Guest Blog: Cheryl Clendaniel on Supporting Tiered Reimbursement

Ed’s note: Earlier this month, Gov. Jack Markell proposed his annual fiscal state budget–and of the $4.1 billion in total, about $11.3 million was requested to further early childhood education in Delaware. Those funds would go to support, among other things, initiatives like the Delaware Readiness Teams, the Delaware Stars Program, and tiered reimbursement, which provides ongoing technical assistance and grants to early learning programs and professionals to help them increase their qualifications and quality standards.

Just last week, during the legislature’s Joint Finance Committee hearings, experts and practitioners–including Cheryl Clendaniel, an early childhood administrator of The Learning Center in Milford–provided public comment to committee members, explaining why these funds are so crucial to Delaware’s youngest learners.

Here are Cheryl’s comments on the importance of tiered reimbursement.

“Good afternoon Senator McDowell, Representative George-Smith, and members of the Joint Finance Committee.

My name is Cheryl Clendaniel and I am the early childhood administrator of The Learning Center (better known as TLC) in Milford.

TLC is a private, for-profit early childcare program (and I use the term ‘for-profit’ loosely). For 37 years, we have served the families of the Milford area and I have been working in the field of early learning for 36 years, about 31 of those years at TLC.

I’m here today to ask for your continued support of tiered reimbursement for quality programs like mine. There are approximately 1,200 early childhood programs in Delaware with 47 percent participating in Delaware Stars. (It’s a good start, but we have a way to go.) We count on tiered reimbursement to be able to provide high quality early care and learning experiences to children from families with low incomes.

Before tiered reimbursement began in 2011, we averaged two children on Purchase of Care each month out of the 100 families served. Today, it is approximately 20 children, and I can tell you we could not do this without tiered reimbursement. It supports our quest to offer and maintain a quality learning environment. Without it, the families of those 20 children would not be with us; thus missing out on spending the most important years of their lives in an environment which supports the whole child and sets the stage for future success.

I am proud to represent our families and the children we serve. Thank you for supporting a bright start for all of their futures.”