7.1 Quality Activities Needs Assessment

7.1.1 Needs assessment process and findings a. Describe the Lead Agency needs assessment process for expending CCDF funds on activities to improve the quality of child care, including the frequency of assessment, how a range of parents and providers were consulted, and how their views are incorporated: The department centers equity in its needs assessment and decision-making processes by deeply engaging with impacted communities, providers and families. To ensure a well- rounded approach, Minnesota’s needs assessment processes collect both qualitative and quantitative data through a number of different sources to inform needs. While the central focus is on equity, the department prioritizes continuous quality improvement and uses program data, research and evaluation, and community input to understand the full picture. This helps to understand trends. This section outlines the breadth of approaches the department uses to gather information about community needs around quality improvement, in four key categories: equity-centered strategies (including Human-Centered Design approaches), analysis of program data, research and evaluation efforts, and ongoing community input. These many needs assessment sources feed into the Child Development Services (CDS) Strategic Plan, which serves as Minnesota’s summary of needs assessment information related to quality improvement activities. This strategic plan is created on a three-year cycle, with updates made at the midpoint and as needed; the most recent CDS strategic plan is for 2022-2024 and was completed in Fall 2021. To account for newly added programs, the plan was updated in June 2023. This strategic plan takes in all of the data inputs described below including multiple approaches to engaging a diverse range of parents and providers. The planning process uses community input and other data sources to identify community needs around quality improvement activities, define quality improvement goals and strategies, and outline measures of success in meeting the identified community needs. The strategic plan goals and measures of progress are described in section 7.1.2 below. Equity-Centered Strategies and Human-Centered Design Minnesota has engaged in human-centered design processes, rooted in deep engagement with end users of Minnesota’s services, for several projects. These approaches ensure that the department is understanding community needs from the community’s own perspective and designing services and supports in a way that will effectively and equitably address those needs. Findings from these efforts inform not only the programs directly involved in the human-centered design work but our overall understanding of needs related to quality improvement. Engagement efforts employing an equity-centered and/or human-centered design approach include: • Preschool Development Grant (PDG) Needs Assessment: Minnesota’s PDG grant supports strengthening Minnesota’s early childhood system, especially for children and families furthest from opportunities. Minnesota completed in-depth needs assessments in both 2020 and 2023. In both needs assessments processes, the state partnered with agencies, communities, and families across the state. The needs assessment process led to a cross-agency strategic plan that informs development of the state’s CCDF plan. • Through the Whole Family Systems program (https://mn.gov/dhs/whole-family- systems/), the department provides grants to organizations throughout Minnesota to engage families in their communities to create innovative program designs, called ￿prototypes￿, to address racial, economic and geographical disparities in human services and outcomes. This innovative design puts families' voices at the center of solution making and program design and creates community-led ￿laboratories￿ for uplifting both the most pressing needs of communities and community-designed solutions that can address these needs. • Parent Aware Racial Equity Action Plan (PAREAP) and Parent Aware Redesign (https://mn.gov/dhs/partners-and-providers/program-overviews/child-care-and-early- education/parent-aware/). Since 2021, Minnesota has been engaged in redesigning the state’s Quality Rating and Improvement System (QRIS), Parent Aware. The Department engaged (https://www.parentaware.org/programs/equity-engagement/) with hundreds of child care programs across the state to identify and report on barriers and to create a plan for improvement, the Parent Aware Racial Equity Action Plan in order to better understand and address (https://www.parentaware.org/programs/equity-engagement/) inequities within Parent Aware. The broader effort to redesign the QRIS system more holistically has also involved deep engagement with child care providers and families around a reimagining of the state’s Standards and Indicators for quality rating. This multi- year effort includes multiple projects and centers best practices and racial, cultural, linguistic, ability and geographic equity. Finally, a formal evaluation of Parent Aware is underway in partnership with Child Trends, which includes ongoing listening sessions to gather information on need from programs participating, not participating and from families. Information from the evaluation will be combined with the engagement to inform the redesign efforts. • The Mixed Delivery Action Labs project is a Preschool Development Grant-funded initiative in which the state is supporting local communities in building collaboratives that bring together partners from across the early childhood system to improve cooperation and coordination in building a mixed-delivery early childhood system. As local communities develop their relationships and address barriers to mixed delivery locally, the project will also help communities develop feedback loops with state partners to ensure that local needs are identified and lifted up to the appropriate actors at the state level. • Minnesota Help Me Connect (https://helpmeconnect.web.health.state.mn.us/HelpMeConnect) is an online navigator that helps expectant families, families with young children birth to 8 years of age, and those working with families find and connect to services in their local communities that support healthy child development and family well-being, including child care. Google Analytics from searches on the page is an important source of information about trends in family needs. • Supports for Family, Friend, and Neighbor (FFN) caregivers: In 2023, the department invested in an FFN design sprint, using human-centered design methodologies to learn how to better serve FFN caregivers as end-users and incorporate their needs, hopes, and unique barriers into program design. This engagement effort identified barriers to outreach and successful professional development design and access that will be addressed to better support FFN caregivers. Analysis of Program Data Another important source of information about community needs that informs the department’s overall needs assessment for quality-improvement activities is ongoing analysis of data across the department’s quality improvement programs. Programs gather significant amounts of administrative data, and analysis of this existing data can provide important insights about community needs without creating additional burden around gathering data from communities. Administrative data that informs this analysis is stored in several State agency databases, including: • NDS2, the statewide data collection system used by Child Care Aware system. These agencies provide parent referrals and NDS2 is the data source for the public facing parent search tool for child care and early education programs, ParentAware.org. Data from this source is used to understand more about child care programs and their rates and vacancies, as well as trends in what kinds of care families are searching for. • Develop, Minnesota’s Quality Improvement and Registry Tool )https://www.developtoolmn.org/), houses Minnesota’s professional development registry, information on training and other quality supports, and supports child care and early education programs participating in Parent Aware. Child care and early education programs are able to link to employees, including their education and training, and apply for Child Care Aware Regional Grants and Parent Aware Ratings. Data from this system is used to understand early educators’ needs around training, coaching, and program use of services such as Parent Aware and grants. Fast Facts (https://www.developtoolmn.org/fast-facts/index.jsp) are publicly available showcasing the most requested types of data related to Parent Aware and training. Related, a Develop Help Desk provides data on customer service issues, as well as trends to identify future needs. • The Minnesota Child Care Provider Hub (https://mn.gov/dhs/partners-and- providers/licensing/child-care-and-early-education/systems-transformation-initiative.jsp) is under development and designed to support the child care industry, creating more streamlined processes for child care programs. Beginning April 2023 and extending through Summer 2024, the Provider Hub is consolidating various services used by child care programs in one place. The data from this system is being used to understand better the interconnections of programs and supports received. Services that are or will be offered in the Provider Hub include: ￿ Child Care Wayfinder, Minnesota’s One Stop Shop for starting, sustaining, and expanding child care programs ￿ A child care licensing portal for certified and licensed centers and family child care homes ￿ Child Care Assistance Program ￿ Great Start Compensation Support Payment Program ￿ Enrollment and attendance ￿ Early Learning Scholarships The department plans to better connect these administrative data sources through the Minnesota Government Data Lake, which will add depth to the analysis possible in-house. • ECLDS (https://eclds.mn.gov/) is an innovative tool combines data collected by various departments into one online, interactive database. The system protects the privacy of children by not showing data for individual children; it shows population results only. It shows children's growth and achievement in relation to their participation in a variety of educational and social programs over time. This is used to understand connections between Rated Programs and children served by Great Start Scholarships, and Child Care Assistance Program by various demographics. Research and Evaluation Efforts Not all questions of interest can be answered or needs identified through administrative data the department already collects through its programs. Where gaps in available data are identified, the department partners with internal and external research and evaluation partners to gather additional information through research and evaluation projects. These projects provide additional insight into community needs, adding to the overall needs assessment picture. Some recent research and evaluation projects that have informed department quality improvement activities include: • Family Access to Child Care Measure (https://eclds.mn.gov/): A partnership with the University of Minnesota to further develop the Family Access Measure, a measure of families’ access to child care. This measure takes into account the nuances of where families live and how they travel to access care in order to understand statewide patterns of access to child care. This data helps inform the department’s understanding of areas in need of focused supports, to ensure supports are targeted to where they are needed most. • Minnesota Child Care Policy Research Project (https://www.childtrends.org/project/minnesota-child-care-policy-research-partnership): Child Trends and University of Minnesota partnered with Minnesota to explore a family centered definition of access which was selected as one of the OPRE funded 2019 Child Care Policy Research Project ending October 2024. Work through the Minnesota Child Care Policy Research project includes: o Impact of the Peacetime Emergency Grants, the first grant program offered to support child care programs during the start of the pandemic in 2020 o Families’ experience with Minnesota’s Child Care Assistance Program and the Early Learning Scholarship Program (https://researchconnections.org/sites/default/files/2023- 09/Families_Experiences_Minnesota_CCEEPRC2023.pdf) presented at CCEEPRC 2023 o Development of a Misalignment Index to better understand the overlap of families’ needs and preferences with available care, presented at the 2023 CCEEPRC meeting, showcasing the Access Composite Score (https://researchconnections.org/sites/default/files/2023- 09/Access_Composite_Score_MN_CCEEPRC2023.pdf) which highlights areas of misalignment building on lessons learned from the University of Minnesota’s prior work. o Provider Perceptions of the Child Care Assistance Program in Minnesota (https://www.childtrends.org/publications/provider-perceptions-of-the-child-care- assistance-program-in-minnesota) • Parent Aware Evaluation: Building on the work and recommendations from the Parent Aware Racial Equity Action Plan and legislative direction, Minnesota has contracted with Child Trends (https://www.childtrends.org/) to independently evaluate Parent Aware using an equity lens (https://www.childtrends.org/publications/a-guide-to- incorporating-a-racial-and-ethnic-equity-perspective-throughout-the-research-process). This evaluation is required by law and funded by the federal American Rescue Plan Act. The goal of the evaluation is to understand the degree to which Parent Aware supports positive outcomes for Minnesota’s children, families, and early care and education workforce. Information on evaluations projects can be found at https://www.childtrends.org/project/evaluation-of-parent-aware-minnesotas-voluntary- child-care-and-early-learning-program-quality-rating-and-improvement-system. • Evaluation efforts related to Family, Friend, and Neighbor supports: Minnesota has or will engage in several efforts to better understand the needs of family, friend, and neighbor caregivers and the impact of Minnesota’s supports for this segment of the child care landscape. These efforts include an Environmental Scan (https://edocs.dhs.state.mn.us/lfserver/Public/DHS-8497A-ENG) completed by The Improve Group in 2023; a design sprint conducted by Radicl in 2023; consultation with Minnesota Management and Budget to develop a set of performance measures for the FFN program and a data-tracking and reporting system; and a behavioral economics intervention under development in 2024 with MDRC through OPRE’s Behavioral Interventions to Advance Self-Sufficiency (BIAS) Next Generation project. • Early Care and Education Workforce Study (https://www.wilder.org/wilder- research/research-library/minnesotas-early-childhood-educators-2023-statewide-study): The department partnered with the Minnesota Department of Education and Children’s Cabinet to complete a 2023 Early Care and Education Workforce Study to better understand the size, demographics, economic wellbeing, and professional development participation and needs of the early care and education workforce. • NSECE: The National Survey of Early Care and Education Survey is a national survey. In recent years, the department has funded a Minnesota supplement, leveraging an ACF opportunity to secure MN fact sheets (https://mn.gov/dhs/partners-and- providers/news-initiatives-reports-workgroups/child-care-and-early-education/) from the 2019 study with comparisons to 2012 study findings.. These fact sheets help the department better understand our own administrative data on child care and early education programs, the child care workforce and families’ need for child care. Minnesota is pursuing similar analysis and fact sheets (https://mn.gov/dhs/partners-and- providers/news-initiatives-reports-workgroups/child-care-and-early-education/) using 2024 NSECE study data, and providing an important view of changes that have occurred before and after the Covid-19 pandemic. • Great Start Compensation Support Payment Program Evaluation: The department is currently in the process of developing an evaluation plan for the program which can be implemented in State Fiscal Year 2025 and beyond. Ongoing Community Input In addition to the sources described above, a final source of information for Minnesota’s needs assessment efforts is ongoing and direct engagement with communities directly affected by quality improvement initiatives. This includes both child care providers and families in search of quality care. Some specific efforts related to gathering community input include: • Minnesota StoryCollective: Through Minnesota’s Preschool Development Grant, the state has adapted a community engagement tool developed by the University of Kansas to provide ongoing feedback loops with communities across the state about their needs. Minnesota’s version of the tool is called StoryCollective. Through StoryCollective, the state and community partners collect stories from Minnesotans about their experiences of encountering challenges and/or experiences of their families thriving. Through participatory ￿Sensemaking Sessions,￿ community members come together to analyze the stories that have been shared, describe themes, and identify opportunities for action. As these identified actions inform policymaking at the state level, state staff circle back to community to share about progress and next steps. Insights from StoryCollective stories and sensemaking sessions are informing needs assessments across state government, ensuring that disparate teams and departments have a shared source of information about community needs. • Development of new communications channels: Particularly during the past few years, as Minnesota nimbly responded to the COVID-19 pandemic, the department honed its capacity to engage with child care providers in new and different ways. These include development of additional methods of communication, such as the Early Childhood Connector (https://mn.gov/dhs/partners-and-providers/news-initiatives-reports- workgroups/child-care-and-early-education/early-childhood-connector/), a cross-agency effort to share updates to child care providers and educators, including a bi-monthly newsletter which always includes a survey where providers can share about their needs with the department as well as a quarterly provider call, where providers can pose questions and have them answered. Input from the survey and the calls is gathered and analyzed to inform policy decisions. Full (and translated) scripts from the phone call as well as recordings are available of the most recent calls. • Development of direct community stakeholder feedback loops: The department seeks to build ongoing relationships with communities who are invested in its services, particularly with families with young children and providers of child care and other early childhood services. The department seeks community input in decision-making and regularly shares updates about its work with community members. These feedback loops build awareness of stakeholder needs around quality supports. Across all of the data collection methods described above, information gathered and analyzed over the course of each biennium helps determine the effectiveness of strategies currently used, and where improvements can be made, using quality set aside funds. b. Describe the findings of the assessment, including any findings related to needs of different populations and types of providers, and if any overarching goals for quality improvement were identified: Using the needs assessment strategies described above, the department has identified four overarching goals for quality improvement within its Child Development Services strategic plan: • Goal 1. Each and every child in Minnesota has the opportunity to access quality child care programs to meet their individual needs. • Goal 2. Child care programs are of high quality and engage in continuous improvement. • Goal 3. Parents have information needed to find quality child care and other services that support their child’s success in school and life. Child care programs have information to support families. • Goal 4. Professionals working in child care programs have the knowledge and skills to support children. Using these goals as the basis for the department’s strategic plan for quality improvement, the department tracks connected measures of progress regularly. The annual review of data informs next steps needed such as additional analysis, stakeholder engagement or program improvement strategies. A fifth strategic plan goal, ￿Goal 5: Internal and external customers receive service that is timely, helpful and meets their needs,￿ is overarching across the four goals listed above and is supported and informed by the findings highlighted in all four sections. This section highlights key findings related to each of these four goals drawn from the needs assessment activities outlined above. Goal 1. Each and every child in Minnesota has the opportunity to access quality child care programs to meet their individual needs. • Administrative data helps the department track Results Based Accountability (RBA) measures and identify areas of strength as well as improvements to make progress on this goal. Data from SFY23 shows that young children using child care assistance are attending Parent Aware Rated programs at a higher level than prior to the pandemic. While children are attending at a higher rate, the number of children attending Rated child care has remained stable over the last fiscal year, with approximately 20% children reported as children with high needs. Relationship-based professional development specialists, such as Mental Health Consultants and Inclusion coaches continue to be in high demand statewide, indicating that programs value this support. • Stories shared through Minnesota StoryCollective have highlighted the broad range of individual needs that shape what type of care will work for a family: not only more commonly-discussed needs related to affordability, a child’s ability and developmental stage, family’s location and access to transportation, cultural and linguistic needs, and access to care at hours that meet parental work schedules, but also needs related to many different types of family structures, mental health, addressing trauma, impacts of military service, and more. • Analysis of the Family Access Measure data described above highlights the geographic areas of the state where access to quality care is insufficient. This analysis allows the department to focus the efforts of various supports, including Child Care Wayfinder, Great Start Compensation Support Payments, and more in areas where support is most needed, to address gaps in access. • Across all of the FFN evaluation efforts described above, a key finding has been that many families prefer FFN care and consider it to be the highest-quality option for them, for various reasons: deepening relationships with key caregivers in the child(ren)’s life, care that meets the family’s schedule, location, and financial needs, shared cultural and linguistic practice, and more. This understanding of FFN care as a high-quality option informs the department’s development of supports for these caregivers. • NSECE Minnesota Survey results reveal a shift in care practices for children in households with all parents working. Since 2012, these households shifted from 95% using one child care provider to 72% in 2019. This shows the ongoing need for access to affordable care for families at impacting multiple income levels. In the 2019 survey, an increased percent of children attended home-based care, while conversely, fewer children attended center-based care. Information about family child care providers, show shifts in the ages of providers, with 26% under 40 years old, and 14% over 60, indicating an aging family child care provider workforce and the need to bolster recruitment of new providers in this sector. • Minnesota’s Preschool Development Grant (PDG) needs assessment identified the priority: families can access the early childhood services they need to help their young children thrive. The PDG needs assessment identified targeted strategies to achieve this priority, including ensuring all public-facing early childhood resources meet the linguistic and accessibility needs of their target communities; eliminating barriers to enrollment and participation in early childhood services; and expanding direct service capacity to address unmet demand across communities. • Across Minnesota’s work, the department looks for evidence of strategies that are successful in expanding families’ access to child care that meets their needs. A recent finding from the final report on the Facility Revitalization Grant program, a program the department recently funded using ARPA dollars through a contract with First Children’s Finance, offered an example of where this evidence can show up even in work that is not explicitly aimed at increasing capacity. Although the Facility Revitalization Grant program was mainly conceived of as a retention program for existing child care programs, by helping them make relatively small repairs to their facilities, the final report revealed that the program resulted in creation of 7,000 new child care slots statewide. This was simply through improvements to existing facilities that enabled the programs to add a few additional slots, rather than through more-costly building of brand-new facilities. Goal 2. Child care programs are of high quality and engage in continuous improvement. • Administrative data has shown us that of those currently eligible, 32% of the child care program population holds a Parent Aware Rating, with the majority of them currently holding a Four-Star Rating. • Findings from the PGD needs assessment suggest that a primary way to ensure that child care programs are of high quality is to invest in building the capacity of the early childhood workforce. Specifically, that state should build a pipeline of early childhood service providers with a focus on recruiting racially, culturally, and linguistically diverse providers, and expand upon existing professional development offerings focused on antiracism, cultural responsiveness, and trauma-informed practices. • Findings from StoryCollective highlight elements of child care programs that make them feel high-quality to families. One key finding here is that provider-family communication is key to quality. When families feel that they connect well with their child care provider, understand what is happening with their child while they are in care, and have a collaborative relationship with the provider to meet their child’s needs, they feel more confident in the quality of the program. • The Parent Aware Redesign effort has surfaced an interest in shifting Minnesota’s QRIS system more in the direction of supporting programs in engaging in continuous quality improvement rather than providing a static star-based rating. The department is further exploring the possibility of this shift through engagement with providers and families. • The Parent Aware Evaluation has provided these key findings thus far: o Interviews from states and a review of the most recent literature released provide information on new trends to embed equity, ensure community engagement, reduce barriers and support teaching staff in improving quality in a meaningful way. While some of the information is conflicting, the focus is on community needs and needs to support children’s learning and the child care workforce. o An indicator analysis reviewed the use of indicators selected by rated programs and patterns since the 2016 Redesign. The analysis have shown that programs consistently opt out of certain indicators, providing helpful information for Parent Aware Redesign efforts as well as for potential improvements to professional development offerings. • Minnesota’s work with MDRC around behavioral interventions for FFN providers is exploring what strategies will be most effective to support FFNs in accessing continuous improvement opportunities such as peer networks and trainings. Goal 3. Parents have information needed to find quality child care and other services that support their child’s success in school and life. Child care programs have information to support families. • Administrative data has shown an increase of 19% in the use of ParentAware.org. Meanwhile, Help Me Connect use Google Analytics and ongoing user engagement to update the search engine, to ensure it stays relevant. For example, as recently searches for diapers increased significantly, prompting a programmatic change to increase ease of access to diapers. • Findings from PDG indicate that in addition to the state providing families with information on quality child care, the state should also provide clear pathways for diverse families, providers, and community members to engage in decision-making processes that impact them, particularly in defining quality according to the needs of diverse racial and cultural communities. • Findings from StoryCollective highlight the importance of state collaboration with local governments and community-based partners￿families have expressed that these are often where they are learning about supports and services in their community, rather than necessarily through state-level resources. • The Mixed Delivery Action Labs project, funded by Minnesota’s Preschool Development Grant, is supporting local communities and the state to learn more about what best enables mixed-delivery partnerships. A more aligned mixed-delivery system helps families find quality care that meets their needs because settings are less siloed and helps programs support families because they are connected to additional supports beyond what they provide themselves. Communities participating in the Action Labs are surfacing barriers to such partnerships such as inequitable compensation across settings, transportation issues, barriers related to licensing, lack of capacity to do the coordination work required, and more. Pilot communities will develop strategies to address these barriers, which will inform future mixed-delivery work in Minnesota. Goal 4. Professionals working in child care programs have the knowledge and skills to support children. • Administrative data show that the quantity of training has increased past pre- pandemic levels. Online training has been accessed by persons in all Minnesota counties, reinforcing other trend data indicating a growing preference for on-line training. A more in-depth review planned will explore the Knowledge and Competency Framework and Course Levels associated with most frequently offered training and provide insights into shifting training needs. • Findings from the NSECE Survey 2019 showed an increased number of teachers in center-based care, with more teacher leads than assistants or aides since 2012. Teachers reported lower education levels than in 2012 with a decline in years of experience as well. Minnesota’s family child care providers are older, with more experience. This information can support the development of trainings targeted toward to differing years of experience and education levels. • The 2023 Early Care and Education Workforce Study described above asked professionals about their participation in various types of professional development experiences. While the study found general satisfaction with currently available professional development offerings, professionals also shared their input about what topics and formats would be most of interest to them. This information is informing ongoing updates to Minnesota’s professional development system. • The PDG needs assessment indicated that the state should prioritize recruitment and hiring practices at all levels of the early care and education ecosystem to increase racial, linguistic, cultural, and socioeconomic diversity in keeping with the characteristics of communities served. • Minnesota’s recently-launched Great Start Compensation Support Payment Program (https://mn.gov/dhs/partners-and-providers/grants-rfps/great-start- grants/compensation-support/), funded with State general fund dollars, is a significant new investment in the early care and education workforce in Minnesota. These payments to increase workforce compensation are a piece of Minnesota’s strategy to recognize the professionals in this workforce for the specialized knowledge and skills they must develop to care for young children. Development of an evaluation plan is currently underway to all Minnesota to continually learn from and improve this program and to inform other workforce supports. • The Mixed Delivery Action Labs project referenced above includes a Pay Parity Pilot project, which pilots implementation of an early childhood wage scale that compensates early educators equitably for their education, experience, and expertise. This project will provide significant information to guide the state’s ongoing efforts to increase support for the early childhood workforce. • Mental Health Coaching and Consulting: Findings from a 2023 survey of Family, Friend and Neighbor (FFN) caregivers who participated in early childhood mental consultation indicate that the consultation group provided a comfortable and culturally responsive environment for participants to share their experiences and gain practical resources to help them provide childcare. Findings also indicate that most respondents made changes in their care practices and felt better able to support children and families and to cope with stress as a result of participation in the consultation group. Respondents also reported that they learned how to better understand and care for themselves and others at work, and that consultation helped them provide better care to children and to better support families. • Trauma-informed Practices: The 2023 Preschool Development Grant (PDG) Strategic Refresh conducted nine focus group sessions with a total of 20 families; seven focus group sessions with 20 early childhood providers; 4 advisory council meetings with families and providers; 12 photovoice participants contributing individual stories, and 13 interviews with state and local early childhood leaders to go deeper into needs identified during the 2019 community-based needs assessment process. The PDG Strategic Refresh identified the need to, ￿Acknowledge trauma and normalize trauma- and healing- informed practices￿ as a guiding principle for the work. • The department’s work to support family, friend, and neighbor care providers has resulted in a number of key findings that inform the shape and structure of the state’s work with these caregivers. Findings include, for instance, that these caregivers often do not receive compensation and are motivated to provide this care for other reasons, such as their relationship with the child(ren) in their care; that many families consider FFN care to be the highest-quality option available to them, even when other options exist; and that few, but some, FFN caregivers are interested in pursuing licensure and a career in early care and education. • Goal Five, Internal and external customers receive service that is timely, helpful and meets their needs. Overall our customers have indicated that our services meet many needs, but could be improved by reviewing the marketing of available supports offered for child care programs, and review application processes to remove burden and simplify whenever possible.