6.1 Supporting the Child Care Workforce

Lead Agencies have broad flexibility to implement policies and practices to support the child care workforce. 6.1.1 Strategies to improve recruitment, retention, compensation, and well-being a. Identify any Lead Agency activities related to strengthening workforce recruitment and retention of child care providers. Check all that apply: i. [ ] Providing program-level grants to support investments in staff compensation. ii. [x] Providing bonuses or stipends paid directly to staff, like sign-on or retention bonuses. iii. [ ] Connecting family child care providers and center-based child care staff to health insurance or supporting premiums in the Marketplace. iv. [ ] Subsidizing family child care provider and center-based child care staff retirement benefits. v. [ ] Providing paid sick, personal, and parental leave for family child care providers and center-based child care staff. vi. [ ] Providing student loan debt relief or loan repayment for family child care providers and center-based child care staff. vii. [x] Providing scholarships or tuition support for center-based child care staff and family child care providers. viii. [x] Other. Describe: ECECD has implemented additional strategies to address recruitment, retention, compensation, and well-being other than the strategies listed in the plan. The following strategies have been used by ECECD to support the early childhood workforce. Recruitment: ECECD implemented the Developing Futures campaign in August 2022 to improve recruitment and address New Mexico’s workforce shortage of early childhood professionals. Developing Futures highlights the various career paths within early childhood education by sharing real-life stories of New Mexican men and women currently in those roles. The campaign includes a website, a wide-spread advertising on social media, billboards, television commercials featuring early childhood education educators, and online ads. Additionally, in April 2024, ECECD expanded the Developing Futures Campaign to include a personalized career quiz which allows individuals who are interested in the field of early childhood to explore their options, and expanded the website to feature new professional profiles, and a commercial featuring New Mexico PreK student and a game show theme. As a future plan for recruitment, ECECD is researching how we will approach registered apprenticeships. ECECD is engaging in a partnership with New Mexico’s Department of Workforce Solutions to create ￿pre-apprenticeship￿ program for early childhood in New Mexico. The plan is to create opportunities for 2-3 apprentices in 6 ECECD identified child care programs. Retention: To address retention, ECECD funds three mentor networks through a contract with Central New Mexico Community College. The networks support early childhood professionals with opportunities to engage in reflective practice with other colleagues in the field. Through an application process, an individual can become a mentor or request a mentor. The three mentor networks are an Infant Toddler Teacher Network, an Early Childhood Director Network, and an Early Childhood Home-Based Provider Network. Currently, 70 individuals are receiving mentorship and there are 79 mentors available. b. Describe any Lead Agency ongoing efforts and future plans to assess and improve the compensation of the child care workforce in the State or Territory, including increasing wages, bonuses, and stipends. ECECD has identified ongoing efforts and future plans to assess and improve the compensation of the early childhood workforce, including increasing wages which are outlined in its 2022-2027 Strategic Plan. Under the School Readiness Goal, there is an objective to ￿Ensure all early childhood professionals are supported by a fully implemented equitable career and compensation system.￿ The current and ongoing efforts to help realize this goal include the following: using an alternative methodology approach to inform state child care subsidy rates; the methodology includes assumptions about wages paid to staff and increases wages as a program’s quality increases. Additionally, New Mexico has an Early Childhood Professionals subcommittee to the Early Childhood Advisory Council. This Subcommittee is tasked with developing recommendations on recruitment, retention, career and compensation lattice, improving credentials, licensure, and teacher preparation. Currently, the subcommittee is reviewing ECECD￿s proposed implementation of the Infant and Toddler pay parity that will provide funding to close the wage gap between infant and toddler educators and PreK educators. Future subcommittee work includes providing consultation with the development and implementation of a career lattice and salary scale that accounts for education and years of experience. Through a contract with Central New Mexico Community College￿s Ingenuity program (CNM-I), ECECD provides PreK pay parity to early childhood teachers and directors who work in Head Start programs including Tribal Head Start, as well as in community-based or tribal state-funded PreK programs. This opportunity is designed to recognize the credentials and experience of early childhood educators and provide comparable salary to early childhood teachers working in a public-school setting. CNM-I also administers ECECD’s Wage Supplement Program that provides education-based supplemental wages to early childhood professionals who work with children from birth to age five. The program is education-based and includes ten incremental levels; the more education one attains, the more supplement one can receive. The program is designed to ensure that no educator that meets the criteria earns less than $18/hour. c. Describe any Lead Agency ongoing efforts and future plans to expand access to benefits, including health insurance, paid sick, personal, and parental leave, and retirement benefits. The ECECD 2022-2027 Strategic Plan has a goal focused on strengthening the early childhood ecosystem and one of the objectives is ￿to partner with New Mexico health care agencies to support early childhood professionals in accessing publicly supported health care coverage.￿ The current efforts to help realize this goal include using an alternative methodology approach to inform state child care subsidy rates; the methodology includes a $6,000 per employee for health and/or retirement benefits. ECECD will partner with the New Mexico Health Care Authority to assess how it may support a system of coverage for early childhood education professionals that include strategies such as using the Healthcare Exchange, Medicaid, and a High-Risk Insurance pool to identify and enroll eligible individuals. d. Describe any Lead Agency ongoing efforts and future plans to support the mental health and well-being of the child care workforce. ECECD is committed to supporting the mental health and well-being of the child care workforce. ECECD makes multiple trainings available via its Quorum professional development platform that address wellbeing and mental health. In addition, in 2023, ECECD launched an Infant Early Childhood Mental Health Consultation (i.e., the Social Emotional and Early Development (SEED) program) which is aimed to help support adults in order to help children. The SEED program supports the mental health and well-being of the workforce through pairing educators with a licensed or license-eligible behavioral health practitioner to help address key behavioral health skills in the classroom or family child care home - from trauma- responsive caregiving to self-regulation skills. In addition, through the FOCUS QRIS redesign, ECECD is examining how to better build support for the well-being of the child care workforce into its consultation processes and standards. e. Describe any other strategies the Lead Agency is developing and/or implementing to support providers’ recruitment and retention of the child care workforce. ECECD engaged the Early Childhood Professionals subcommittee of the Early Childhood Advisory Council who provided recommendations on recruitment and retention In their Year One Report to the Governor which includes the development or implementation of the following: * A marketing campaign to attract new individuals into the Early Childhood industry. *A streamlined hiring and onboarding process for new hires that includes a competitive wage. *Professional development opportunities or benefits to retain employees. ECECD has partnered with a local data science company to create a Professional Development Information System (PDIS) which will serve as the state’s workforce registry, as well as a central place to house professional development transcripts, degrees, and certificates. This will support recruitment and retention by linking content about career pathways and scholarships, pay parity, and wage supplements, and by helping individuals in the field set goals, and visualize their progress toward those goals in one place, even if they change their employment. ECECD has developed a Career Pathways document which was released January 6, 2022. The document outlines the pathways that exist for early childhood educators who want to advance their credentials or for those wanting to enter the field. ECECD is updating the Guide on a frequency to ensure all Institutes of Higher Education offering early childhood coursework, certificate pathways, or degrees are represented accordingly. 6.1.2 Strategies to support provider business practices a. Describe other strategies that the Lead Agency is developing and/or implementing to strengthen child care providers’ business management and administrative practices. Other strategies that ECECD is implementing to strengthen child care providers’ business management and administrative practices include implementing ￿Strengthening Business Practices," a 4-part training series offered through the state’s training system, New Mexico Early Learning System. In addition, beginning in 2024 ECECD partnered with Women’s Economic Self-Sufficiency Team (WESST), a local CDFI and business development agency who administers business development grants and coaching through CRECER, which stands for Capacity Resources for Enhancing Care, Excellence, and Resilience and is the Spanish word for ￿to grow.￿ The CRECER program administers grants to family child care home and child care centers and provides business coaching related to taxes, budgeting, and other key competencies related to operating a child care business. b. Check the topics addressed in the Lead Agency’s strategies for strengthening child care providers’ administrative business practices. Check all that apply: i. [x] Fiscal management. ii. [x] Budgeting. iii. [x] Recordkeeping. iv. [ ] Hiring, developing, and retaining qualified staff. v. [ ] Risk management. vi. [ ] Community relationships. vii. [ ] Marketing and public relations. viii. [ ] Parent-provider communications. ix. [x] Use of technology in business administration. x. [ ] Compliance with employment and labor laws. xi. [ ] Other. Describe any other efforts to strengthen providers’ administrative business: 6.1.3 Strategies to support provider participation Lead Agencies must facilitate participation of child care providers and staff with limited English proficiency and disabilities in the child care subsidy system. Describe how the Lead Agency will facilitate this participation, including engagement with providers to identify barriers and specific strategies used to support their participation: a. Providers and staff with limited English proficiency: ECECD uses multiple strategies to ensure the participation of child care providers and staff with limited English proficiency. ECECD employs child care assistance and regulatory staff are bilingual in order provides professional development in English and Spanish and is developing its workforce registry, the Professional Development Information System, in both English and Spanish. In addition, ECECD facilitates participation of child care providers and staff with limited English proficiency by inviting providers whose first language is not English to participate in community dialogue through simultaneous translation as part of its monthly community calls and in-person feedback sessions. In addition, ECECD works with community organizations to understand and meet the needs of providers with limited English proficiency. and utilizing community advocates and local coalitions to facilitate communication and support. b. Providers and staff who have disabilities: ECECD facilitates participation of child care providers and staff who have disabilities by recruiting providers from the community, and utilizing community advocates and local coalitions to support the needs of child care providers who may have a disability. ECECD also ensures compliance with the American’s with Disabilities Act.