Early Literacy Efforts Remain Front and Center in Delaware
Delaware continues to focus on early literacy, a critical benchmark for a child’s educational development, and an area where Delaware (along with most of the nation) has declined in recent years. Recent focus has been on the NAEP scores, which have put Delaware below most other states and well below some of our neighbors, and with one of...
Delaware Looks to Build on Success Strengthening its Educator Workforce
Delaware continues to launch strategies to further strengthen its educator workforce—from increased pay recommended in the next budget cycle—to a handful of new bills introduced in Legislative Hall this session.
Like the rest of the country, Delaware has fewer teachers in its pipeline than in generations past, punctuated by declines...
Tragic Child Care Incidents: Wake-Up Call for Delaware
Although Delaware has some of the strongest licensing policies in terms of what types of child care are required to be licensed (almost no program is exempt) and what the requirements are for the workforce, several incidents of injury and even death of children have occurred in recent years. These include murder, smothering, physical abuse...
Delaware Crunching the Numbers on Child Care Investment Rates: Is Support on the Way for Providers?
As we have written about in the past, the rates at which Delaware funds child care remain too low for providers to support quality—let alone to cover basic costs required to operate, like paying staff, rising wages and costs, driven by minimum wage increases and inflation.
Delaware has long relied on a "market rate" study to set those...