Child care is one of the hottest topics in public discourse today, and for good reason. The sector is finally (if a bit slowly) getting the attention it deserves, and several universal truths have emerged:

1. The ROI for early childhood investment is staggering. From a purely economic standpoint, few investments pay off as strongly or as consistently as early childhood. The National Forum on Early Childhood Policy and Programs estimates returns between $4 and $9 per every $1 invested in high-quality early childhood programs.
2. Child care is a bipartisan issue. Although specific strategies and priorities may differ from right to left, all of society benefits from well-funded and well-functioning early care and education systems.
3. Child care is ripe for modernization. We’re not going to see sustainable gains by pouring more money into the old way of doing things. Better data and technology infrastructure can reduce barriers to entry, improve efficiencies, and give policymakers the data they need to make informed decisions.

November 2025 Updates

The Shutdown Ends. Now What?

Much to the relief of millions of Americans, Congress reached an agreement to bring an end to the longest government shutdown in U.S. history on November 12. None of the initial reasons for the impasse saw any material momentum, and no concessions were given aside from a handshake agreement to hold a vote on Affordable Care Act tax credits in the Senate. In short, the American people suffered for nothing. 

The most immediate impacts to the early care and education space are the resumption of SNAP payments, the reversal of layoffs in ACF and the Department of Education (along with some protections against future layoffs), and the gradual reopening of the Head Start programs that had been forced to close, along with a return to business as usual for those who found alternative ways to keep their doors open.

The long-term pains of the shutdown will be even more acute. As BridgeCare CEO Jamee Herbert put it, “When funding becomes inconsistent, the first things to go are the new ideas and pilot programs—like those being funded by [PDG B-5]—that represent real progress.” 

We can’t keep playing politics with ECE funding streams. As we say every month in the opening to this article, the field of ECE needs innovation and modernization right now. Every funding freeze or delay in disbursement just adds to the backlog of initiatives and mountain of opportunity cost faced at every level of the system. Here’s hoping Congress can step up and pass some meaningful child care investments now that they’re finally back to work. 

Read: The longest government shutdown in U.S. history comes to a close (NPR)

A Growing Number of States are Severely Underwater on Child Care

It feels like every month we’re calling attention to yet another freeze or reinstitution of waitlists for state child care assistance programs. What started as a quiet trickle of states in the wake of last year’s CCDF Final Rule updates has become an alarming trend. The (very predictable) end of Covid-era relief funding, the need for states to fill new gaps in social safety nets due to sharp decreases in federal investment, and omnipresent rising costs and stagnant incomes have all come together to form a perfect storm for child care funding that has left many states scrambling and desperate.

Indiana has been perhaps the most visible example of these challenges this year. They opened a waitlist for their child care and Pre-K vouchers last December, and have seen enrollment drop from 69,000 to 55,000 with 31,000 children now on the waitlist, 80% of whom are under the federal poverty line. They also recently reduced reimbursement rates, putting even more strain on providers. The state will not issue any new vouchers until at least 2027. The state’s administration has continued to message their decisions as prioritizing children and families at the cost of “short-term strain” on child care businesses, which is an almost laughable decoupling of affordability and supply. 

Would that they were the only one. Arizona’s waitlist sits at just under 10,000 children, Arkansas just made significant cuts to their reimbursement rates. Wisconsin providers are receiving 80% of what they were last year under the Covid-era Child Care Counts program, forcing some to close their doors for good. Nebraska is facing a significant shortfall next year if not addressed in the 2026 legislative session. Colorado has estimated that they will have to scale back the number of children served by their assistance program by as much as 64%, and their 10 largest counties all have enrollment freezes in place. Maryland just realized last year that they were overenrolled for their funding levels, and they’ve been frozen since May. Texas has been teetering on the edge of 100,000 waitlisted children for at least a year, only recently approving enough funding to reduce that number by about 10%.  

This situation isn’t getting better any time soon. What we really need is increased federal investment, but in its absence, states are going to need to step up and find ways to fund the economic and workforce pillar that is child care. Because while the price tag might look high now, the long-term impact on the state’s economy is orders of magnitude higher. 

• Read: No Time to Wait: How Child Care Funding Uncertainty and the Reemergence of Waitlists are Shaping Families’ Futures (Child Care Aware of America)

   

• Read: Child care crisis deepens as funding slashed for poor families (The Hechinger Report)

   

• Read: States are quietly cutting child care funding — and families are out of options (Fulcrum)

ECE Shows Out in November Elections

Colorado’s Garfield, Pitkin, and SW Eagle Counties passed Measure 7A, creating the state’s first Early Childhood Education Special District, which will provide early care and education tuition credits, expand capacity, and support educators and providers in numerous ways. The measure, a true community effort spearheaded by business, family, and ECE leaders, is expected to cost approximately $12 million per year, funded by a .25% sales tax. On the eastern side of the state, Larimer County passed a similar Measure (1B) that will use the same .25% sales tax to generate about $28 million annually to address their own supply shortages. 

Seattle, Washington voters passed Proposition 1, which increased the city’s investment in ECE to $1.3 billion, half of which will be used to double access to affordable child care slots and provide payments to child care providers. This marked a significant increase to the previous levy, funded by an average increase of approximately $27/month in property taxes. The levy passed in a landslide, with 80% voting in favor. 

Cincinnati, Ohio experienced a similar overwhelming victory, with 73% of voters saying yes to Cincinnati Public Schools Issue 28, which, along with supporting several K-12 learning programs, also renewed funding for the city’s successful Preschool Promise program, which provides $15 million in tuition assistance and preschool quality improvement while serving more than 5,250 students annually. 

A Proposed New Resource for Small Child Care Businesses

Few things are more exciting these days than a little bipartisan legislation. The COACH Act, introduced by Senators Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and John Curtis (R-UT) and Representatives Nikema Wiliams (D-GA), Pete Stauber (R-MN), and Judy Chu (D-CA) in the Senate and House respectively, would direct the Small Business Administration to create and maintain an up-to-date resource guide for small child care businesses. 

The Act would ostensibly help small businesses on multiple fronts. First, it would be immediately beneficial to the child care businesses themselves, who would benefit from tools to help them succeed in an increasingly challenging market with low margins and significant administrative hurdles. Second, it would be an indirect boon to other small businesses, which are struggling daily with a lack of accessible, affordable child care for their employees. The more small, high-quality child care businesses we can stand up, the better the health of the entire business community. 

It does seem strange that such a small thing would even require congressional intervention (why hasn’t the SBA already tackled this low-lift, high-impact project?), but one would think that this should be relatively easy to pass. 

Read: H.R. 6045 - COACH Act (congress.gov)  

Trending Original Research and Reports

ECE Supports are an Investment in Colorado’s Future - The Bell Policy Center analyzed three years of ECE workforce investment via a survey of Metropolitan State University of Denver students. The numbers were clear: increased financial support leads directly to retention and career growth, improves quality, and makes educators feel more professionally validated. The report includes policy recommendations for future investment in the aftermath of ARPA funding. 

What exactly is “universal” child care? - Elliot Haspel lays the groundwork for conversations about universal child care by examining the foundational question of what the concept of “universality” even means. He concludes the discussion with some examples of what New York City is doing right, and why it’s important for a universal child care rollout to be done “gradually,” with very clear communication and transparency throughout the process. We’ll be coming back to this topic early and often in 2026.

ICYMI: October 2025 Updates

Government Shutdown Continues With No End in Sight

As the finger-pointing and partisan rhetoric continues to ramp up, what started as a temporary inconvenience now looms as a potentially devastating threat to tens of millions of Americans. At the time of publication, the current shutdown already ranks as the second longest in U.S. history, surpassed only by the one lasting 34 days in 2018-2019 during the first Trump presidency. 

While the shutdown has already resulted in significant delays for many federally provided services and a freeze on crucial grant funding, including CCAMPIS and PDG B-5, those effects pale in comparison to what will happen when SNAP programs run out of funding (as early as October 27 for some states). When that happens, children throughout the country will go hungry. In many cases, there is no stopgap or reserve fund to tap into. Payments will simply cease for the duration of the shutdown. The same is true for WIC, which currently serves more than 7 million low-income families. 

On the ECE front, the President has made it clear that the administration is using the shutdown as a political hammer to halt federal programs “that we wanted to close up, or that we never wanted to happen.” He added, “We are closing up Democrat programs that we disagree with, and they’re never going to open again.” Thus far, those efforts have resulted in approximately 4,000 reduction-in-force notices during the shutdown, including most of the Office of Special Education Programs and a large contingent of Department of Health and Human Services staff. Those RIFs were temporarily blocked by court order on October 15. 

Per First Five Years Fund, more than 100 Head Start programs are scheduled to receive grants on November 1, meaning tens of thousands of children could lose access to their care and education. FFYF has put together a toolkit in support of an October 29 Day of Action to protect that access. For those looking for any kind of silver lining, CCDF and CACFP appear to have enough of a buffer to weather the shutdown for a little longer. 

Read: Issue Brief: How a Government Shutdown Hurts Kids (First Focus on Children)

ACF Updates its Vision, Mission, Values, Priorities, and Guiding Principles

The Administration for Children and Families, which has lost 30-40% of its workforce this year as part of the ongoing reduction in force efforts across HHS, issued new guidance on the types of programs it intends to fund and support under the Trump administration. This new “strategic alignment initiative,” announced by Acting Assistant Secretary Andrew Gradison, includes a number of familiar talking points. We urge our readers to review the full announcement, but here’s a summary of the agency’s new priorities and principles: 

• Programs that promote work and self-sufficiency: ACF will be funding programs that “demonstrate measurable reductions in dependency,” using employment outcomes as a KPI.
• Promoting marriage and family formation: Traditional, two-parent households are a cornerstone of this priority. Mention is also made of “programs that recognize and support the value of human life.”
• Gold-standard research: We certainly need more evidence-based policy and funding decisions in this space. The agency’s stated commitment to “gold standard science” is a big win, coming at a time when anti-science bills are flying through state legislatures at breakneck speed. This feels like a welcome pivot for the administration, and we are looking forward to seeing this criteria in action.
• Values-aligned funding: Employment, marriage, “biological definitions of sex,” immigration, and efficiency top the list of values that will drive funding decisions. Programs that contain any hint of DEI and gender ideology will not be supported. Immigrants who are not “qualified aliens” will not be eligible for ACF-funded programs, to the extent permitted by law.
• Parental authority: ACF has voiced its support for parent choice in curriculum and classroom environment, including the “right to protect their children from exposure to content that burdens the exercise of their religious beliefs.”
• Tough on crime: ACF will no longer support “harm reduction” activities or “housing first” policies. They are encouraging “more competition amongst grantees in relevant programs,” including the Runaway and Homeless Youth Program, with prioritization for grantees that emphasize treatment, recovery, and self-sufficiency. 

Child Care Matters will continue to monitor how these new priorities and principles affect federal policy and investment in the months to come. 

Read: ACF Vision, Mission, Values, Priorities, & Guiding Principles

Texas Expands its Workforce-Centered Child Care Supports

Texas has long taken a unique approach to addressing child care access and affordability, with many of its most recent significant programs and initiatives spearheaded by groups of employers and administered by the Texas Workforce Commission (TWC). Child care has always been a workforce issue, so the concept isn’t far-fetched, it’s just different from how most states view child care policy. 

This month, TWC announced a new Employer Child Care Solutions initiative, through which vetted and approved technical assistance providers will help employers set up child care solutions at or near their workplaces. Promoted services include: 

• Employer needs assessments
• Employer feasibility and cost analysis studies
• Options analysis and recommendations report
• Site selection report
• Business plans

TWC is currently accepting proposals from interested vendors to support the program. 

Read: TWC Launches Employer Child Care Initiative

Arkansas Child Care Funding Crisis Reaches a Tipping Point

The Arkansas Early Childhood Commission is scrambling this month to find a stopgap solution to child care affordability for low-income families. After the Department of Education announced a significant cut (~18%) to reimbursement rates in September, followed by a major public outcry from child care providers, the deadline for implementation got pushed back from October to November. Now that the time has arrived without any movement on a solution, providers are at imminent risk of needing to close their doors. 

The cuts were necessitated in part by the state spending “$6 million to $9 million more each month than it was budgeted” under CCDF. Couple that with the expiration of COVID-era federal funding, and there’s simply no longer enough money to go around for the state’s School Readiness Assistance voucher program. As of Tuesday, October 21, Department of Education Deputy Commissioner Stacy Smith said, “We have about five weeks of remaining funding left in that CCDF pot.” 

Proposed scenarios include reducing the cuts to reimbursement rates, capping copay requirements for families with multiple children in the program, cutting school-aged children from the program, boosting work requirements, and identifying alternative funding streams.

Read: Emergency work group aims to cushion child care providers from drastic cuts (Arkansas Times) 

Trending Original Research and Reports

• Issue Brief: U.S. Child Poverty in 2024 - First Focus on Children examined data and trends from the U.S. Census Bureau related to child poverty and provided a blueprint for federal policy based on years of research. Early indications are that the number of children experiencing poverty (already “greater than the population of 11 states”) will almost certainly increase in 2025 without congressional intervention.
• National Home Visiting Resource Center: 2025 Home Visiting Yearbook - This comprehensive resource, published by James Bell Associates and the Urban Institute, leverages 2024 data to provide a deep dive into the impact of home visiting at the national and state levels. It includes data on reach, workforce, outcomes, and both evidence-based and emerging models of home visiting services. 

Other Developments Throughout the Country

At the federal level, two noteworthy new bills were introduced just prior to the shutdown: the bipartisan Expanding Childcare in Rural America (ECRA) Act aims to offer loans and grants aimed at increasing supply, quality, and affordability of care in agricultural and rural communities through U.S. Department of Agriculture Rural Development. 

The Child Care for Every Community Act was also reintroduced by a group of Democratic representatives led by Sen. Elizabeth Warren and Rep. Mikie Sherrill. The Act would draw from successful approaches in the U.S. military child care program and Head Start to address accessibility, affordability, quality, workforce investment, and Pre-K services. 

Montgomery County, Alabama passed a bill to increase eligibility for their day care and child care property tax credit, moving the cap from $3,000 to $10,000. The county is in need of more licensed child care providers, including family child care facilities, to meet family demand. Frederick County, Maryland is currently considering the same change to their tax credit.