QUALITY ENHANCEMENT PROGRAM

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ll Mississippi's children deserve high-quality child care. Adequate financial support is critical to achieving this goal, especially in centers serving low-income communities. MLICCI advocates for sufficient funding and promotes quality enhancement by offering state-wide training and technical assistance in:

  • preparing for the ECERS & ITERS assessments;
  • parent engagement; and
  • anti-bias work with children and families.

Step-Up Demonstraton Project

QRS and the Low-Income Child Care Sector

Challenges facing the low-income child care sector are compounded by the requirements of the state's new quality rating system (QRS), which aims to improve child care by offering a graduated scale for reimbursements, based on quality enhancements. However, the reimbursements rates are too small even to finance basic QRS entry requirements. We know from our examination of the pilot program that centers serving low-income working parents have two options: choose not to participate or raise fees (effectively excluding or pricing poor children out of the QRS). Either outcome will further exacerbate inequities that plague our state.

Identify Barriers to Participation and Demonstrate Solutions

With a major grant from the Kellogg Foundation, MLICCI is launching Step Up—a three-year operating project designed to:

  • demonstrate what it costs for centers serving low-income families to successfully participate in the QRS;
  • create detailed recommendations for providing resources so that poor children are not left behind; and
  • examine whether/how other states have made quality improvements in their early care and education systems without making these critical services unaffordable for low-income working families—research that has not been done.

The project will enroll 20 representative low-income centers from across the state. Each will receive technical assistance and financial support in the form of items needed to implement quality improvement plans to meet QRS entry requirements. Their progress will be closely monitored and evaluated as the basis for an extensive study of the sector's needs.

Assessing the Impact of Mississippi’'s
Quality Rating System (QRS)

The Step-Up Project grew out of a 2008 report commissioned by MLICCI to assess the impact of the new QRS system on low-income child care centers: MS Child Care Quality Impact Study, and is monitoring the program and inequities. We are supporting low-income child care centers' quality improvement efforts through training, technical assistance, and parental engagement (see Traning & Events).    TOP  »

On-site Training and Technical Assistance

MLICCI participated as a state partner in the Kellogg Foundation-funded Mississippi SPARK (Supporting Partnerships to Assure Ready Kids) project spearheaded by the Southern Regional Office of the Children's Defense Fund. SPARK aims to align and improve the early childhood education experiences of children ages three-second grade in five public school districts in Mississippi. SPARK involves parents, child care centers, Head Start programs, public school districts, and other partners locally and state-wide. MLICCI provided training and technical assistance to child care centers located in these five school districts and contributed policy analysis related to child care issues on the SPARK Statewide Committee.

See MLICCI’s table comparing Head Start to child care subsidies.

MLICCI is offereing regional training and on-site techncial assistance (TA) and stipends throughout the state to improve quality in low-income child care centers. The training inculdes preparation for evaluation by the ECERS and ITERS scales, with the goal of climbing the ranks of Mississippi's new quality rating systems (MCCQSS). MLICCI has trained more than 100 providers in the regional trainings to date and is currently working with 30 centers statewide, which receive small stipends to help them with the costs of particpating in MCCQSS.

Curriculum Enhancement Kits

MLICCI is offering training and special curriculum enhancement kits with books, puppets, and other materials to interested low-income child care centers. The kits will focus on cultural diversity, parent engagement, and gender equity. These kits will be made available at training events where MLICCI will help providers understand how to utilize these materials to enhance early childhood experiences for children in their centers. Contact us for more information.    TOP  »

Prepare for ECERS & ITERS Assessment

Mississippi's new Quality Rating Scale utilizes the ECERS (Early Childhood Environmental Rating Scale) and the ITERS (Infant Toddler Environmental Rating Scale) as one measure to ascribe which step—and therefore which reimbursement rate—a center can achieve on the new five-step scale. MLICCI can help centers understand these rating scales and offers resources to prepare for assessments. We have alimited supply of books and DVDs on this topic to give to centers. Contact us to find out more.    TOP  »

Assessing the Impact of Mississippi's
Quality Rating System (QRS)

The Mississippi Department of Human Services (DHS) is piloting a quality rating system (QRS) using tiered reimbursements. In tiered systems, child care providers receive higher ratings and rates of reimbursement for achieving specific quality improvements.

These improvements cost money. States that have successfully implemented tiered systems have made significant investments to help low-income child care centers pay for required improvements. However, DHS is proposing to implement Mississippi's system with no such additional funding. And it plans to target only the most financially vulnerable centers (due to their reliance on the inadequate and insecure child care certificate program).    TOP  »

This proposal threatens to create a segregated child care system in which only centers with the resources to finance quality improvements can afford to participate. Since most child care centers'  funds come from parent fees, centers serving parents who can afford to pay fees will get higher reimbursements, and centers serving parents who cannot afford to pay fees will be left behind.

All Mississippi's children deserve high-quality child care. Adequate financial support is critical to achieving this goal, especially in centers serving low-income communities.
photo girl playground
Studies show that
while quality early childhood experiences benefit all children, they make the most significantly positive difference in outcomes for poor children.
Quality improvements cost money.
States that have successfully implemented tiered systems have made significant investments to help low-income child care centers
pay for required improvements.

However, DHS is implementing Mississippi's system with inadequate funding. And it plans to target only the most financially vulnerable centers—due to their reliance on the inadequate and insecure child care certificate program