A new task force in Alaska is working to address the ongoing child care crisis in the state, focusing on affordability, access, and support for childcare providers.
Childcare provider Ariél Pino sings “Five Little Monkeys” with a group of toddlers at Little Bears Early Learning Center in Girdwood in 2023. The state of child care in Alaska is in crisis, with rising costs and staffing issues making it hard for families to find affordable care and for centers to provide that care. In 2023, Gov. Mike Dunleavy established a child care task force made up of government officials, business leaders and families to try to find solutions.
The task force recently released recommendations, including streamlining background checks for childcare workers and strengthening resources for aspiring educators. Task force member Stephanie Berglund is executive director of thread Alaska, a statewide nonprofit aimed at improving access to child care. She says the pandemic strained the state’s child care sector, and the industry is still recovering. Below is the transcript of an interview with Berglund on Alaska News Nightly. It has been lightly edited for length and clarity.We still consider the child care sector still in crisis. Unfortunately, we're seeing the child care businesses continue to close, not at the same rate that we saw during the pandemic, but we are still seeing child care programs struggle. And that, in effect, impacts really the working families of Alaska, so they're still really unable to find the care that they need and they want.really looked at reducing some barriers to, you know, being a part of the child care sector community. So looking at how to strengthen the kind of background process which is required by all early educators, and also looking at how to strengthen the resources available for early educators who want to become child care professionals. So strengthening some of the regulation process. There are other recommendations focused on affordability and how to strengthen child care subsidy and the cost for families, really looking at the market price and the true cost of care, but also looking at how we can expand access overal
CHILDCARE ALASKA ECONOMY EDUCATION TASK FORCE
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