Mayor Eric Adams and Department of Education (DOE) Chancellor David C. Banks released an outline for their long-term plans for Early Childhood Education (ECE), along with commitments to pay a significant portion of this fiscal year’s community-based ECE contracts.
Adams and Banks committed to paying at least 75% of the value of Fiscal Year 2022 (FY22) DOE contracts for all community-based ECEs, aiming to support these programs while also stabilizing the sector following a decline related to the COVID-19 pandemic.
“I cannot emphasize it enough; none of this work is possible without the partnership of our community members, childcare providers, and educators, who selflessly devote so much of their lives to our young people,” said Mayor Adams on Nov. 3. “Thank you to the entire school community partners who walk alongside us as we work to build a stronger Early Childhood Education system, a reality for generations of New Yorkers to come.”
The ECE program relies on nearly 1,000 community-based providers, many of which are run by women of color or are family-owned.
“This is our show of support and our investment in the network of small businesses who are our community providers—many of them family-owned programs that have risen to the call and opened up their doors to fellow New Yorkers to care for their children and to get those children connected to their education at an early age,” said Banks on Thursday.
In the next few weeks, both the Mayor’s Office and the DOE will be deploying Rapid Response Teams of highly trained personnel to provide speedy, one-on-one support to individual ECE providers who need help with navigating the invoicing process.
“I’m thrilled that we have Dr. Ahmed leading the next phase of Early Childhood Education in New York City,” said Sherry Cleary, former Executive Director of the New York Early Childhood Professional Development Institute and University Dean of the Office of Early Childhood Initiatives at CUNY. “The entire sector, and particularly the CBO sector, has been destabilized by the effects of the pandemic and by the lack of careful planning and infrastructure in the systems that Kara and her team inherited.”
The Rapid Response Teams – funded by the City – will conduct weekly meetings with ECE providers until all FY22 invoices are submitted and up-to-date. The teams will also provide in-person visits to ECE workplaces and meet providers at their borough offices for scheduled support sessions.
Both the Mayor’s Office and Chancellor Banks are conducting community-based analyses of the demand for seats in ECE facilities, which will be used in the future to determine and drive forward the allocation of infant, toddler, 3K and Pre-K seats – including students with disabilities. This assessment will most likely be completed by next spring.
“This plan to invest and stabilize the sector is a direct result of Kara’s resolute advocacy and hard work on behalf of her staff and the network of community providers we all know are essential to our education system,” said Cleary. “Our sector and our children are in very good hands with [Dr. Ahmed] leading us forward to bring high-quality, birth-to-5 programs to families in all communities across our city.”
To learn more visit the NYC DOE website, schools.nyc.gov.
