcare space specifically designed for young children. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The providers will share the cost of other resources, like the laundry machines, and save on big purchases, like cribs and classroom furniture.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a huge benefit because if you’re expanding, you have to find all of the funds for that by yourself,” Perkins said. “And in this economy, it’s hard, you know?”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Fundraising is underway to build a family resource center near the parking lot for anyone in the community seeking child care, a food pantry, and social services. The county’s Office of Education will also provide on-site coaching to early childhood educators who might need help supporting a child with special needs or developmental concerns, Harris said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To have that professional development on site where [the coaches] can respond right away, it’s just such a tremendous difference than being in isolation by yourself all day, every day,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081812\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12081812\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-43-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-43-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-43-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-43-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">An aerial view of Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. The center recently opened, repurposing a former elementary school into a campus with classrooms, outdoor areas, and childcare space specifically designed for young children. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>For Ruben Aurelio, the superintendent of Vallejo City Unified School District, the partnerships that were formed to create the center give him hope for the future of Vallejo. In its heyday, long before he led the district, more than 22,000 students were enrolled.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re currently sitting around 9,000 students,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The closure of Mare Island Naval Shipyard in 1996 devastated the local economy, and the 2008 financial crisis led the city to declare bankruptcy.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A high crime rate, police misconduct scandals and neglected infrastructure gave Vallejo a bad reputation. Declining enrollment and overspending also brought the school district to the brink of bankruptcy. After receiving a $60 million bailout from the state, it lost local control for 20 years and is \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12046637/vallejo-city-unified-takes-back-local-control-of-schools-after-21-years\">emerging from state oversight\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12081814\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12081814 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-12-BL.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-12-BL.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-12-BL-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260428-VallejoChildCare-12-BL-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Students play at Rise Vallejo, an early education center, in Vallejo on April 28, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Aurelio said the district will close three more elementary schools by the end of this school year as it seeks to “right-size” itself, and is looking at ways to reopen vacant or surplus facilities to benefit the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>We just don’t like seeing them sit empty,” he said. “That’s a blight on the community, and it diminishes that sort of pride that the community has.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>After touring Rise Vallejo on its opening day celebration, Aurelio said he was heartened to see the school reimagined into something that brings value to the community.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But, there’s another benefit, he said, “Those preschoolers will hopefully feed my schools one day.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "bay-area-nature-camp-fights-bureaucracy-and-nimbyism-ahead-of-key-vote",
"title": "Bay Area Nature Camp Wins Key Approval for New Home After Fighting ‘Bureaucracy and NIMBYism’",
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"content": "\u003cp>Alameda County Supervisors have approved an outdoor education program’s plan to build a permanent campsite for \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/bay-area\">Bay Area\u003c/a> school children in the rolling hills of Castro Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For 25 years, the Mosaic Project has been bringing tens of thousands of fourth and fifth graders from different backgrounds together for a week of learning in nature, renting land in Napa and Santa Cruz counties — locations that require long bus rides for the kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The organization spent $3 million and 10 years developing plans for a permanent home in Alameda County and hopes to serve up to 100 students per week, for about 130 days out of the year. It applied for a conditional land use permit to replace a former car storage building with cabins, a dining hall and staff residence on a piece of land off Cull Canyon Road.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>School leaders and parents praise its mission of teaching the students to resolve conflicts peacefully, and numerous students inspired by the experience come back as youth leaders or counselors. But the Oakland-based nonprofit faced an uncertain future due to fierce opposition by a small, but influential group of Castro Valley residents over its plans to establish the camp near their rural properties. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We give kids the experience of living in a welcoming, inclusive and joyful community. We’re the only ones that we know of that are doing this, and we’re in danger of not existing because of bureaucracy and NIMBYism,” Lara Mendel, co-founder of the project, said ahead of Thursday’s vote. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Board members voted 3-1 to allow the project to move forward. The only ‘no’ vote came from Nate Miley, the longtime supervisor who represents Castro Valley, an unincorporated community of 66,000 wedged between suburban sprawl and picturesque open spaces. Supporters of the outdoor recreation facility had questioned whether he can vote independently given that he appointed members of a municipal advisory council that unanimously rejected county staff recommendations to approve the project last August. \u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12080109\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1014px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12080109\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1014\" height=\"657\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-02-KQED.jpg 1014w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-02-KQED-160x104.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1014px) 100vw, 1014px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Mosaic Project’s proposed new facility would replace a former car storage building with cabins, a dining hall and staff residence on a piece of land off Cull Canyon Road in Castro Valley. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the Mosaic Project)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The MAC has, I would say, not very diverse appointments, and amplifies a Castro Valley that I don’t think is Castro Valley writ large,” said Michael Kusiak, a school board member who wants to provide local students convenient access to the program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said the appointees overwhelmingly represent “legacy voices” in the community who want to preserve the status quo in Castro Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Those voices tend to get amplified a bit more than others, and that’s frustrating, particularly when you hear people make these comments that makes you go, ‘What are we really talking about here, people? Maybe you want to say what you really mean,’” he said. “I haven’t found the arguments against the project to be very credible.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miley also nominated the majority of a five-member zoning board that voted against the proposal in December.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://alamedacounty.granicus.com/player/clip/9984?view_id=3&redirect=true\">At that meeting\u003c/a>, members of the governing board said they were worried the facility would increase traffic and wildfire danger in the boxed canyon, as well as strain the local water supply, which depends on wells.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Thursday’s board meeting, Miley said he wasn’t convinced by expert assessments that the project met fire safety requirements. He also worried about putting children close to a winery where alcohol consumption is permitted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To me it’s important that I put authenticity on the people who have lived in the canyon, who have experienced these issues and concerns, not academically, not by study, but by everyday existence,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Teddy Seibert, vice-chair of the West County Board of Zoning Adjustments, recused herself from voting in the December meeting because she owns a winery that shares boundaries with the Mosaic Project’s property. But in a letter submitted to the board, she called the proposal “a thinly-veiled attempt at urban expansion.” Her husband, Keith Seibert, said in public comments that he feared losing the winery’s license to serve alcohol if a youth facility moved in next door.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12080113\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12080113\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1706\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-2000x1333.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-2048x1365.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">This rendering shows plans for the Mosaic Project’s proposed permanent home in Alameda County, which it hopes will serve up to 100 students per week, for about 130 days out of the year, at a proposed new permanent facility in Castro Valley. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the Mosaic Project)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Chuck Shipman, a resident of the Sequoians nudist club at the end of the road, said: “I would kind of feel concerned if somebody comes in there and says, ‘Well, I don’t want my kids around a nudist resort.’ That would affect our business also.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another resident worried about additional noise from “100 fourth and fifth graders at an evening campfire or tromping through the hills collecting forest products.” Several others sought to redefine the program as a school, which would violate Measure D, a 26-year-old initiative Miley championed to restrict urban development in rural parts of Alameda County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, the Mosaic Project’s land use attorney, David Smith, said an environmental review and scientific studies by outside consultants have addressed these concerns.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said the facility, which would cover just two acres of the 37-acre property, will be built with fire-resistant materials that would create a break in the canyon in the event of a conflagration. Water tanks at the site would be reserved for fire suppression that everyone in the canyon can use.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have put in exhaustive modeling from fire experts of all possible scenarios,” Smith said. “It’s undisputed that the wildfire risk for the canyon as a whole is materially improved with the project than without it.”[aside postID=news_12078183 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/031626_PINNACLESFORTHEDAY-_GH_040-KQED.jpg']Hydrologists also discovered a plentiful and drinkable water source on the site. As for the winery’s concern, Smith pointed out that a state law that refuses alcohol licenses for businesses near youth facilities doesn’t apply to those seeking a renewal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They herald [the Mosaic Project] but say it’s the wrong place for it, because a winery is the right place for parties but not for kids next door? That’s just hard to accept,” Smith said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Email messages seeking comments from the Seiberts, owners of the TwiningVine Estate Winery, have not been returned.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Grace Russell, an eighth grade student at Oakland School of the Arts, said the long rides to the Santa Cruz Mountains created “a lot of anticipating” when she went on her first-ever overnight camp with the Mosaic Project four years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think having Mosaic closer to where most of the schools are [located] would make a big impact because not only is it easier to get there, but then on the first day there’s more time for doing ‘get to know you’ activities, and there’s time on the last day for people to say their goodbyes,” Russell said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Russell plans to return to Mosaic in the fall as a youth leader.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a little bit hard to understand why people don’t want Mosaic in their community, just because of how much it helps people,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mendel said the rental locations also create unsustainable commutes for the staff, who mostly live in the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We go away for six weeks, and people give up their life for this,” she said. “We’ve lost amazing staff because they fall in love and they want a family and they can’t be leaving for six, seven weeks a session.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A permanent location in Castro Valley would keep the program going in the long term, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Alameda County Supervisors have approved an outdoor education program’s plan to build a permanent campsite for \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/bay-area\">Bay Area\u003c/a> school children in the rolling hills of Castro Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For 25 years, the Mosaic Project has been bringing tens of thousands of fourth and fifth graders from different backgrounds together for a week of learning in nature, renting land in Napa and Santa Cruz counties — locations that require long bus rides for the kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The organization spent $3 million and 10 years developing plans for a permanent home in Alameda County and hopes to serve up to 100 students per week, for about 130 days out of the year. It applied for a conditional land use permit to replace a former car storage building with cabins, a dining hall and staff residence on a piece of land off Cull Canyon Road.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>School leaders and parents praise its mission of teaching the students to resolve conflicts peacefully, and numerous students inspired by the experience come back as youth leaders or counselors. But the Oakland-based nonprofit faced an uncertain future due to fierce opposition by a small, but influential group of Castro Valley residents over its plans to establish the camp near their rural properties. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We give kids the experience of living in a welcoming, inclusive and joyful community. We’re the only ones that we know of that are doing this, and we’re in danger of not existing because of bureaucracy and NIMBYism,” Lara Mendel, co-founder of the project, said ahead of Thursday’s vote. \u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Board members voted 3-1 to allow the project to move forward. The only ‘no’ vote came from Nate Miley, the longtime supervisor who represents Castro Valley, an unincorporated community of 66,000 wedged between suburban sprawl and picturesque open spaces. Supporters of the outdoor recreation facility had questioned whether he can vote independently given that he appointed members of a municipal advisory council that unanimously rejected county staff recommendations to approve the project last August. \u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12080109\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"max-width: 1014px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12080109\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1014\" height=\"657\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-02-KQED.jpg 1014w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-02-KQED-160x104.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1014px) 100vw, 1014px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">The Mosaic Project’s proposed new facility would replace a former car storage building with cabins, a dining hall and staff residence on a piece of land off Cull Canyon Road in Castro Valley. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the Mosaic Project)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“The MAC has, I would say, not very diverse appointments, and amplifies a Castro Valley that I don’t think is Castro Valley writ large,” said Michael Kusiak, a school board member who wants to provide local students convenient access to the program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said the appointees overwhelmingly represent “legacy voices” in the community who want to preserve the status quo in Castro Valley.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Those voices tend to get amplified a bit more than others, and that’s frustrating, particularly when you hear people make these comments that makes you go, ‘What are we really talking about here, people? Maybe you want to say what you really mean,’” he said. “I haven’t found the arguments against the project to be very credible.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Miley also nominated the majority of a five-member zoning board that voted against the proposal in December.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://alamedacounty.granicus.com/player/clip/9984?view_id=3&redirect=true\">At that meeting\u003c/a>, members of the governing board said they were worried the facility would increase traffic and wildfire danger in the boxed canyon, as well as strain the local water supply, which depends on wells.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Thursday’s board meeting, Miley said he wasn’t convinced by expert assessments that the project met fire safety requirements. He also worried about putting children close to a winery where alcohol consumption is permitted.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“To me it’s important that I put authenticity on the people who have lived in the canyon, who have experienced these issues and concerns, not academically, not by study, but by everyday existence,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Teddy Seibert, vice-chair of the West County Board of Zoning Adjustments, recused herself from voting in the December meeting because she owns a winery that shares boundaries with the Mosaic Project’s property. But in a letter submitted to the board, she called the proposal “a thinly-veiled attempt at urban expansion.” Her husband, Keith Seibert, said in public comments that he feared losing the winery’s license to serve alcohol if a youth facility moved in next door.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12080113\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2560px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12080113\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2560\" height=\"1706\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-scaled.jpg 2560w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-2000x1333.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260415-Mosaic-Project-06-KQED-2048x1365.jpg 2048w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2560px) 100vw, 2560px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">This rendering shows plans for the Mosaic Project’s proposed permanent home in Alameda County, which it hopes will serve up to 100 students per week, for about 130 days out of the year, at a proposed new permanent facility in Castro Valley. \u003ccite>(Courtesy of the Mosaic Project)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Chuck Shipman, a resident of the Sequoians nudist club at the end of the road, said: “I would kind of feel concerned if somebody comes in there and says, ‘Well, I don’t want my kids around a nudist resort.’ That would affect our business also.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Another resident worried about additional noise from “100 fourth and fifth graders at an evening campfire or tromping through the hills collecting forest products.” Several others sought to redefine the program as a school, which would violate Measure D, a 26-year-old initiative Miley championed to restrict urban development in rural parts of Alameda County.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>However, the Mosaic Project’s land use attorney, David Smith, said an environmental review and scientific studies by outside consultants have addressed these concerns.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>He said the facility, which would cover just two acres of the 37-acre property, will be built with fire-resistant materials that would create a break in the canyon in the event of a conflagration. Water tanks at the site would be reserved for fire suppression that everyone in the canyon can use.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have put in exhaustive modeling from fire experts of all possible scenarios,” Smith said. “It’s undisputed that the wildfire risk for the canyon as a whole is materially improved with the project than without it.”\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Hydrologists also discovered a plentiful and drinkable water source on the site. As for the winery’s concern, Smith pointed out that a state law that refuses alcohol licenses for businesses near youth facilities doesn’t apply to those seeking a renewal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“They herald [the Mosaic Project] but say it’s the wrong place for it, because a winery is the right place for parties but not for kids next door? That’s just hard to accept,” Smith said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Email messages seeking comments from the Seiberts, owners of the TwiningVine Estate Winery, have not been returned.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Grace Russell, an eighth grade student at Oakland School of the Arts, said the long rides to the Santa Cruz Mountains created “a lot of anticipating” when she went on her first-ever overnight camp with the Mosaic Project four years ago.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I think having Mosaic closer to where most of the schools are [located] would make a big impact because not only is it easier to get there, but then on the first day there’s more time for doing ‘get to know you’ activities, and there’s time on the last day for people to say their goodbyes,” Russell said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Russell plans to return to Mosaic in the fall as a youth leader.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“It’s a little bit hard to understand why people don’t want Mosaic in their community, just because of how much it helps people,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mendel said the rental locations also create unsustainable commutes for the staff, who mostly live in the East Bay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We go away for six weeks, and people give up their life for this,” she said. “We’ve lost amazing staff because they fall in love and they want a family and they can’t be leaving for six, seven weeks a session.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>A permanent location in Castro Valley would keep the program going in the long term, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "when-child-care-costs-half-a-paycheck-bay-area-parents-must-choose-kids-or-career",
"title": "When Child Care Costs Half a Paycheck, Bay Area Parents Must Choose: Kids or Career",
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"headTitle": "When Child Care Costs Half a Paycheck, Bay Area Parents Must Choose: Kids or Career | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cp>\u003cem>This story is part of \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/affordability\">How We Get By\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>, a KQED series exploring how people are coping with rising costs in the Bay Area and California. Find the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/affordability\">full series here\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Annie Malekzadeh was shopping at a Joanne Fabrics store in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/concord\">Concord\u003c/a> a couple of years ago when she had an encounter that stung her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An older woman who saw her pregnant while pushing her toddler son in a shopping cart, told her: “I don’t know why you would want more than two [children]. It’s basically impossible in the Bay Area.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At the time I was like, how dare she?” she said. “But now I’m like, oh, [she] was right. It’s really hard.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Malekzadeh wound up having another baby, and the decision to have three kids pushed her child care expenses to roughly $56,000 a year and ultimately changed the course of her career.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12061802/how-are-child-care-costs-affecting-the-lives-of-bay-area-families-you-told-us\">Rising child care costs in the Bay Area\u003c/a> are forcing parents to make painful tradeoffs, either by passing up career opportunities, cutting back work hours, or quitting altogether. For families with multiple young children, these expenses can surpass a parent’s entire salary, disproportionately affecting mothers and shaping their long-term economic security.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Malekzadeh’s story is just one example of how the gap between what families can afford and the actual cost of care is pushing parents to find creative solutions — and prompting calls for systemic change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Child care has long been expensive for parents, but recently it’s been even more so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078461\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078461\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00035_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00035_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00035_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00035_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Annie Malekzadeh, a mom who quit her teaching job to save on child care and is now pursuing her master’s degree in mathematics, studies at Pleasant Hill Library in Pleasant Hill on April 1, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Prices shot up almost 30% between 2020 and 2024, outpacing inflation by 7 percentage points, according to \u003ca href=\"https://www.childcareaware.org/price-landscape24/\">a survey of child care resource and referral organizations \u003c/a>around the country. In just the last year, 40% of child care programs in California \u003ca href=\"https://www.naeyc.org/sites/default/files/wysiwyg/user-174467/2026_survey_brief.pdf\">reported raising tuition \u003c/a>to offset rising operating costs like insurance and food.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Four years ago, Malekzadeh was a math teacher at a private middle school, earning roughly $32,000 annually and working 25 hours per week. At the time, her son was in kindergarten and her daughter in preschool. Her husband is a psychiatrist, she said, and because he earned more money and worked more hours, most of the parenting responsibilities went to her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With their joint income, the cost of preschool and before- and afterschool care was manageable for the Pleasant Hill couple. But when their baby boy came along in July 2022, and needed full-time infant care, the amount for all three kids’ care — about $4,700 per month — was almost double her teacher’s salary.[aside postID=news_12070762 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/240911-CHILDCARE-REAX-MD-01_qed.jpg']“It didn’t make sense,” she said. “My job wasn’t really making enough of a contribution to justify that kind of expense.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the time the school year ended, Malekzadeh decided to quit, even though she didn’t want to leave a profession she loved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My grandparents were both educators,” she said. “They were beloved by their community, and they were really excited when I chose to become a teacher. So that was my plan, and I didn’t ever expect to deviate from that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The move is saving about $600 a week in child care. The older two are in public school, and the youngest is still in preschool. While he’s in care, Malekzadeh takes classes at Diablo Valley College as she pursues a master’s degree in math, which she hopes will ultimately lead to a higher-paying job to make up for time away from the labor market.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you quit to stay home with your kids, it creates gaps in your resume that a lot of places don’t necessarily look nicely at,” Melakzadeh said. “You have to have some kind of explanation for that, which might translate into less pay.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Child care prices vary by region and depend on a child’s age and the type of provider. In California, full-time infant care in 2024 cost an average of $22,628, which is 16% of the average married couple’s income and 50% of a single parent’s. Bay Area families pay the highest child care prices \u003ca href=\"https://tootris.com/edu/blog/parents/cost-of-child-care-in-california-by-city-age-and-type-of-care-provider/?utm_source=chatgpt.com\">compared to other parts of California\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078462\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12078462 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00228_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00228_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00228_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00228_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Annie Malekzadeh plays a card game with her daughter as they wait for her older son to finish school at Valhalla Elementary School in Pleasant Hill on April 1, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The spike in prices came as companies began mandating employees return to work and \u003ca href=\"https://rapidsurveyproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/arpa-funding-factsheet-aug2023.pdf\">child care providers lost federal funds\u003c/a> meant to help them recover from the pandemic. Less flexibility and high costs led to a decline in labor force participation for moms of children under the age of 5, and college-educated moms in particular, according to\u003ca href=\"https://kpmg.com/us/en/articles/2025/october-2025-the-great-exit.html\"> an analysis by the financial firm KPMG.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Their labor force participation declined by 2.3 percentage points, while the number of college-educated dads of young children who were working or seeking a job continued to increase.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Families are facing child care prices that are higher than the price of rent or mortgage. So this is a huge problem. It’s one of the biggest expenses in a family’s budgets,” said Julie Kashen, a researcher at The Century Foundation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078476\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078476\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-04-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-04-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-04-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-04-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nolan Cruz eats oatmeal for breakfast in the morning on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The progressive think tank conducted an October survey of 1,400 voters about their affordability concerns. Kashen said that while all families are facing rising costs, it’s women who experience a greater threat to their economic security.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Women are faring worse in terms of taking on debt to cover their basics, borrowing from friends and families to pay the bills,” she said. “So when you add child care on top of that, I think it’s incredibly challenging.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those challenges led Amy Cruz to walk away from a six-figure nursing job to freelance as a dance teacher and care for her 3-year-old son, Nolan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078474\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078474\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1346\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-02-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-02-KQED-160x108.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-02-KQED-1536x1034.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Brandon and Nolan Cruz cook oatmeal for breakfast on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Until he was about two years old, Cruz paid $3,000 per month to share a nanny with another family for just four days a week of child care (on the fifth day, she leaned on family members to look after him). While child care wasn’t the only reason she left her job, it was a significant factor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Essentially, half of my monthly income was going to child care,” Cruz said. “Watching that much money leave our account every month was tough.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once Nolan was old enough to start preschool, she enrolled him in a three-day program near her Berkeley home, which cut her child care costs in half. When he’s there, she teaches dance — something she did professionally before going to nursing school — to afford his tuition. With a second baby on the way, she also figured that it was “worth it to make a little less money but be able to be with my kids more.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078475\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078475\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-03-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-03-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-03-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-03-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Amy Cruz picks raspberries for her son Nolan’s breakfast in the morning on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Economists call child care a broken market because the actual cost of providing care is a lot more than what families can afford to pay. In California, \u003ca href=\"https://rrnetwork.org/assets/general-files/California.pdf\">the demand for licensed infant care exceeds supply\u003c/a> because it’s the most expensive and labor-intensive. Babies need constant care, and California has strict rules limiting the number of children each adult can care for in a licensed child care home or center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the same time, low pay and benefits have made it tough for child care providers to attract or retain early educators. In January, nearly half of providers said they didn’t have enough staff to enroll children at capacity, according to a survey by the National Association for the Education of Young Children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For providers, energy costs, food, insurance have all gone up,” said Matthew Nestler, senior economist at KPMG. “They can’t necessarily raise their workers’ wages to the degree that they would like to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078473\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078473\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-01-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-01-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-01-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-01-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(From left) Brandon, Amy and Nolan Cruz prepare breakfast and pack a lunch for Nolan in the morning on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The shortage can cause parents to weave in and out of the workforce. Malezadeh first left her job when her eldest child was born eight years ago, and she couldn’t find an open infant care slot when her maternity leave ended. She didn’t know she had to reserve months in advance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We didn’t actually find any kind of daycare spot for him until he was two, and by then, I was already expecting my second child,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Malekzadeh stayed out of teaching for four years and went back to work when her first two kids were a little older.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But after a year, the costs of infant care for her youngest, combined with her older children’s care, were too great, and she left her job again.[aside postID=news_12078480 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/AffordabilitySeriesIntro_Lede.jpg']Kashen, from The Century Foundation, said public investment can help close the gap between what parents like Malekzadeh and Cruz can afford and what it actually costs to provide child care. As an example, she pointed to New Mexico’s recent move to offer free child care for all residents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When governments invest in child care, that is the biggest thing that we can do because right now what we have is essentially a DIY, do-it-yourself, system for families where everyone’s on their own,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, Cruz gave birth to a daughter. During her pregnancy, she considered becoming a nanny so she could take care of her baby alongside someone else’s, allowing her to make some money. She also thought about continuing to teach dance part-time, and while she’s at work, trading child care responsibilities with other parents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been thinking about it more and more, because I can make more money teaching dance than doing my own nanny share,” Cruz said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Building a community with other parents has helped Malekzadeh get by when she’s in a child care pinch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you’re gonna be five minutes late to pick up, you have to have someone else that you can text, and be like, ‘Can you grab my kid for me real quick?’” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078901\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078901\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-affordabilitychildcare00326_TV_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-affordabilitychildcare00326_TV_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-affordabilitychildcare00326_TV_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-affordabilitychildcare00326_TV_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Annie Malekzadeh walks her kids home after school in Pleasant Hill on April 1, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Malekzadeh tutors on the side to make some money and said she’s constantly revising the family budget as grocery and health insurance prices go up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m looking at where can we cut costs and what bundle can I use or coupon can I use to save money? I do most of our shopping at Costco now because buying in bulk is usually cheaper,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her family is also taking fewer trips, but Malezadeh said, despite these compromises, she’s grateful she has been able to afford raising three kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I feel very fortunate that I got through having our second kid and didn’t feel done,” she said. “Instead of living with the potential of regretting it for the rest of my life, I was able to say, ‘Hey, can we have another one? Can we work that into the budget?’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>\u003cem>This story is part of \u003cstrong>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/affordability\">How We Get By\u003c/a>\u003c/strong>, a KQED series exploring how people are coping with rising costs in the Bay Area and California. Find the \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/affordability\">full series here\u003c/a>.\u003c/em>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Annie Malekzadeh was shopping at a Joanne Fabrics store in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/concord\">Concord\u003c/a> a couple of years ago when she had an encounter that stung her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An older woman who saw her pregnant while pushing her toddler son in a shopping cart, told her: “I don’t know why you would want more than two [children]. It’s basically impossible in the Bay Area.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“At the time I was like, how dare she?” she said. “But now I’m like, oh, [she] was right. It’s really hard.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Malekzadeh wound up having another baby, and the decision to have three kids pushed her child care expenses to roughly $56,000 a year and ultimately changed the course of her career.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12061802/how-are-child-care-costs-affecting-the-lives-of-bay-area-families-you-told-us\">Rising child care costs in the Bay Area\u003c/a> are forcing parents to make painful tradeoffs, either by passing up career opportunities, cutting back work hours, or quitting altogether. For families with multiple young children, these expenses can surpass a parent’s entire salary, disproportionately affecting mothers and shaping their long-term economic security.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Malekzadeh’s story is just one example of how the gap between what families can afford and the actual cost of care is pushing parents to find creative solutions — and prompting calls for systemic change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Child care has long been expensive for parents, but recently it’s been even more so.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078461\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078461\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00035_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00035_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00035_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00035_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Annie Malekzadeh, a mom who quit her teaching job to save on child care and is now pursuing her master’s degree in mathematics, studies at Pleasant Hill Library in Pleasant Hill on April 1, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Prices shot up almost 30% between 2020 and 2024, outpacing inflation by 7 percentage points, according to \u003ca href=\"https://www.childcareaware.org/price-landscape24/\">a survey of child care resource and referral organizations \u003c/a>around the country. In just the last year, 40% of child care programs in California \u003ca href=\"https://www.naeyc.org/sites/default/files/wysiwyg/user-174467/2026_survey_brief.pdf\">reported raising tuition \u003c/a>to offset rising operating costs like insurance and food.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Four years ago, Malekzadeh was a math teacher at a private middle school, earning roughly $32,000 annually and working 25 hours per week. At the time, her son was in kindergarten and her daughter in preschool. Her husband is a psychiatrist, she said, and because he earned more money and worked more hours, most of the parenting responsibilities went to her.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>With their joint income, the cost of preschool and before- and afterschool care was manageable for the Pleasant Hill couple. But when their baby boy came along in July 2022, and needed full-time infant care, the amount for all three kids’ care — about $4,700 per month — was almost double her teacher’s salary.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“It didn’t make sense,” she said. “My job wasn’t really making enough of a contribution to justify that kind of expense.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the time the school year ended, Malekzadeh decided to quit, even though she didn’t want to leave a profession she loved.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My grandparents were both educators,” she said. “They were beloved by their community, and they were really excited when I chose to become a teacher. So that was my plan, and I didn’t ever expect to deviate from that.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The move is saving about $600 a week in child care. The older two are in public school, and the youngest is still in preschool. While he’s in care, Malekzadeh takes classes at Diablo Valley College as she pursues a master’s degree in math, which she hopes will ultimately lead to a higher-paying job to make up for time away from the labor market.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When you quit to stay home with your kids, it creates gaps in your resume that a lot of places don’t necessarily look nicely at,” Melakzadeh said. “You have to have some kind of explanation for that, which might translate into less pay.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Child care prices vary by region and depend on a child’s age and the type of provider. In California, full-time infant care in 2024 cost an average of $22,628, which is 16% of the average married couple’s income and 50% of a single parent’s. Bay Area families pay the highest child care prices \u003ca href=\"https://tootris.com/edu/blog/parents/cost-of-child-care-in-california-by-city-age-and-type-of-care-provider/?utm_source=chatgpt.com\">compared to other parts of California\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078462\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12078462 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00228_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00228_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00228_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-AFFORDABILITYCHILDCARE00228_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Annie Malekzadeh plays a card game with her daughter as they wait for her older son to finish school at Valhalla Elementary School in Pleasant Hill on April 1, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The spike in prices came as companies began mandating employees return to work and \u003ca href=\"https://rapidsurveyproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/arpa-funding-factsheet-aug2023.pdf\">child care providers lost federal funds\u003c/a> meant to help them recover from the pandemic. Less flexibility and high costs led to a decline in labor force participation for moms of children under the age of 5, and college-educated moms in particular, according to\u003ca href=\"https://kpmg.com/us/en/articles/2025/october-2025-the-great-exit.html\"> an analysis by the financial firm KPMG.\u003c/a>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Their labor force participation declined by 2.3 percentage points, while the number of college-educated dads of young children who were working or seeking a job continued to increase.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Families are facing child care prices that are higher than the price of rent or mortgage. So this is a huge problem. It’s one of the biggest expenses in a family’s budgets,” said Julie Kashen, a researcher at The Century Foundation.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078476\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078476\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-04-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-04-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-04-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-04-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Nolan Cruz eats oatmeal for breakfast in the morning on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The progressive think tank conducted an October survey of 1,400 voters about their affordability concerns. Kashen said that while all families are facing rising costs, it’s women who experience a greater threat to their economic security.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Women are faring worse in terms of taking on debt to cover their basics, borrowing from friends and families to pay the bills,” she said. “So when you add child care on top of that, I think it’s incredibly challenging.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Those challenges led Amy Cruz to walk away from a six-figure nursing job to freelance as a dance teacher and care for her 3-year-old son, Nolan.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078474\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078474\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-02-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1346\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-02-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-02-KQED-160x108.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-02-KQED-1536x1034.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Brandon and Nolan Cruz cook oatmeal for breakfast on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Until he was about two years old, Cruz paid $3,000 per month to share a nanny with another family for just four days a week of child care (on the fifth day, she leaned on family members to look after him). While child care wasn’t the only reason she left her job, it was a significant factor.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Essentially, half of my monthly income was going to child care,” Cruz said. “Watching that much money leave our account every month was tough.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Once Nolan was old enough to start preschool, she enrolled him in a three-day program near her Berkeley home, which cut her child care costs in half. When he’s there, she teaches dance — something she did professionally before going to nursing school — to afford his tuition. With a second baby on the way, she also figured that it was “worth it to make a little less money but be able to be with my kids more.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078475\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078475\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-03-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-03-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-03-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-03-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Amy Cruz picks raspberries for her son Nolan’s breakfast in the morning on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Economists call child care a broken market because the actual cost of providing care is a lot more than what families can afford to pay. In California, \u003ca href=\"https://rrnetwork.org/assets/general-files/California.pdf\">the demand for licensed infant care exceeds supply\u003c/a> because it’s the most expensive and labor-intensive. Babies need constant care, and California has strict rules limiting the number of children each adult can care for in a licensed child care home or center.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At the same time, low pay and benefits have made it tough for child care providers to attract or retain early educators. In January, nearly half of providers said they didn’t have enough staff to enroll children at capacity, according to a survey by the National Association for the Education of Young Children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“For providers, energy costs, food, insurance have all gone up,” said Matthew Nestler, senior economist at KPMG. “They can’t necessarily raise their workers’ wages to the degree that they would like to.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078473\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078473\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-01-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1334\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-01-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-01-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/251027-CHILD-CARE-PRICES-MD-01-KQED-1536x1025.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">(From left) Brandon, Amy and Nolan Cruz prepare breakfast and pack a lunch for Nolan in the morning on Oct. 27, 2025. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The shortage can cause parents to weave in and out of the workforce. Malezadeh first left her job when her eldest child was born eight years ago, and she couldn’t find an open infant care slot when her maternity leave ended. She didn’t know she had to reserve months in advance.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We didn’t actually find any kind of daycare spot for him until he was two, and by then, I was already expecting my second child,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Malekzadeh stayed out of teaching for four years and went back to work when her first two kids were a little older.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But after a year, the costs of infant care for her youngest, combined with her older children’s care, were too great, and she left her job again.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Kashen, from The Century Foundation, said public investment can help close the gap between what parents like Malekzadeh and Cruz can afford and what it actually costs to provide child care. As an example, she pointed to New Mexico’s recent move to offer free child care for all residents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“When governments invest in child care, that is the biggest thing that we can do because right now what we have is essentially a DIY, do-it-yourself, system for families where everyone’s on their own,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, Cruz gave birth to a daughter. During her pregnancy, she considered becoming a nanny so she could take care of her baby alongside someone else’s, allowing her to make some money. She also thought about continuing to teach dance part-time, and while she’s at work, trading child care responsibilities with other parents.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’ve been thinking about it more and more, because I can make more money teaching dance than doing my own nanny share,” Cruz said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Building a community with other parents has helped Malekzadeh get by when she’s in a child care pinch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“If you’re gonna be five minutes late to pick up, you have to have someone else that you can text, and be like, ‘Can you grab my kid for me real quick?’” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12078901\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12078901\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-affordabilitychildcare00326_TV_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-affordabilitychildcare00326_TV_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-affordabilitychildcare00326_TV_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/04/260401-affordabilitychildcare00326_TV_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Annie Malekzadeh walks her kids home after school in Pleasant Hill on April 1, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Malekzadeh tutors on the side to make some money and said she’s constantly revising the family budget as grocery and health insurance prices go up.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I’m looking at where can we cut costs and what bundle can I use or coupon can I use to save money? I do most of our shopping at Costco now because buying in bulk is usually cheaper,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Her family is also taking fewer trips, but Malezadeh said, despite these compromises, she’s grateful she has been able to afford raising three kids.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I feel very fortunate that I got through having our second kid and didn’t feel done,” she said. “Instead of living with the potential of regretting it for the rest of my life, I was able to say, ‘Hey, can we have another one? Can we work that into the budget?’”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cp>Babies and toddlers with special needs are not getting the therapies they’re entitled to receive in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco\">San Francisco\u003c/a> in a timely way, if at all, according to a survey released Monday of more than 400 early child educators and providers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://felton.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/WHITE-PAPER_EII-Equity-Taskforce_11-2025.pdf\">report, from a task force made up of early childhood education advocates\u003c/a>, found the agencies responsible for delivering them are disconnected from one another. These challenges make it \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11979071/californias-low-income-families-face-barriers-to-in-home-therapy-for-infants-with-developmental-delays\">especially hard for immigrant and low-income families\u003c/a> to access services aimed at supporting children’s language, physical and social-emotional development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The report calls for building a system that better coordinates services — something the San Francisco Department of Early Childhood is looking into.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of programs are fragmented, and it’s up to us to start putting those pieces together,” said Ingrid Mezquita, director of the department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R43631\">Federal law guarantees\u003c/a> services like speech therapy, occupational therapy and physical therapy for children under the age of 3 who may have a disability. Experts say getting these services during the early years, when children’s brains are the most adaptable, can head off the need for special education services when they’re older. Any delay can have long-term consequences for their development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076657\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12076657 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1126\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1-1536x865.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1-1200x675.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Babies and toddlers with special needs in San Francisco are not receiving therapies they’re entitled to in a timely way — if at all — according to a new survey of more than 400 early childhood educators and providers. \u003ccite>(Andrew Stelzer for KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“And yet we see time and time again, particularly for children in certain zip codes, children of certain races, children who speak certain languages, that they are waiting long periods of time or never being connected to the services,” said Heidi Lamar, program director for Compass Family Services’ Children Center, and coleader of the task force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Usually, caregivers or pediatricians who observe a developmental concern refer families to the Golden Gate Regional Center, a nonprofit responsible for getting children assessed, determining their eligibility and arranging early intervention services. The services are funded by a blend of state and federal grants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If a child needs therapies after turning 3, their families must go to the San Francisco Unified School District to request continuing services.[aside postID=news_11979071 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/03/240309-EARLY-START-DEVELOPMENTAL-DELAYS-MD-02-KQED-1-1020x680.jpg']But early childhood educators and providers reported in the survey that limited coordination and communications between these systems and underfunding of the services often result in delayed and unequal access to the therapies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The report noted that Black and Latinx students, and children with special needs, scored the lowest in SFUSD’s kindergarten readiness evaluations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karla Ramos said her daughter, who has Down syndrome, lost access to therapies after turning three last Fall and had to wait months to restart them through the school district.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Imagine a child who’s already struggling — she’s still in diapers, and she just learned to walk in October — still maneuvering and learning a lot of things,” Ramos said. “I felt that it’s a great disservice for children with needs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some child care programs have taken it upon themselves to hire in-house early intervention specialists, but have a hard time recruiting and retaining them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mezquita said the city is also looking into “building the capacity” at early learning programs to provide the services to children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076655\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076655\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260130-sfchildcareaccess00146_TV_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260130-sfchildcareaccess00146_TV_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260130-sfchildcareaccess00146_TV_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260130-sfchildcareaccess00146_TV_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Victoria Golobordko walks a child at Daycare Bumblebee in San Francisco on Jan. 30, 2026. San Francisco is expanding access to child care by offering 50% discounts to middle- and upper-middle-income earners in an effort to tackle affordability issues in one of the most expensive cities in the country. Daycare Bumblebee is trying to get approval to enter the city’s Early Learning For All system. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Besides calling for better coordination between child care providers, the school district, regional centers and health care providers, the task force also urged the city to fund the “true cost” of supporting children with disabilities, including smaller class sizes staffed with specialists.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lamar said most of the people involved in caring for or providing early intervention services want to make improvements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s interest, there’s motivation, there is care,” she said. “There are also some feelings of being daunted by the huge workload it’s going to take to really make sure that no child is falling through the cracks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Babies and toddlers with special needs are not getting the therapies they’re entitled to receive in \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco\">San Francisco\u003c/a> in a timely way, if at all, according to a survey released Monday of more than 400 early child educators and providers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The \u003ca href=\"https://felton.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/03/WHITE-PAPER_EII-Equity-Taskforce_11-2025.pdf\">report, from a task force made up of early childhood education advocates\u003c/a>, found the agencies responsible for delivering them are disconnected from one another. These challenges make it \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11979071/californias-low-income-families-face-barriers-to-in-home-therapy-for-infants-with-developmental-delays\">especially hard for immigrant and low-income families\u003c/a> to access services aimed at supporting children’s language, physical and social-emotional development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The report calls for building a system that better coordinates services — something the San Francisco Department of Early Childhood is looking into.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of programs are fragmented, and it’s up to us to start putting those pieces together,” said Ingrid Mezquita, director of the department.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003ca href=\"https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/R43631\">Federal law guarantees\u003c/a> services like speech therapy, occupational therapy and physical therapy for children under the age of 3 who may have a disability. Experts say getting these services during the early years, when children’s brains are the most adaptable, can head off the need for special education services when they’re older. Any delay can have long-term consequences for their development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076657\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12076657 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1126\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1-160x90.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1-1536x865.jpg 1536w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/Yolanda-WIlson-2-kids_qed-1-1200x675.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Babies and toddlers with special needs in San Francisco are not receiving therapies they’re entitled to in a timely way — if at all — according to a new survey of more than 400 early childhood educators and providers. \u003ccite>(Andrew Stelzer for KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“And yet we see time and time again, particularly for children in certain zip codes, children of certain races, children who speak certain languages, that they are waiting long periods of time or never being connected to the services,” said Heidi Lamar, program director for Compass Family Services’ Children Center, and coleader of the task force.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Usually, caregivers or pediatricians who observe a developmental concern refer families to the Golden Gate Regional Center, a nonprofit responsible for getting children assessed, determining their eligibility and arranging early intervention services. The services are funded by a blend of state and federal grants.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>If a child needs therapies after turning 3, their families must go to the San Francisco Unified School District to request continuing services.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But early childhood educators and providers reported in the survey that limited coordination and communications between these systems and underfunding of the services often result in delayed and unequal access to the therapies.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The report noted that Black and Latinx students, and children with special needs, scored the lowest in SFUSD’s kindergarten readiness evaluations.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Karla Ramos said her daughter, who has Down syndrome, lost access to therapies after turning three last Fall and had to wait months to restart them through the school district.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Imagine a child who’s already struggling — she’s still in diapers, and she just learned to walk in October — still maneuvering and learning a lot of things,” Ramos said. “I felt that it’s a great disservice for children with needs.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some child care programs have taken it upon themselves to hire in-house early intervention specialists, but have a hard time recruiting and retaining them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mezquita said the city is also looking into “building the capacity” at early learning programs to provide the services to children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076655\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076655\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260130-sfchildcareaccess00146_TV_qed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260130-sfchildcareaccess00146_TV_qed.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260130-sfchildcareaccess00146_TV_qed-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260130-sfchildcareaccess00146_TV_qed-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Victoria Golobordko walks a child at Daycare Bumblebee in San Francisco on Jan. 30, 2026. San Francisco is expanding access to child care by offering 50% discounts to middle- and upper-middle-income earners in an effort to tackle affordability issues in one of the most expensive cities in the country. Daycare Bumblebee is trying to get approval to enter the city’s Early Learning For All system. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Besides calling for better coordination between child care providers, the school district, regional centers and health care providers, the task force also urged the city to fund the “true cost” of supporting children with disabilities, including smaller class sizes staffed with specialists.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lamar said most of the people involved in caring for or providing early intervention services want to make improvements.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“There’s interest, there’s motivation, there is care,” she said. “There are also some feelings of being daunted by the huge workload it’s going to take to really make sure that no child is falling through the cracks.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>In Kristi Fowler’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/transitional-kindergarten\">transitional kindergarten\u003c/a> classroom, 4-year-olds learn math by counting steps as they jump and by sorting objects by shape or color.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They can skip-count by 10s to get up to 100 and recognize patterns in a numerical sequence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>“\u003c/em>I used to think that TK [students] were just babies, and they can’t do that kind of stuff,” Fowler said. “They can, and they love it, and they’re excited to do it, and they’re really good at it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Getting these students to learn through play is one goal at Yokayo Elementary School, where Fowler works, in the North Coast city of Ukiah. Another is to ensure the skills they gain in TK will last throughout elementary school.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The district is one of dozens in California hoping to maximize the benefits of transitional kindergarten, which this year became \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11989955/what-to-expect-when-enrolling-your-child-in-transitional-kindergarten\">free and available for all 4-year-olds across the state\u003c/a>. Gov. Gavin Newsom called the \u003ca href=\"https://calbudgetcenter.org/resources/how-california-is-expanding-transitional-kindergarten/\">$15 billion rollout\u003c/a> “a huge opportunity to invest in our kids and their future” and narrow the \u003ca href=\"https://www.ap.org/news-highlights/spotlights/2026/kindergarten-readiness-varies-widely-by-income-new-data-shows-cities-are-stepping-in-to-help/\">gap in kindergarten readiness\u003c/a> — such as the ability to socialize, pay attention and regulate emotions — between kids from lower-income and higher-income families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the enthusiasm for TK is tempered by concerns that the investment won’t pay off if the program’s benefits fade over time. Studies have shown that children who attend preschool start kindergarten with a measurable advantage over classmates who didn’t participate, but those gains seem to disappear by roughly the third grade. In Tennessee, a multi-year study found that 4-year-olds who attended a public pre-kindergarten program fared worse academically by the time they reached sixth grade than those who didn’t participate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076149\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076149\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-04-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-04-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-04-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-04-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Students work on a math question in their second grade class with teacher Yadira DeLuna at Yokayo Elementary School in Ukiah on Jan. 6, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>California \u003ca href=\"https://laist.com/news/education/early-childhood-education-pre-k/california-legislature-newsom-transitional-kindergarten-budget-research\">doesn’t have a plan to evaluate\u003c/a> the effectiveness of universal TK. And while the California Department of Education has guidelines on \u003ca href=\"https://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/cd/re/psfoundations.asp\">what students should learn, \u003c/a>there is no mandated curriculum — leaving TK programs potentially vulnerable to repeating the pitfalls in Tennessee’s program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some districts are seeking out best practices to avoid the same fate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Ukiah Unified, a high-poverty school district where a large percentage of its 5,800 students are in foster care or are English learners from Spanish-speaking households, administrators are determined to ensure the TK students are set up for success later on. They’re supporting an initiative at Yokayo Elementary, where teachers emphasize learning math skills in TK and building on what students know as they move to the next grade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The school is focusing on math because more than 60% of California students \u003ca href=\"https://edsource.org/2025/california-students-struggle-math-english/742613#:~:text=%E2%80%9CProficient%20is%20a%20pretty%20high,and%20transparency%20from%20the%20state.\">are not proficient in the subject\u003c/a>, and studies show that students’ early math skills predict their academic achievement in middle and even high school.[aside postID=news_12052609 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2025/08/240520-TKParentsDilemma-32-BL_qed.jpg']“If they don’t get that foundation, then it’s a house of cards,” said Deborah Stipek, an expert on early childhood and elementary education at Stanford’s Graduate School of Education. “And as they make an effort to learn more advanced math, it falls apart because they don’t really have that basic understanding.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When students are forced to reach too high when they start a new grade, they can feel lost and frustrated. If they repeat something they already know, they can lose interest in learning, Stipek said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Yokayo, teachers from TK to third grade get together to align their curriculum and standards to ensure students make academic progress from one grade to the next.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a type of collaboration that might seem intuitive, but that runs counter to the way schools are typically organized. Teachers usually talk to their colleagues from the same grade level and follow pre-designed lesson plans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Steven Kellner, director of district leadership and state policy for the nonprofit California Education Partners, said that creates a “herky-jerky” learning experience for students.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“‘Kindergarten’s this way and first grade’s that way,’ and they have nothing to do with each other,” he said of districts’ typical approach. “Transitional kindergarten is great, but if it’s not connected to the other grades, it’s not super helpful.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ed Partners, which is dedicated to improving student outcomes in under-resourced districts, is helping dozens of school districts across the state develop what it calls “preschool through third grade coherence.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076152\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076152\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-13-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-13-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-13-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-13-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Students run during gym class at Yokayo Elementary School in Ukiah on Jan. 6, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The nonprofit pairs \u003ca href=\"https://centerx.gseis.ucla.edu/math-project/\">university experts\u003c/a> with teams of teachers, principals and school district leaders to share math teaching strategies that work across the early elementary school years. The teams receive ongoing coaching to improve the way they teach math, based on how much progress students make between the beginning and end of each school year. Stipek is an advisor to the nonprofit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yokayo Elementary is in the third year of implementing this strategy. In Fowler’s classroom, for example, students play a game called “How many ways?” where they’re asked to represent the number 4 and share their reasoning with classmates. Some students drew four dots or four hearts, while others wrote their names four times on the whiteboard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the time they get to second grade, in teacher Yadira De Luna’s classroom, they’ll perform the same task but with increasing difficulty. One recent morning, she asked her students to show multiple ways to represent the number 175. Some drew 175 circles or bars, while others filled their sheet of paper with as many addition or subtraction formulas they could think of that end in 175.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This exercise lets students see that there is more than one way to get to the right answer. It also encourages them to articulate their reasoning in front of their peers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076151\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076151\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-10-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-10-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-10-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-10-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Principal Dana Milani speaks with second grade students about a math question in their class at Yokayo Elementary School in Ukiah on Jan. 6, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“By allowing them to play with numbers and to look at patterns and to see what they look like in the real world, that’s where you’re going to get that love of math,” said Dana Milani, the school’s principal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Milani spent 15 years teaching fifth grade at Yokayo Elementary before switching to administration. She said having transitional kindergarten at her school has made her appreciate the opportunity to nurture young children’s love of learning, while being careful not to stifle it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re not making [math lessons] too long, we’re not having them get to where they’re like, ‘Ugh, do we have to do math again?’” she said. “It’s this really fun time where they get to use problem-solving skills. When you’re 4, problem-solving is a big deal, and if they can figure out how to problem-solve socially, they can do it academically.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers say engaging in math activities early on teaches young kids cognitive skills (like memorizing and organizing) that can be applied to other areas of life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076150\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076150\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-05-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-05-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-05-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-05-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Students work on a math question in their second grade class with teacher Yadira DeLuna at Yokayo Elementary School in Ukiah on Jan. 6, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Recently, \u003ca href=\"https://edsource.org/2026/clarifying-transitional-kindergartens-curriculum-keeps-kids-playing/751419\">the state proposed redefining transitional kindergarten\u003c/a> in official documents to clarify that, instead of using a “modified kindergarten curriculum,” TK instruction should prioritize play as a form of learning. The California Department of Education also encourages school districts to align \u003ca href=\"https://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/gs/p3/#:~:text=Successful%20P%2D3%20alignment%20requires%20cross%2Dsector,families%2C%20and%20continuity%20of%20pathways.\">preschool to third grade\u003c/a> teachings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But with no standard statewide curriculum, Stipek said she’s heard a variety of stories about what goes on in TK classrooms — from a “drill and kill” approach, where “all the kids do is sit and do worksheets” to the “incredibly wonderful, playful learning that’s going on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said one reason Tennessee’s Pre-K program failed kids was that it rigidly focused on knowing letters and numbers, instead of exploring learning through interaction and play.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An evaluation of the fully expanded program would help California state leaders and educators figure out how to fine-tune TK, Stipek said. So far, the Legislature has not committed funding for a study.[aside postID=news_11989955 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2024/06/240520-TKPARENTSDILEMMA-07-BL-KQED-1020x680.jpg']In the meantime, the Ukiah Unified School District plans to track its students’ progress from this first year of universal TK, and Ed Partners will evaluate the districts that implemented preschool through third grade alignment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The district’s superintendent, Deborah Kubin, said so far, TK seems to be working. Ukiah Unified used its state funding to add a new building and playground just for 4-year-olds on Yokayo’s sprawling campus. Each of the two spacious classrooms has a teacher and a teacher’s aide, and classes are capped at no more than 20 students to ensure the kids get the attention that they need.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Students who attended the program when the district began offering it scored 7% higher on their third grade assessments last year than students who didn’t go to TK.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Launching the program “definitely has been a challenge, but as we’re seeing in our results, the students are doing better,” Kubin said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Parent Katie Sims said at the beginning of the school year, her son, Sawyer, had a hard time transitioning from a small day care to Fowler’s classroom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But once he settled in, he did have a great experience with the teachers,” Sims said. “He absolutely loves going to school now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>TK wasn’t an option when her older son, who’s in seventh grade, began his educational journey.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My youngest son is going to have an easier transition into kindergarten and actual academics, versus my older son, who just got kind of thrown in and didn’t know what to expect,” Sims said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"title": "California Invested Big in Transitional Kindergarten. How 1 School Is Making the Most of It | KQED",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>In Kristi Fowler’s \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/transitional-kindergarten\">transitional kindergarten\u003c/a> classroom, 4-year-olds learn math by counting steps as they jump and by sorting objects by shape or color.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>They can skip-count by 10s to get up to 100 and recognize patterns in a numerical sequence.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003cem>“\u003c/em>I used to think that TK [students] were just babies, and they can’t do that kind of stuff,” Fowler said. “They can, and they love it, and they’re excited to do it, and they’re really good at it.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Getting these students to learn through play is one goal at Yokayo Elementary School, where Fowler works, in the North Coast city of Ukiah. Another is to ensure the skills they gain in TK will last throughout elementary school.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The district is one of dozens in California hoping to maximize the benefits of transitional kindergarten, which this year became \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11989955/what-to-expect-when-enrolling-your-child-in-transitional-kindergarten\">free and available for all 4-year-olds across the state\u003c/a>. Gov. Gavin Newsom called the \u003ca href=\"https://calbudgetcenter.org/resources/how-california-is-expanding-transitional-kindergarten/\">$15 billion rollout\u003c/a> “a huge opportunity to invest in our kids and their future” and narrow the \u003ca href=\"https://www.ap.org/news-highlights/spotlights/2026/kindergarten-readiness-varies-widely-by-income-new-data-shows-cities-are-stepping-in-to-help/\">gap in kindergarten readiness\u003c/a> — such as the ability to socialize, pay attention and regulate emotions — between kids from lower-income and higher-income families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But the enthusiasm for TK is tempered by concerns that the investment won’t pay off if the program’s benefits fade over time. Studies have shown that children who attend preschool start kindergarten with a measurable advantage over classmates who didn’t participate, but those gains seem to disappear by roughly the third grade. In Tennessee, a multi-year study found that 4-year-olds who attended a public pre-kindergarten program fared worse academically by the time they reached sixth grade than those who didn’t participate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076149\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076149\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-04-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-04-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-04-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-04-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Students work on a math question in their second grade class with teacher Yadira DeLuna at Yokayo Elementary School in Ukiah on Jan. 6, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>California \u003ca href=\"https://laist.com/news/education/early-childhood-education-pre-k/california-legislature-newsom-transitional-kindergarten-budget-research\">doesn’t have a plan to evaluate\u003c/a> the effectiveness of universal TK. And while the California Department of Education has guidelines on \u003ca href=\"https://www.cde.ca.gov/sp/cd/re/psfoundations.asp\">what students should learn, \u003c/a>there is no mandated curriculum — leaving TK programs potentially vulnerable to repeating the pitfalls in Tennessee’s program.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some districts are seeking out best practices to avoid the same fate.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Ukiah Unified, a high-poverty school district where a large percentage of its 5,800 students are in foster care or are English learners from Spanish-speaking households, administrators are determined to ensure the TK students are set up for success later on. They’re supporting an initiative at Yokayo Elementary, where teachers emphasize learning math skills in TK and building on what students know as they move to the next grade.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The school is focusing on math because more than 60% of California students \u003ca href=\"https://edsource.org/2025/california-students-struggle-math-english/742613#:~:text=%E2%80%9CProficient%20is%20a%20pretty%20high,and%20transparency%20from%20the%20state.\">are not proficient in the subject\u003c/a>, and studies show that students’ early math skills predict their academic achievement in middle and even high school.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“If they don’t get that foundation, then it’s a house of cards,” said Deborah Stipek, an expert on early childhood and elementary education at Stanford’s Graduate School of Education. “And as they make an effort to learn more advanced math, it falls apart because they don’t really have that basic understanding.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>When students are forced to reach too high when they start a new grade, they can feel lost and frustrated. If they repeat something they already know, they can lose interest in learning, Stipek said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>At Yokayo, teachers from TK to third grade get together to align their curriculum and standards to ensure students make academic progress from one grade to the next.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>It’s a type of collaboration that might seem intuitive, but that runs counter to the way schools are typically organized. Teachers usually talk to their colleagues from the same grade level and follow pre-designed lesson plans.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Steven Kellner, director of district leadership and state policy for the nonprofit California Education Partners, said that creates a “herky-jerky” learning experience for students.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“‘Kindergarten’s this way and first grade’s that way,’ and they have nothing to do with each other,” he said of districts’ typical approach. “Transitional kindergarten is great, but if it’s not connected to the other grades, it’s not super helpful.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ed Partners, which is dedicated to improving student outcomes in under-resourced districts, is helping dozens of school districts across the state develop what it calls “preschool through third grade coherence.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076152\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076152\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-13-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-13-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-13-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-13-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Students run during gym class at Yokayo Elementary School in Ukiah on Jan. 6, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>The nonprofit pairs \u003ca href=\"https://centerx.gseis.ucla.edu/math-project/\">university experts\u003c/a> with teams of teachers, principals and school district leaders to share math teaching strategies that work across the early elementary school years. The teams receive ongoing coaching to improve the way they teach math, based on how much progress students make between the beginning and end of each school year. Stipek is an advisor to the nonprofit.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Yokayo Elementary is in the third year of implementing this strategy. In Fowler’s classroom, for example, students play a game called “How many ways?” where they’re asked to represent the number 4 and share their reasoning with classmates. Some students drew four dots or four hearts, while others wrote their names four times on the whiteboard.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>By the time they get to second grade, in teacher Yadira De Luna’s classroom, they’ll perform the same task but with increasing difficulty. One recent morning, she asked her students to show multiple ways to represent the number 175. Some drew 175 circles or bars, while others filled their sheet of paper with as many addition or subtraction formulas they could think of that end in 175.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>This exercise lets students see that there is more than one way to get to the right answer. It also encourages them to articulate their reasoning in front of their peers.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076151\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076151\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-10-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-10-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-10-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-10-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Principal Dana Milani speaks with second grade students about a math question in their class at Yokayo Elementary School in Ukiah on Jan. 6, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“By allowing them to play with numbers and to look at patterns and to see what they look like in the real world, that’s where you’re going to get that love of math,” said Dana Milani, the school’s principal.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Milani spent 15 years teaching fifth grade at Yokayo Elementary before switching to administration. She said having transitional kindergarten at her school has made her appreciate the opportunity to nurture young children’s love of learning, while being careful not to stifle it.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re not making [math lessons] too long, we’re not having them get to where they’re like, ‘Ugh, do we have to do math again?’” she said. “It’s this really fun time where they get to use problem-solving skills. When you’re 4, problem-solving is a big deal, and if they can figure out how to problem-solve socially, they can do it academically.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Researchers say engaging in math activities early on teaches young kids cognitive skills (like memorizing and organizing) that can be applied to other areas of life.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12076150\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12076150\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-05-BL-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-05-BL-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-05-BL-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/03/260106-PREVENTINGPRESCHOOLFADEOUT-05-BL-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Students work on a math question in their second grade class with teacher Yadira DeLuna at Yokayo Elementary School in Ukiah on Jan. 6, 2026. \u003ccite>(Beth LaBerge/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Recently, \u003ca href=\"https://edsource.org/2026/clarifying-transitional-kindergartens-curriculum-keeps-kids-playing/751419\">the state proposed redefining transitional kindergarten\u003c/a> in official documents to clarify that, instead of using a “modified kindergarten curriculum,” TK instruction should prioritize play as a form of learning. The California Department of Education also encourages school districts to align \u003ca href=\"https://www.cde.ca.gov/ci/gs/p3/#:~:text=Successful%20P%2D3%20alignment%20requires%20cross%2Dsector,families%2C%20and%20continuity%20of%20pathways.\">preschool to third grade\u003c/a> teachings.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>But with no standard statewide curriculum, Stipek said she’s heard a variety of stories about what goes on in TK classrooms — from a “drill and kill” approach, where “all the kids do is sit and do worksheets” to the “incredibly wonderful, playful learning that’s going on.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>She said one reason Tennessee’s Pre-K program failed kids was that it rigidly focused on knowing letters and numbers, instead of exploring learning through interaction and play.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>An evaluation of the fully expanded program would help California state leaders and educators figure out how to fine-tune TK, Stipek said. So far, the Legislature has not committed funding for a study.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>In the meantime, the Ukiah Unified School District plans to track its students’ progress from this first year of universal TK, and Ed Partners will evaluate the districts that implemented preschool through third grade alignment.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The district’s superintendent, Deborah Kubin, said so far, TK seems to be working. Ukiah Unified used its state funding to add a new building and playground just for 4-year-olds on Yokayo’s sprawling campus. Each of the two spacious classrooms has a teacher and a teacher’s aide, and classes are capped at no more than 20 students to ensure the kids get the attention that they need.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Students who attended the program when the district began offering it scored 7% higher on their third grade assessments last year than students who didn’t go to TK.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Launching the program “definitely has been a challenge, but as we’re seeing in our results, the students are doing better,” Kubin said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Parent Katie Sims said at the beginning of the school year, her son, Sawyer, had a hard time transitioning from a small day care to Fowler’s classroom.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But once he settled in, he did have a great experience with the teachers,” Sims said. “He absolutely loves going to school now.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>TK wasn’t an option when her older son, who’s in seventh grade, began his educational journey.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“My youngest son is going to have an easier transition into kindergarten and actual academics, versus my older son, who just got kind of thrown in and didn’t know what to expect,” Sims said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"slug": "oakland-mayor-barbara-lee-champions-alameda-county-diaper-drive-and-early-childhood-learning",
"title": "Oakland Mayor Barbara Lee Champions Free Diaper Campaign With an Early Learning Message",
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"content": "\u003cp>Oakland Mayor \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/barbara-lee\">Barbara Lee\u003c/a> announced a new campaign to distribute free diapers and wipes to California families struggling to afford these essential products on Monday — while raising awareness about early childhood development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pink and blue balloons transformed Oakland City Hall into a baby shower on Monday to announce the initiative, made possible through a public-private partnership. The products were labeled with the message “Diaper Time Is Talk Time,” to encourage parents and caregivers to make meaningful connections with infants and toddlers even during a simple routine like a diaper change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Diaper time is not just diaper time. It’s connection time, and connection time is brain-building time,” Lee said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The diapers are being distributed throughout Alameda County and other parts of the state to address diaper insecurity — an issue Lee championed when she served in the U.S. House of Representatives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lower-income families cannot use federal aid to pay for diapers, which cost more than $100 each month per child. \u003ca href=\"https://rapidsurveyproject.com/article/caregivers-of-young-children-report-difficulty-accessing-essentials-from-food-pantries/\">In a nationwide survey\u003c/a>, one in four parents reported going to food pantries for diapers and/or wipes, according to the Stanford Center on Early Childhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12074300\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12074300 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-08-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-08-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-08-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-08-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Boxes of diapers stacked at a press event announcing the launch of line of “Diaper Time Is Talk Time,” at City Hall in Oakland on Feb. 23, 2026. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When they don’t have enough diapers, parents often reuse them or resort to using menstrual pads or cloths to keep babies clean and dry. Not having enough diapers can also prevent them from enrolling their babies in child care programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Citing state public health data, Lee said diaper insecurity has contributed to about 40,000 hospital visits each year to treat severe diaper rashes or urinary tract infections.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Most of those visits are covered by Medi-Cal, so we’re paying for diaper needs but in the most painful, harmful and expensive and insufficient way possible,” Lee said. “This is a public health issue. It’s an economic issue and an equity issue. And I know that we can do better.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Congress, Lee proposed \u003ca href=\"https://wclp.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Final-Rep-Lee-diaper-letter.pdf\">eliminating\u003c/a> sales tax on diapers and bolstering\u003ca href=\"https://delauro.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/delauro-lee-introduce-legislation-address-diaper-need\"> diaper banks\u003c/a> that distribute free products to families in need.[aside postID=news_12070762 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/240911-CHILDCARE-REAX-MD-01_qed.jpg']Her advocacy led the leader of SupplyBank.org, an Oakland-based nonprofit, to use its bulk purchasing power to buy massive amounts of diapers at reduced prices and distribute them to community organizations that serve families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, Alameda County \u003ca href=\"https://supplybank.org/free-alameda-county-diaper-program-launched/\">launched \u003c/a>a nearly $6 million program to pass out diapers and wipes to health clinics, family resource centers, food-aid offices for women and children and other community-based organizations that serve families over a three-year period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The diapers and wipes initially had no branding. But under a \u003ca href=\"https://www.clintonfoundation.org/programs/education-health-equity/too-small-fail/\">partnership\u003c/a> with Too Small to Fail, an early childhood initiative of the Clinton Foundation, the products now feature a smiling teddy bear, nudging parents and caregivers to talk or sing to little ones during diaper changes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Benito Delgado-Olson, executive director of \u003ca href=\"http://supplybank.org\">SupplyBank.org\u003c/a>, said the new diaper designs not only offer “smart and gentle” prompts for parents and caregivers to engage with babies, they also signal to organizations distributing the diapers that the products are “just as good as something that you or I would buy in the store.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Almost 60% of children in the United States start kindergarten unprepared, lagging behind their peers in critical language and reading skills, the Clinton Foundation reports. Engaging in language-rich interactions can improve brain development during the first three years of childhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12074303\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12074303 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-11-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-11-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-11-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-11-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Benito Delgado-Olson, executive director of Supplybank.org, speaks at City Hall in Oakland on Feb. 23, 2026. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>These seemingly small interactions add up in big ways to strengthen bonds and support healthy development,” said Perri Chinalai, a managing director of the Too Small to Fail initiative. “And we also know that many kids aren’t getting the support they need to learn, grow and thrive. Gaps in opportunities emerge early, and if not addressed, these disparities often widen over time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Delgado-Olson said his organization also distributes diapers to community organizations in Santa Clara and San Francisco counties, as well as Merced, Kern and several rural counties across the state. He said the new partnership will make the diapers and wipes more widely accessible to public agencies and nonprofit organizations across California this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Attorney General Rob Bonta praised the public-private partnership in Alameda County as a model for other parts of the state, particularly at a time when the Trump administration threatens to cut federal funds for child care and other social services for families with young children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Filling gaps like this is critical,” Bonta said Monday. “It makes life just a bit more manageable and more affordable for hardworking families.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003cp>Oakland Mayor \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/barbara-lee\">Barbara Lee\u003c/a> announced a new campaign to distribute free diapers and wipes to California families struggling to afford these essential products on Monday — while raising awareness about early childhood development.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Pink and blue balloons transformed Oakland City Hall into a baby shower on Monday to announce the initiative, made possible through a public-private partnership. The products were labeled with the message “Diaper Time Is Talk Time,” to encourage parents and caregivers to make meaningful connections with infants and toddlers even during a simple routine like a diaper change.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Diaper time is not just diaper time. It’s connection time, and connection time is brain-building time,” Lee said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The diapers are being distributed throughout Alameda County and other parts of the state to address diaper insecurity — an issue Lee championed when she served in the U.S. House of Representatives.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Lower-income families cannot use federal aid to pay for diapers, which cost more than $100 each month per child. \u003ca href=\"https://rapidsurveyproject.com/article/caregivers-of-young-children-report-difficulty-accessing-essentials-from-food-pantries/\">In a nationwide survey\u003c/a>, one in four parents reported going to food pantries for diapers and/or wipes, according to the Stanford Center on Early Childhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12074300\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12074300 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-08-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-08-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-08-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-08-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Boxes of diapers stacked at a press event announcing the launch of line of “Diaper Time Is Talk Time,” at City Hall in Oakland on Feb. 23, 2026. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>When they don’t have enough diapers, parents often reuse them or resort to using menstrual pads or cloths to keep babies clean and dry. Not having enough diapers can also prevent them from enrolling their babies in child care programs.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Citing state public health data, Lee said diaper insecurity has contributed to about 40,000 hospital visits each year to treat severe diaper rashes or urinary tract infections.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Most of those visits are covered by Medi-Cal, so we’re paying for diaper needs but in the most painful, harmful and expensive and insufficient way possible,” Lee said. “This is a public health issue. It’s an economic issue and an equity issue. And I know that we can do better.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>In Congress, Lee proposed \u003ca href=\"https://wclp.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/Final-Rep-Lee-diaper-letter.pdf\">eliminating\u003c/a> sales tax on diapers and bolstering\u003ca href=\"https://delauro.house.gov/media-center/press-releases/delauro-lee-introduce-legislation-address-diaper-need\"> diaper banks\u003c/a> that distribute free products to families in need.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>Her advocacy led the leader of SupplyBank.org, an Oakland-based nonprofit, to use its bulk purchasing power to buy massive amounts of diapers at reduced prices and distribute them to community organizations that serve families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last year, Alameda County \u003ca href=\"https://supplybank.org/free-alameda-county-diaper-program-launched/\">launched \u003c/a>a nearly $6 million program to pass out diapers and wipes to health clinics, family resource centers, food-aid offices for women and children and other community-based organizations that serve families over a three-year period.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The diapers and wipes initially had no branding. But under a \u003ca href=\"https://www.clintonfoundation.org/programs/education-health-equity/too-small-fail/\">partnership\u003c/a> with Too Small to Fail, an early childhood initiative of the Clinton Foundation, the products now feature a smiling teddy bear, nudging parents and caregivers to talk or sing to little ones during diaper changes.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Benito Delgado-Olson, executive director of \u003ca href=\"http://supplybank.org\">SupplyBank.org\u003c/a>, said the new diaper designs not only offer “smart and gentle” prompts for parents and caregivers to engage with babies, they also signal to organizations distributing the diapers that the products are “just as good as something that you or I would buy in the store.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Almost 60% of children in the United States start kindergarten unprepared, lagging behind their peers in critical language and reading skills, the Clinton Foundation reports. Engaging in language-rich interactions can improve brain development during the first three years of childhood.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12074303\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-12074303 size-full\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-11-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-11-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-11-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260223-DIAPER-DISTRIBUTION-MD-11-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Benito Delgado-Olson, executive director of Supplybank.org, speaks at City Hall in Oakland on Feb. 23, 2026. \u003ccite>(Martin do Nascimento/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>\u003cstrong>“\u003c/strong>These seemingly small interactions add up in big ways to strengthen bonds and support healthy development,” said Perri Chinalai, a managing director of the Too Small to Fail initiative. “And we also know that many kids aren’t getting the support they need to learn, grow and thrive. Gaps in opportunities emerge early, and if not addressed, these disparities often widen over time.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Delgado-Olson said his organization also distributes diapers to community organizations in Santa Clara and San Francisco counties, as well as Merced, Kern and several rural counties across the state. He said the new partnership will make the diapers and wipes more widely accessible to public agencies and nonprofit organizations across California this year.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Attorney General Rob Bonta praised the public-private partnership in Alameda County as a model for other parts of the state, particularly at a time when the Trump administration threatens to cut federal funds for child care and other social services for families with young children.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Filling gaps like this is critical,” Bonta said Monday. “It makes life just a bit more manageable and more affordable for hardworking families.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003c/div>\u003c/p>",
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"content": "\u003cp>When Daniel Zimmerman heard that \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/tag/san-francisco\">San Francisco\u003c/a> would offer free or low-cost child care to more families, he went online to make sure he and his wife qualify for a discount and started dreaming about having another baby.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>For the last few years, the couple has been paying about $3,500 per month to send their children, ages 2 and 5, to a Spanish immersion preschool. Zimmerman said even though they earn six figures — he’s a nurse, and she’s a dietician — keeping up with the high cost of child care leaves them “basically in the red every month.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We’re not saving money, but we figured, especially when they’re young, we’ll just weather the storm until they get into public school,” he said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad fullwidth]\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The prospect of getting financial aid made him think they could raise three kids in the city. But he may need to brace for some snags when he starts looking for child care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under guidelines set by the city Department of Early Childhood, income-eligible families can only select from nearly 600 child care programs within a pre-approved network. That might limit parents’ choices at a time when San Francisco is \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12069711/san-francisco-expands-child-care-subsidies-to-tackle-affordability-issues\">expanding child care subsidies\u003c/a> to middle-income earners as part of a broader push to make the city affordable for families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, Mayor Daniel Lurie announced that a family of four making less than $234,000 a year can get free child care, and starting in July, those earning up to $312,000 annually will qualify for a \u003ca href=\"https://provider.sfdec.org/wp-content/uploads/ELFA-Center-FCC-Rates-FY25-26.pdf\">50% discount\u003c/a>. The changes put San Francisco ahead of other major cities in offering nearly universal access to child care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12071945\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12071945\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00075_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00075_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00075_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00075_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Children play at an in-home child care business called Daycare Bumblebee in San Francisco on Jan. 30, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Up to 12,000 kids under age 5 will be eligible for the newly expanded subsidies — though fewer than half are expected to enroll — paid by \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11948690/business-tax-provides-crucial-funding-for-early-childhood-education-and-care-in-san-francisco\">funds from Baby Prop C, a 3.5% tax on commercial property leases\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of people are excited and have a lot of questions,” said Mark Ryle, CEO of Wu Yee Children’s Services, an agency contracted by the city to refer families who qualify for subsidies to child care providers with available spaces. “We’ve seen a pretty significant uptick in inquiries around the tuition credit program.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some families are discovering, though, that getting public funding for child care comes with a catch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>The early years matter. Tell us what you want to learn about early childhood education and care by \u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"https://survey.alchemer.com/s3/8658266/ChildhoodAudience\">\u003cstrong>\u003cem>clicking here\u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>.\u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>When Danielle Eichenbaum learned she qualified for the city’s subsidized child care, her toddler was already enrolled in Daycare Bumblebee in the West Portal neighborhood. She wanted him to stay — not only with the caregivers he already bonded with, but because they were teaching him Russian and exposing him to music, karate and other enriching activities.[aside postID=news_12069711 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/260115-SFCHILDCARESUBSIDIES00057_TV-KQED.jpg']But the day care wasn’t part of the city-funded network, called Early Learning for All, or ELFA.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I cried when we left. It was such a wonderful program,” she said. “His program now is great, too, but I miss the other one.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bumblebee’s owner, Lyuba Schkolnik, decided to join ELFA to help Eichenbaum. But she soon discovered the process could take more than a year, requiring her to complete several early childhood education classes and undergo evaluations to determine if her program meets the city’s \u003ca href=\"https://provider.sfdec.org/wp-content/uploads/Quality-Standard_Updated_052125.pdf\">quality standards\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Schkolnik, who left a marketing career to open her day care, didn’t mind taking the classes and hopes to get in. Joining the network comes with perks: Last year, in-home day care owners like her got $16,000 stipends to help them earn a living wage, and $12,000 to boost their assistants’ pay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But the fact it takes so long for someone to become a provider within the system is a little bit disheartening because the [expanded subsidies] are supposed to launch shortly, and we want to help families,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other parents expressed frustration over a policy that prohibits placing a deposit to hold space at their preferred day care, which is a standard practice in private-pay programs, where families often compete for scarce infant-care slots. Ryle said this assures fair access for everyone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eichenbaum said that while she understood the system’s equitable goals, she worries the high standards to join ELFA are making it too hard for providers like Schkolnik to participate in the system and for parents like her to get the child care that works for them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12071946\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12071946\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00137_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00137_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00137_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00137_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lyuba Shkolnik teaches children how to bake muffins at her in-home child care business called Daycare Bumblebee in San Francisco on Jan. 30, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Their goals are so lofty that they don’t look at the real-world impact,” she said. “They are letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inside City Hall, two members of the Board of Supervisors want the early childhood department to speed things up for providers who want to join ELFA. They worry that when the subsidies expand, the waitlist for child care will grow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Do I want to go faster than they probably feel comfortable with? Of course I do,” Supervisor Stephen Sherrill said. “I think we can expand the system without sacrificing quality.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Supervisor Myrna Melgar said she’d like to see a simpler and more accessible system.[aside postID=news_12070762 hero='https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/01/240911-CHILDCARE-REAX-MD-01_qed.jpg']“There are multiple things that go into the decision to pick a provider. It’s how you feel. Sometimes it’s cultural and language competence, sometimes it is proximity to your home or work. And so on top of it, to layer a bunch of other things for eligibility, it makes it difficult and complicated,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ingrid Mezquita, director of the Department of Early Childhood, said the city is carefully building out the system, adding more ELFA sites and infant and toddler care slots in neighborhoods that need them most. Depending on their qualifications, she said, some providers can “easily whisk through in less than three months and some programs may take a little longer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need to have those kinds of quality assurances because, at the end of the day, our accountability and our responsibility is to that child and to that family and the programs that do come on board and do enroll in this public funding support also prescribe to that and have that shared accountability with us,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the past three years, the city used unspent funds that accrued when it was fighting a taxpayer group’s lawsuit over Baby Prop C to clear the waitlist for lower-income families who needed child care, boost wages for more than 3,000 early educators, who have historically been underpaid, and support their professional development. Those funds are expected to run out in six years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result, the city-funded child care programs are serving more than 9,000 kids, have a lower staff turnover rate than the state average, and children’s kindergarten readiness has gone up, Mezquita said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12071947\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12071947\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00152_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00152_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00152_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00152_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Shoes line a cubby at Daycare Bumblebee in San Francisco on Jan. 30, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>About 700 children are currently on the wait list for care, though there are about 1,000 available spaces. One reason for the discrepancy is that there aren’t enough infant- and toddler-care slots to meet demand, or the open slots don’t match families’ preferred schedule, location or language, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have expanded access, but the only thing that is a little bit of an art and a science — mostly art — to pinpoint is the preferences of families,” she said at a recent Board of Supervisors hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Department of Early Childhood estimates that ongoing revenue from the commercial rent tax can pay for the expanded subsidies. But the department cautions that it may not cover the program’s full cost down the road if the commercial real estate market softens.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mezquita said she’s hopeful San Francisco’s experiment will demonstrate that it can be scaled up and funded with state dollars. The city was first to offer free preschool for 4-year-olds in 2005, and this year, California expanded transitional kindergarten for all children who turn 4 by Sept. 1.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are building a universal system. How we’re designing it is also taking into account that eventually, yes, we also need the partnership with the state to be able to not only expand it, but also make it widely available,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>[ad floatright]\u003c/p>\n",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The prospect of getting financial aid made him think they could raise three kids in the city. But he may need to brace for some snags when he starts looking for child care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Under guidelines set by the city Department of Early Childhood, income-eligible families can only select from nearly 600 child care programs within a pre-approved network. That might limit parents’ choices at a time when San Francisco is \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/12069711/san-francisco-expands-child-care-subsidies-to-tackle-affordability-issues\">expanding child care subsidies\u003c/a> to middle-income earners as part of a broader push to make the city affordable for families.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Last month, Mayor Daniel Lurie announced that a family of four making less than $234,000 a year can get free child care, and starting in July, those earning up to $312,000 annually will qualify for a \u003ca href=\"https://provider.sfdec.org/wp-content/uploads/ELFA-Center-FCC-Rates-FY25-26.pdf\">50% discount\u003c/a>. The changes put San Francisco ahead of other major cities in offering nearly universal access to child care.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12071945\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12071945\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00075_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00075_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00075_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00075_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Children play at an in-home child care business called Daycare Bumblebee in San Francisco on Jan. 30, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>Up to 12,000 kids under age 5 will be eligible for the newly expanded subsidies — though fewer than half are expected to enroll — paid by \u003ca href=\"https://www.kqed.org/news/11948690/business-tax-provides-crucial-funding-for-early-childhood-education-and-care-in-san-francisco\">funds from Baby Prop C, a 3.5% tax on commercial property leases\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“A lot of people are excited and have a lot of questions,” said Mark Ryle, CEO of Wu Yee Children’s Services, an agency contracted by the city to refer families who qualify for subsidies to child care providers with available spaces. “We’ve seen a pretty significant uptick in inquiries around the tuition credit program.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Some families are discovering, though, that getting public funding for child care comes with a catch.\u003c/p>\n\u003cblockquote>\u003cp>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>The early years matter. Tell us what you want to learn about early childhood education and care by \u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003ca href=\"https://survey.alchemer.com/s3/8658266/ChildhoodAudience\">\u003cstrong>\u003cem>clicking here\u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/a>\u003cstrong>\u003cem>.\u003c/em>\u003c/strong>\u003c/p>\u003c/blockquote>\n\u003cp>When Danielle Eichenbaum learned she qualified for the city’s subsidized child care, her toddler was already enrolled in Daycare Bumblebee in the West Portal neighborhood. She wanted him to stay — not only with the caregivers he already bonded with, but because they were teaching him Russian and exposing him to music, karate and other enriching activities.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>But the day care wasn’t part of the city-funded network, called Early Learning for All, or ELFA.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“I cried when we left. It was such a wonderful program,” she said. “His program now is great, too, but I miss the other one.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Bumblebee’s owner, Lyuba Schkolnik, decided to join ELFA to help Eichenbaum. But she soon discovered the process could take more than a year, requiring her to complete several early childhood education classes and undergo evaluations to determine if her program meets the city’s \u003ca href=\"https://provider.sfdec.org/wp-content/uploads/Quality-Standard_Updated_052125.pdf\">quality standards\u003c/a>.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Schkolnik, who left a marketing career to open her day care, didn’t mind taking the classes and hopes to get in. Joining the network comes with perks: Last year, in-home day care owners like her got $16,000 stipends to help them earn a living wage, and $12,000 to boost their assistants’ pay.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“But the fact it takes so long for someone to become a provider within the system is a little bit disheartening because the [expanded subsidies] are supposed to launch shortly, and we want to help families,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Other parents expressed frustration over a policy that prohibits placing a deposit to hold space at their preferred day care, which is a standard practice in private-pay programs, where families often compete for scarce infant-care slots. Ryle said this assures fair access for everyone.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Eichenbaum said that while she understood the system’s equitable goals, she worries the high standards to join ELFA are making it too hard for providers like Schkolnik to participate in the system and for parents like her to get the child care that works for them.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12071946\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12071946\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00137_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00137_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00137_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00137_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Lyuba Shkolnik teaches children how to bake muffins at her in-home child care business called Daycare Bumblebee in San Francisco on Jan. 30, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>“Their goals are so lofty that they don’t look at the real-world impact,” she said. “They are letting the perfect be the enemy of the good.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Inside City Hall, two members of the Board of Supervisors want the early childhood department to speed things up for providers who want to join ELFA. They worry that when the subsidies expand, the waitlist for child care will grow.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“Do I want to go faster than they probably feel comfortable with? Of course I do,” Supervisor Stephen Sherrill said. “I think we can expand the system without sacrificing quality.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Supervisor Myrna Melgar said she’d like to see a simpler and more accessible system.\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"content": "\u003cdiv class=\"post-body\">\u003cp>“There are multiple things that go into the decision to pick a provider. It’s how you feel. Sometimes it’s cultural and language competence, sometimes it is proximity to your home or work. And so on top of it, to layer a bunch of other things for eligibility, it makes it difficult and complicated,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Ingrid Mezquita, director of the Department of Early Childhood, said the city is carefully building out the system, adding more ELFA sites and infant and toddler care slots in neighborhoods that need them most. Depending on their qualifications, she said, some providers can “easily whisk through in less than three months and some programs may take a little longer.”\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We need to have those kinds of quality assurances because, at the end of the day, our accountability and our responsibility is to that child and to that family and the programs that do come on board and do enroll in this public funding support also prescribe to that and have that shared accountability with us,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Over the past three years, the city used unspent funds that accrued when it was fighting a taxpayer group’s lawsuit over Baby Prop C to clear the waitlist for lower-income families who needed child care, boost wages for more than 3,000 early educators, who have historically been underpaid, and support their professional development. Those funds are expected to run out in six years.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>As a result, the city-funded child care programs are serving more than 9,000 kids, have a lower staff turnover rate than the state average, and children’s kindergarten readiness has gone up, Mezquita said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cfigure id=\"attachment_12071947\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\" style=\"max-width: 2000px\">\u003cimg loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-12071947\" src=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00152_TV-KQED.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"2000\" height=\"1333\" srcset=\"https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00152_TV-KQED.jpg 2000w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00152_TV-KQED-160x107.jpg 160w, https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/10/2026/02/260130-SFCHILDCAREACCESS00152_TV-KQED-1536x1024.jpg 1536w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 2000px) 100vw, 2000px\">\u003cfigcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Shoes line a cubby at Daycare Bumblebee in San Francisco on Jan. 30, 2026. \u003ccite>(Tâm Vũ/KQED)\u003c/cite>\u003c/figcaption>\u003c/figure>\n\u003cp>About 700 children are currently on the wait list for care, though there are about 1,000 available spaces. One reason for the discrepancy is that there aren’t enough infant- and toddler-care slots to meet demand, or the open slots don’t match families’ preferred schedule, location or language, she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We have expanded access, but the only thing that is a little bit of an art and a science — mostly art — to pinpoint is the preferences of families,” she said at a recent Board of Supervisors hearing.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>The Department of Early Childhood estimates that ongoing revenue from the commercial rent tax can pay for the expanded subsidies. But the department cautions that it may not cover the program’s full cost down the road if the commercial real estate market softens.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>Mezquita said she’s hopeful San Francisco’s experiment will demonstrate that it can be scaled up and funded with state dollars. The city was first to offer free preschool for 4-year-olds in 2005, and this year, California expanded transitional kindergarten for all children who turn 4 by Sept. 1.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>“We are building a universal system. How we’re designing it is also taking into account that eventually, yes, we also need the partnership with the state to be able to not only expand it, but also make it widely available,” she said.\u003c/p>\n\u003cp>\u003c/p>\u003c/div>",
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"info": "What kind of no sabo word is Hyphenación? For us, it’s about living within a hyphenation. Like being a third-gen Mexican-American from the Texas border now living that Bay Area Chicano life. Like Xorje! Each week we bring together a couple of hyphenated Latinos to talk all about personal life choices: family, careers, relationships, belonging … everything is on the table. ",
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"marketplace": {
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"info": "Our flagship program, helmed by Kai Ryssdal, examines what the day in money delivered, through stories, conversations, newsworthy numbers and more. Updated Monday through Friday at about 3:30 p.m. PT.",
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"masters-of-scale": {
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},
"mindshift": {
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"info": "The MindShift podcast explores the innovations in education that are shaping how kids learn. Hosts Ki Sung and Katrina Schwartz introduce listeners to educators, researchers, parents and students who are developing effective ways to improve how kids learn. We cover topics like how fed-up administrators are developing surprising tactics to deal with classroom disruptions; how listening to podcasts are helping kids develop reading skills; the consequences of overparenting; and why interdisciplinary learning can engage students on all ends of the traditional achievement spectrum. This podcast is part of the MindShift education site, a division of KQED News. KQED is an NPR/PBS member station based in San Francisco. You can also visit the MindShift website for episodes and supplemental blog posts or tweet us \u003ca href=\"https://twitter.com/MindShiftKQED\">@MindShiftKQED\u003c/a> or visit us at \u003ca href=\"/mindshift\">MindShift.KQED.org\u003c/a>",
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"order": 12
},
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"google": "https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vS1FJTkM1NzY0NjAwNDI5",
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"morning-edition": {
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"onourwatch": {
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"tagline": "Deeply-reported investigative journalism",
"info": "For decades, the process for how police police themselves has been inconsistent – if not opaque. In some states, like California, these proceedings were completely hidden. After a new police transparency law unsealed scores of internal affairs files, our reporters set out to examine these cases and the shadow world of police discipline. On Our Watch brings listeners into the rooms where officers are questioned and witnesses are interrogated to find out who this system is really protecting. Is it the officers, or the public they've sworn to serve?",
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"info": "Our weekly podcast explores how the media 'sausage' is made, casts an incisive eye on fluctuations in the marketplace of ideas, and examines threats to the freedom of information and expression in America and abroad. For one hour a week, the show tries to lift the veil from the process of \"making media,\" especially news media, because it's through that lens that we see the world and the world sees us",
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},
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},
"pbs-newshour": {
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},
"perspectives": {
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"order": 14
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"info": "The economy explained. Imagine you could call up a friend and say, Meet me at the bar and tell me what's going on with the economy. Now imagine that's actually a fun evening.",
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"imageSrc": "https://ww2.kqed.org/radio/wp-content/uploads/sites/50/2018/04/planetmoney.jpg",
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"link": "/radio/program/planet-money",
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"politicalbreakdown": {
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"title": "Political Breakdown",
"tagline": "Politics from a personal perspective",
"info": "Political Breakdown is a new series that explores the political intersection of California and the nation. Each week hosts Scott Shafer and Marisa Lagos are joined with a new special guest to unpack politics -- with personality — and offer an insider’s glimpse at how politics happens.",
"airtime": "THU 6:30pm-7pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Political-Breakdown-2024-Podcast-Tile-703x703-1.jpg",
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"order": 5
},
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"possible": {
"id": "possible",
"title": "Possible",
"info": "Possible is hosted by entrepreneur Reid Hoffman and writer Aria Finger. Together in Possible, Hoffman and Finger lead enlightening discussions about building a brighter collective future. The show features interviews with visionary guests like Trevor Noah, Sam Altman and Janette Sadik-Khan. Possible paints an optimistic portrait of the world we can create through science, policy, business, art and our shared humanity. It asks: What if everything goes right for once? How can we get there? Each episode also includes a short fiction story generated by advanced AI GPT-4, serving as a thought-provoking springboard to speculate how humanity could leverage technology for good.",
"airtime": "SUN 2pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/Possible-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
"officialWebsiteLink": "https://www.possible.fm/",
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"source": "Possible"
},
"link": "/radio/program/possible",
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"spotify": "https://open.spotify.com/show/730YpdUSNlMyPQwNnyjp4k"
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},
"pri-the-world": {
"id": "pri-the-world",
"title": "PRI's The World: Latest Edition",
"info": "Each weekday, host Marco Werman and his team of producers bring you the world's most interesting stories in an hour of radio that reminds us just how small our planet really is.",
"airtime": "MON-FRI 2pm-3pm",
"imageSrc": "https://cdn.kqed.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/The-World-Podcast-Tile-360x360-1.jpg",
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},
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},
"radiolab": {
"id": "radiolab",
"title": "Radiolab",
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