Sec. 7. State expansion and quality enhancement activities
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Using funds made available through an allotment under section 5(b), the State shall reserve at least 80 percent for direct services provided through grants, contracts, or certificates, to expand access to high-quality child care for infants and toddlers and to increase parental options for and access to such care. During the period beginning not later than the date on which the allotment is made and ending not later than 6 months after that date, and every third year thereafter, the State shall use the cost of high-quality child care study, described in section 6(b)(4), to ensure that, for all infant and toddler child care slots— the child care is of sufficient quality; the providers of the care are supported along a career pathway to achieve higher levels of training and education; and provider payment rates are sufficient as described in section 6(b)(4)(A)(i).
The State shall ensure that all infant and toddler child care providers, who participate in activities funded through the Child Care and Development Fund, meet quality standards by the end of fiscal year 2026, including— ensuring that the providers enable lead teachers and educators, regardless of setting, to receive program quality funds reserved under subsection (b), through grants, contracts, or certificates, to prepare for meeting higher standards of quality and to progress through professional development goals; and offering full-day, full-year care or otherwise meeting the needs of working families; meeting the requirements described in section 6(b)(4)(A)(i)(III); ensuring individuals working directly with infants and toddlers have the qualifications, knowledge, and skills to promote the healthy social, emotional, cognitive, and physical development of children as appropriate to the children’s age, and attain the compensation levels necessary to attract, support, and retain a well-qualified workforce, in a manner aligned with the findings in the study entitled Transforming the Workforce for Children Birth Through Age 8:
A Unifying Foundation , issued by the National Academy of Sciences in April 2015; aligning its activities with the State’s Early Learning and Development Guidelines that apply to infants and toddlers and the Head Start Early Learning Outcomes Framework; coordinating activities with other public or private agencies to ensure that, to the extent that services are available in the community, infants and toddlers are referred to local agencies or other appropriate providers, including community-based organizations, for comprehensive health, mental health, family, and nutrition services, similar to those provided through Early Head Start programs; and engaging with parents in their roles as first teachers and partnering with parents in their child’s early care and learning and transition to pre-kindergarten or a Head Start program.
Based on a valid needs assessment referred to in section 6(b)(6), the State shall identify geographic areas and special populations described in that section. The State shall develop and implement a plan to increase the availability of high-quality child care (including by stabilizing the income of providers of such care)— in geographic areas and for populations identified under subparagraph (A); and to the extent practicable, in hard-to-serve areas or populations. Congress finds that the activities described in paragraph
(3)are interconnected and that each of the activities is critical to enhancing the quality of infant and toddler child care. The State shall reserve at least 12 percent of funds made available through each allotment made under subsection (b), (c), or
(e)of section 5 to carry out activities described in paragraph (3), to increase the quality of child care programs for infants and toddlers in eligible families. The activities referred to in paragraph
(2)shall consist of— activities that improve the skills and competencies of the infant and toddler child care workforce, including competencies specific to working with children who are culturally and linguistically diverse and children with disabilities, by providing a pathway to higher levels of training and education consistent with the findings in the National Academy of Sciences study described in subsection (a)(3)(B)(iii); activities that support training and technical assistance through a statewide network of infant and toddler specialists, infant and early childhood mental health consultants, or coach mentors, that provide onsite assistance directly to providers who receive funds under this Act; activities that provide startup grants, to purchase equipment and materials needed to provide high-quality early care and learning experiences to infants and toddlers, such as cribs, changing tables, safety equipment, infant and toddler curricula, and age- and developmentally-appropriate toys; or activities that establish networks of family child care providers to share workforce training and technical assistance. The State shall use the funds described in paragraph
(2)to ensure that infant and toddler child care providers meet relevant standards and shall develop statewide plans to improve the knowledge and competencies of the infant and toddler child care workforce, by implementing 1 or more of the activities described in paragraph (3). The State shall coordinate the activities carried out under this subsection with other quality enhancement efforts funded through the Child Care and Development Fund. In carrying out activities under this section, a State shall comply with the requirements of this Act and the Child Care and Development Block Grant Act of 1990 ( 42 U.S.C. 9858 et seq. ). Amounts made available under this Act shall be used to supplement and not supplant other Federal, State, and local public funds expended to provide child care for children under age 13.
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Sec. 7
State expansion and quality enhancement activities
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