Systems Building & Advocacy

 As an Early Childhood Council, Bright Futures works creatively and collaboratively with government, community members, and stakeholders to improve early childhood systems.  

Early childhood systems include any care and services for children 0-5 years old.

Much of our work in early childhood systems building is focused on policy change and advocacy addressing the child care crisis; there are far fewer child care slots in our region than there are children, and many families need child care but either cannot get a slot, or cannot afford it.

At the same time, child care centers face challenges with staff turnover, low pay, and the high costs associated with offering care (parent tuition often only covers about 60% of costs, meaning that centers must rely on private or government funding to stay open).

We are always looking for new, innovative ways to improve our early childhood systems.

If you have a concern or an idea related to early childhood systems, we would love to hear from you!