Early child care: a key component

Apr. 19—Like many in early childhood development, Darcy Peterson doesn't use the term "day care" because it's a misnomer.

"We're not taking care of days, we're taking care of children," said Peterson, associate professor of early childhood development at Lewis-Clark State College in Lewiston.

Changing the perception of people from thinking about day care to child care to early childhood development is one thing she's hoping to accomplish with a film screening.

The film "No Small Matter" will present the issue for the public from 4 to 6 p.m. Thursday at the Lewiston City Library. The film shows the value of early childhood education that provides long-term academic and life success, as well as access to care for families.

The full documentary can be rented on Amazon Prime, but the screening will be an abridged version.

Peterson has been working in childhood development since receiving her degree in 1993 from the University of Idaho. She's been teaching at Lewis-Clark State College for seven years and has spent time working at Head Start and other childcare facilities.

Peterson said the field of early childhood development is under-recognized for the value it brings to the community and society. The window of learning for infants until third grade, which is the time frame of early childhood development, can set children up for lifelong success. She said 90% of brain development in children happens by the time they reach 5 years old.

"Babies are born to learn, they're born with over a 100 billion neurons just ready for those early childhood experiences — that begins the brain-building that's so vital to their later academic and life success," Peterson said. "There is such a missed opportunity when we don't focus our efforts on providing our children with high-quality early learning experiences."

Peterson said not all childcare facilities and programs provide the same enrichment for children. For working parents, children can spend 10 hours in other people's care, so having that high-quality care and educational services are key to children's growth and development. Those programs improve a child's learning, development and preparing them for school as well as learning social and emotional skills.

"Social and emotional development is the foundation for all other learning," Peterson said. "If you don't have those skills it's really challenging to be able to conquer academic topics."

Those skills include identifying and regulating their own emotions and then recognizing them in other children, as well as having empathy, compassion and learning to get along.

Early childhood development not only helps children reach those early milestones but also can intervene if those achievements aren't accomplished. That early intervention may identify a special need, and the sooner it is identified the sooner action can be taken to improve or remediate the issue. Sometimes it can be resolved before the child reaches school age, depending on what the need is.

Parents also are a component of early childhood education.

"We consider that parents are children's first teachers. Parents are the expert on their child and we can come alongside with knowledge of child development," Peterson said. "We have to have that parent expertise because each child is unique and different so the two together give us the best information for supporting children and their optimal growth and development."

Parents need to remain involved when their child reaches kindergarten, not only before that time. Peterson said that a stronger transition from early age to school age would help families and the child in that process.

To help families monitor their child's progress, the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare has information on its website called the Idaho Early Learning eGuidelines, which has developmental and behavior information and strategies for children from birth to third grade. Then families see areas that can be improved on and share those concerns with their teacher or child care provider to work with the child in that area.

For many families, those programs that offer the high-quality services of education and intervention aren't affordable. The average cost of infant care can be around $800 a month. Peterson said that Head Start programs help children from 3 to 5 years old, but it requires an income eligibility that some people don't qualify for even though they can't afford other high-quality child care.

Many families can't afford to have a single-income household and need both parents working, which means finding childcare. If parents leave the workforce because they need to provide childcare, that can also negatively impact the local economy. Peterson noted that's another value of early childhood programs and asks businesses and business leaders to support their employees to find care.

Finding care now can be even harder because some facilities shut down in the COVID-19 pandemic. According to the Idaho Early Childhood Care and Education Workforce Report in 2022, 95% of programs have no space for infants and 41% of programs have no opening in any range.

The other financial side to childcare is the low wages childcare providers receive. Early childcare educators in Idaho earn an average of $12.98 an hour and 34% qualify for government assistance to be able to provide for their families. Even some of the employees who do have a bachelor's degree in early childhood development are still earning less than a kindergarten teacher who earns an average of $22 an hour, according to the Idaho Early Childhood Care and Education Workforce Report. The low wages also cause a high turnover rate for childcare providers, which affects children who need consistent care from the same teacher to build social and emotional skills.

The benefits of early childhood development also extend to more than just the child and family receiving care. James Heckman, an economist and Nobel Prize laureate, found that the benefits of investing in early childhood development can have a 13% return on investment. Studies also show that children in early childhood development programs have improved health outcomes, higher earnings and lower incarceration rates than their peers who didn't participate in those programs.

"It's much easier to support healthy development than to repair," Peterson said.

That's why Peterson wants to do the film screening for the community, including business leaders and legislators.

"This is important information for our community childcare providers, but that's kind of preaching to the choir in a sense," Peterson said. "Wanting our leaders and our business leaders to see that as we're looking ahead to who is going to be leading us as generations age, we need to support this critical time period."

It's also hard in Idaho compared to Washington, which has differences in state funding and wages for early-childhood care providers. An example of that difference played out in the Idaho legislature this year.

The Idaho Joint Finance Appropriations Committee voted to end federal grant money for childcare providers in March before turning around and extending the grants to June. The June date was the original deadline childcare providers like Lindsey Smalley, owner of TenderCare Children's Center in Lewiston, had planned on.

The funds were for the Idaho Child Care Program that supported childcare providers by offsetting costs for low-income families. Another was the Federal American Rescue Plan that served children from 5 to 13 years old. With the return of the funds Smalley and other childcare providers that used the grants can offer better wages for employees and keep cost of care low for families.

Smalley hasn't seen the money come in yet, but the grants are being distributed by the Idaho Department of Labor instead of the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare, so it could be the new system is still being worked out.

However, the federal grants could have also been extended to September but the committee decided not to, which means the funds will go back to the federal government and distributed to other states, Smalley said.

"Which is a bummer," Smalley said. "It's kind of a bittersweet outcome."

Smalley is still grateful the original June date was kept, which gives her more time to adjust to the changes in funding. She also is glad that lawmakers listened to parents and families affected by the funding changes.

Although Smalley's thankful the funding returned, the switch from ending the funding to keeping the funding was stressful for herself and her staff. Smalley said it would have been better if the childcare providers would have been listened to in the first place.

"It still doesn't seem like there is much value put on what we do," Smalley said. "There seems to be a lot more to do to help Idaho lawmakers understand the importance of childcare for families."

The main advocacy group for early childhood development in the state is the Idaho Association for the Education of Young Children to bring the issue to legislatures. However, a lot of the attention is focused on children in kindergarten and older rather than birth to 5 years old, Peterson said.

One improvement Peterson recognized is the Idaho Stars program, which has a system providers can volunteer to participate in called Steps to Quality. Childcare facilities that do participate earn different rating levels based on the curriculum the program has for the children and it gives other resources providers can use. It also helps families find programs includes complaints and investigations about a provider.

The benefits of early childhood development are many, but there are also hurdles for childcare providers to overcome. Both the positives and the struggles are outlined in the "No Small Matter" film.

"Our biggest hope is that (viewers of the film) might see it as more than day care. We're not babysitters, we are early care and educators. We develop curriculum. We assess children's growth and development. We individualize lesson plans to, ideally, support that child's individual learning trajectory," Peterson said. "There's so much more to it than what people realize, and that's what we're trying to bring awareness to."

Brewster may be contacted at kbrewster@lmtribune.com or at (208) 848-2297.