Action Plan Aims to Boost Public Awareness about Early Childhood and Child Care – and How Little Its Workers are Paid

Original coverage in WGLT by Ryan Denham.

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A new action plan lays out three recommendations for improving Central Illinois’ early childhood education and child care infrastructure – starting with raising public awareness about what’s not working. 

The action plan comes from leaders with Birth to Five Illinois’ Region 17, which includes McLean, DeWitt, Livingston and Logan counties. It’s a follow-up to a 2023 needs assessment that found improving worker pay and benefits would be one of the best ways to improve Central Illinois’ early childhood system. 

The first “action” recommendation is to raise public awareness about how little early childhood workers are paid. The public may not realize the average annual salary in this area for this profession is around $27,000, said Carol Weisheit, regional council manager for Region 17. 

“They’re at poverty level,” she said. “The very people who are educating our children are actually struggling in their own lives because they have to be on SNAP, they have to get assistance from a lot of other programs, because they’re not making a living wage to provide for their own families. The amount of stress on our providers is just incredible.” 

To raise awareness, Birth to Five Illinois wants to collect salary data that lays bare that discrepancy, plus promote opportunities for early childhood teachers to increase their pay. 

Another recommendation is to launch a public awareness campaign about the importance of early childhood education and care and having a well-trained workforce. Birth to Five Illinois leaders hope to do this through social media posts, holding town halls, media appearances, and more. 

Child care is expensive and, in some places, hard to even find available spots. That forces many households into keeping one of the parents home, even if they would prefer to re-enter the workforce. 

Weisheit said engaging the business community is especially important. 

“There’s been such a disconnect between looking at early childhood as an economic issue. It is! If you don’t have workers who have child care – whether you’re first shift, second shift or third shift – you’re not gonna have a workforce. It’s not a separate issue, but it’s an issue that affects all of us,” Weisheit said. “I just don’t think it’s in people’s forefront of their mind. They don’t view it as an economic issue, and it certainly is.” 

The third recommendation is to identify transportation barriers facing families in rural areas. Birth to Five Illinois plans to engage county government officials, state lawmakers and community partners. 

“In the four counties we have, they each have access to Show Bus. Unfortunately, it doesn’t help parents who are having issues, (like) with kids in a half-day program and having to leave that program and go to, say, a home provider or another center because the first program was only half-day. Many parents can’t just leave their work and take their child and say to their boss, ‘I’ll be back in 20 minutes. I gotta pick up my kid,’” Weisheit said.