In this Issue

• Forum Customer Service Survey
• Spotlight On: Quality Counts Career Center
• Forum Corner
• Early Learning Coalition Briefs
• Legislative Updates
• Calendar of Events
• State and National News
• Lights on Afterschool
• Now Available: New Opportunity for Program Directors

There are 1,325 licensed child care providers in Miami-Dade County, including 960 child care centers, 237 family child care homes and 128 large family child care homes. In the child care centers alone, nearly 8,000 teachers work each day providing an education for children. Many of these teachers, like numerous others around the state, are working in high-need communities preparing children who may be at-risk for school success. To achieve this goal, teachers must have the knowledge to facilitate healthy child development, teach children for whom English is a second language and scaffold appropriate learning opportunities.

The Quality Counts Career Center, modeled after the cutting-edge work in Palm Beach County funded by the Children's Services Council, provides a host of opportunities and resources to child care providers in the Miami-Dade community. These include maintaining a website with information on training, educational opportunities, resources and important links. Additionally, the Career Center employs trained career advisors to help child care providers develop a plan to meet their educational goals. Whether help is needed to obtain a GED, apply and register for college classes, translate transcripts or consider an advanced degree in early childhood education, career advisors are available to help explore the options available. To achieve these plans, scholarships provided through the Children's Trust are also available to assist with their expenses. In the Career Center's first year since its inception, over 1,300 individual scholarships have been awarded to providers.

One of the integral components of the Career Center is the Training Registry, a central database which serves as a repository of information, essentially becoming a transcript of professional development. The Registry serves as a valuable tool for child care providers as one central location for recording and validating credentials, employment in the early childhood field and credentials earned. As of July 1, 2008, 1,800 providers have had their training information entered in the Registry - a major milestone since the Registry only became active in March 2008. The Training Registry is also a source of data about the condition of the child care workforce including educational levels and needs of the community. Further, it confirms the work we do with young children and child care providers to help professionalize the early care and education field.

All of these exciting new advances in the Miami-Dade area are part of an even bigger system to improve child care quality for children through the Quality Counts initiative, including a Quality Rating Improvement System (QRIS) which is voluntary for providers. QRIS is a five-star rating system that evaluates early learning programs according to clearly-defined standards and offers supports and incentives to help providers reach their goals. The goals of Quality Counts are to:

• Ensure young children throughout Miami-Dade County are provided with the best possible early learning experiences through high-quality early learning programs
• Provide information and support to early learning programs to improve and sustain the quality of their programs
• Provide families with an easy-to-use tool to select the best program for their child

Currently, 150 child care centers and 35 family child care homes are participating in the QRIS with promising results. Although the services from the Children's Forum are currently available only in Miami-Dade County, many other counties around the state are also creating Quality Rating Systems with related incentive programs such as scholarships, wage stipends, technical assistance, and grants. For more information on what your county is doing, contact your local Early Learning Coalition.