Overview
The Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) has five primary goals: (1) to allow States flexibility to develop child care programs and policies that best suit the needs of children and parents within the State; (2) to promote parental choice to empower working parents to make their own decisions on the child care that best suits their family's needs; (3) to encourage States to provide consumer education information to help parents make informed choices about child care; (4) to provide child care to parents trying to achieve economic self-sufficiency; and (5) to assist States in implementing health, safety, licensing, and registration standards established in State regulations. Among the expected long-term outcomes of the CCDF are: 1) improved employment and self-sufficiency outcomes for parents; and 2) increased availability of high quality care for low-income working families.
Since 2000, Congress has appropriated about $10 million per year of CCDF discretionary funds to be used for child care research and evaluation. These funds have supported projects that add to our knowledge about the efficacy of child care subsidy policies and programs toward achieving the two targeted long-term outcomes of the CCDF.
Goals of the Child Care Policy Research Grants
Child Care Policy Research Grants have three main goals:
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To address issues of current relevance to decision makers at the local, State, and national levels. Research and evaluation are critical to understanding child care issues and their implications for children and families. In Fiscal Year (FY) 2007, topics of particular interest are: 1) the child care needs and utilization patterns of low-income working parents; 2) factors that influence parental choice of care, including home-based care, among low-income working parents; and 3) the relationship between public and private child care and early education sectors, and implications for the supply and quality of care available to low-income working families.
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To encourage active communication, networking, and collaboration among prominent child care researchers and policymakers.
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To increase the dissemination capacity for child care research at the national, State, and local levels.
The project period is 9/30/07-9/29/10 and the point of contact is Susan Jekielek. Ask a Question.