HECHINGER’S “CRISIS IN CHILD CARE” SMEAR CAMPAIGN IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY KELLOGG!
Posted: February 3, 2016 Filed under: Administration for Children and Families, Allies for Quality Care, Business Ethics, CCPP-approved Provider, Child Care Advisory Council, Child Care Development Fund, Child Care Licensing, Child Care Mississippi, Clarion-Ledger, DECCD-MDHS, Early Learning Guidelines (ELG), Hechinger Foundation, Kellogg Foundation, Mississippi Board of Health, Mississippi First, Mississippi Health Department, Mississippi Legislature, Mississippi's Child Care Crisis, MS Department of Education, MS Department of Health, MS Department of Human Services, Office of the Attorney General, QRS Mississippi, Quality Rating System, SECAC Mississippi, Uncategorized | Tags: Administration for Children and Families, Allies for Quality Care, child care licensing Mississippi, child care quality rating systems Mississippi, DECCD, DECCD-MDHS, Early Learning Guidelines (ELG), Hechinger Report, Kellogg Foundation, Mississippi CCDF State Plan, Mississippi Child Care Resource and Referral, Mississippi First, Mississippi Health Department, Mississippi State Early Childhood Institute, Mississippi's Child Care Crisis, Quality Rating System; DECCD-MDHS; CCDF Quality Improvement, SECAC Mississippi, The Mississippi Center for Education Innovation Leave a commentA child care press conference will be held on Monday, February 8, 2016, on the second floor of the Capitol at 10:00 AM.
HECHINGER’S “CRISIS IN CHILD CARE” SMEAR CAMPAIGN IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY KELLOGG!
The Hechinger Report knew the Mississippi Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights was investigating potential Disparate Impact in Mississippi’s child care quality rating system before publishing harmful, unsubstantiated child care complaints (that should not have been disclosed because Courts have ruled no public interest exists in unsubstantiated complaints) and expressed its disdain for Constitutional Due Process of Law in Sunday’s Clarion-Ledger – its partner.
Seems to me they may as well partner with the paparazzi and the National Inquirer!
Hechinger is funded by the W. K. Kellogg Foundation which is actively involved in the promotion and support of Mississippi’s Pre-K Collaborative and QRIS.
Up to now, it has seemed, particularly to self-employed child care providers, that the strategy (in Mississippi) of some Pre-K Collaborative supporters (including some media outlets, public policy groups and member organizations) may be to lift up their member programs (and gainful employment through associated grants) by disparaging self-employed child care providers (the majority of which are Black and/or women owned and operated Programs) through selective reporting, adverse policy, exclusion, and marginalization.
Perhaps the idea is to bully the citizenry and working parents, over time, into agreement that child care and time spent with us is not safe or where a child should be; only six hours of public Pre-K such that they would be funded to advise/provide/report can really meet a family’s work support and early learning needs.
And such strategy would be particularly necessary when Frank Porter Graham’s recent Evaluation of Mississippi’s very costly yet unavailing QRIS and measured child outcomes in the recent legislative review of the Pre-K Collaborative are scathing!
The Joint Legislative Committee on Performance Evaluation and Expenditure Review from PEER: The Mississippi Legislature’s Oversight Agency, is the only external Early Learning Collaborative evaluation available to legislators because:
- there is no child care regulatory oversight for Pre-K classrooms such as is required in other states;
- there is no QRIS classroom requirement such as is required for Pre-K classrooms in other states so Mississippi cannot compare Pre-K “quality”;
- the physical standards as governed by the Early Learning Guidelines are less stringent for existing Mississippi Pre-K classrooms than they are for child care classrooms and standards have recently been weakened for new construction through July 2017.
The report does not recommend increased funding or additional staff for Pre-K.
A child care press conference will be held on Monday, February 8, 2016, on the second floor of the Capitol at 10:00 AM.
This is your opportunity to unite as the small business child care industry and present the facts.
Stand up for your small business!
Come stand with us!
A message from Carol Burnet of MLICCI:
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Ignorance or Arrogance? The DECCD 2016 CCDBG State Plan Work
Posted: January 6, 2016 Filed under: Administration for Children and Families, Allies for Quality Care, Business Ethics, CCPP-approved Provider, Child Care Development Fund, Child Care Mississippi, Consumer Protection, DECCD-MDHS, Head Start, Hechinger Foundation, Kellogg Foundation, Mississippi Building Blocks, Mississippi Legislature, MS Department of Human Services, Office of the Attorney General, QRS Mississippi, Quality Rating System, School Readiness Mississippi, SECAC Mississippi, Uncategorized | Tags: 2007 Market Survey Rates, Administration for Children and Families, Allies for Quality Care, CCPP-approved Provider, child care Mississippi, child care quality rating systems Mississippi, DECCD, DECCD-MDHS, equal access, Hechinger Report, Kellogg Foundation, Market Survey Rates, MDHS, Mississippi CCDF State Plan, Mississippi Child Care Quality Steps, Mississippi Child Care Resource and Referral, QRS Mississippi, Quality Rating System; DECCD-MDHS; CCDF Quality Improvement, SECAC Mississippi, The Mississippi Center for Education Innovation Leave a comment
UPDATE: CENTRAL PLANNERS AWARD CCDBG FUNDING CONTRACTS WITHOUT CONDUCTING REQUIRED QUALITY NEEDS ASSESSMENT
The Early Years Network contract was awarded to a single agency who serves as the fiscal agent. This agency works with other agency partners to provide high quality services.
| Contract Awardee: | Mississippi State Universtiy Extension Service |
| Contract Partners (alphabetical order): |
Mississippi Center for Education Innovation |
| Mississippi State University Early Childhood Institute | |
| NEW FUNDING | Save the Children (Head Start) |
| NEW FUNDING | University of Mississippi Center for Education Research and Evaluation |
| University of Southern Mississippi | |
| Department of Child and Family Studies | |
| Institute for Disability Studies |
FACT :
Since DECCD took the Certificate Program In-House, approximately 250 Licensed Child Care Facilities have gone out of business. It has not yet been determined if a disproportionate number of those failed businesses were owned and operated by members of a protected class. However, no or few Certificates funding newly enrolled children have been issued by DECCD this fiscal year which began Oct. 1, 2015, (citing lack of funding) so the number of failed businesses serving large numbers of low-income children is expected to rise due to the fact Low-income Providers have not been able to fill vacancies left when children began the new school year last August or aged out of the Program.
Webinar Questions and Answers:
http: //www.mdhs.ms.gov/media/318009/Webinar-1_Questions-and-Polls.pdf
Q: What document will be provided in advance as a basis for development? Anything other than the 2013 Plan?
A: DECCD will not release a draft of the State Plan until such time as the Office of Child Care releases a final version of the State Plan Preprint.
http://www.mdhs.ms.gov/media/318968/Webinar-3_comments.pdf
Question: Is it also the consideration of state policy makers to reduce the assistance such low-income families now receive in order to attempt to serve the same number of children while increasing grants for quality? If so, will you be providing an Economic Impact Statement?
DECCD Response: States have been required by the 2014 Reauthorization to make greater investments in quality activities and program oversight processes such as monitoring providers. At this time, the state’s allocation of funds has not increased. DECCD will make every effort to judiciously allocate limited resources in order to comply with federal regulations and to meet the needs of our clients.
Any future policy changes proposed by DECCD will be presented to the Attorney General’s Office for review. DECCD will follow the instructions provided by legal counsel regarding program performance and the requirement of any Economic Impact Statement.
Dept. of Ed Requires First Phase QRIS and Scores Absent APL!
Posted: October 31, 2013 Filed under: "Race to the Top", Administration for Children and Families, Allies for Quality Care, CCPP-approved Provider, Child Care Advisory Council, Child Care Development Fund, DECCD-MDHS, Early Childhood Education Mississippi, Early Learning Guidelines (ELG), General, Hechinger Foundation, Kellogg Foundation, Mississippi Building Blocks, Mississippi First, Mississippi Legislature, MS Department of Education, MS Department of Human Services, Office of the Attorney General, QRS Mississippi, Quality Rating System, SB2395, School Readiness, School Readiness Mississippi, SECAC, SECAC Mississippi, Uncategorized | Tags: "Race to the Top", 2007 Market Survey Rates, Allies for Quality Care, Attorney General Jim Hood; Quality Rating System; Quality Star Step; DECCD-MDHS;, CCPP-approved Provider, Child Care Licensing, child care quality rating systems Mississippi, DECCD, DECCD-MDHS, Early Childhood Education Mississippi, Early Learning Guidelines (ELG), equal access, Hechinger Report, Hechinger Report; Kellogg Foundation; Quality Rating System; SECAC, Kellogg Foundation, MDHS, Mississippi CCDF State Plan, Mississippi Child Care Quality Steps, Mississippi Child Care Resource and Referral, Mississippi early childhood education, Mississippi early learning system, Mississippi First, Mississippi Quality Stars, Mississippi School Readiness, Mississippi State Early Childhood Institute, QRS Mississippi, Quality Rating System, SECAC Mississippi, The Mississippi Center for Education Innovation Leave a commentDept. of Ed Requires First Phase QRIS and Scores Absent APL!
The Associated Press reports the competition is fierce among groups applying for preschool money.
“The Department of Education says 72 groups have indicated interest in the money, which is supposed to fund at least 1,325 spots statewide.”
“About 50 of the community consortiums are led by public school districts, while the rest are led by private child care centers or nonprofit groups. Some led by private child care centers could be ineligible, because the law specifies that a community group must be led by a school or nonprofit.”
Providers noted right away the original legislation drafted by Rachel Cantor and sponsored by Senator Brice Wiggins also required participating child care programs to participate in this State’s very poor performing QRIS…which would have left 97% of all licensed child care ineligible right from the start!
A recent national study concludes that after more than 14 years of implementation, QRIS systems still do not improve school readiness or learning outcomes for young children.
Another long-term study now being concluded by the Mississippi Low-Income Child Care Initiative has revealed Mississippi’s Quality Stars scoring method is both subjective and inconsistent.
Even Mississippi’s recent Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge application acknowledges the need and lays out a plan to validate costly QRIS through child outcomes.
So, if current and removed QRIS is not valid and does not improve school readiness, who is insisting it be included now as one pre-requisite for Pre-K participation?
Read on.
During the 2013 legislative session, the Mississippi Association of Licensed Child Care Providers successfully lobbied to have QRIS or any specific measure of quality removed from the Early Learning Collaborative Act as a requirement of participation until 2016, in hopes that either a validated measure of quality will be developed in that time or it will be more widely accepted that “smoke and mirrors” QRIS does not raise academic achievement or justify implementation costs.
However, following the close of the legislative session and sometime after meeting with Representative Toby Barker and Senator Brice Wiggins, the Mississippi Department of Ed.’s Tracina Green and others put the QRIS requirement back in as child care “policy“ without benefit of the required exercise in Administrative Procedures.
Further, MDE requested a large budget increase above and beyond the scheduled incremental pre-kindergarten funding expansions and NOT the first day of state funded preschool has taken place yet!
Why didn’t MDE recommend that more than $11,000,000 in quality funding now supporting the legislatively removed QRIS be used, instead, to fund expanded pre-kindergarten programs in child care programs which meet all other qualifications and offer full day, full year Universal pre-k options to working families?
Emails to Representative Toby Barker have gone unanswered.
Two requests to MDE’s Robin Lemonis for identification of the task force members MDE appointed to advise in pre-school implementation have gone unanswered.
Many providers are guessing that MDE task force relationships will likely link to programs funded by or programs partnering with those currently funded through QRIS – a screening tool that may very well claim disparate intent and “narrowing of the competitive field” as its greatest achievements thus far!
Others have turned wide-spread discussion of this MDE conduct into a humorous game show of sorts to just Name the First Wave of Pre-K Awards!
Let us join in the fun!
Identify the Players from the above text!
Which programs do you think will receive First Wave Pre-K Funding?
Send in your Answers!
(Participating child care providers/educators will remain anonymous.)
It will be great fun to look back and see how correct we are/were when MDE awards are finally announced!
In the meantime, the Mississippi Association of Licensed Child Care Providers’ Executive Committee will meet soon to determine the much more serious nature and course of its response to the Department of Education’s interpretation of the Early Learning Collaborative Act.
Flouting Law with Impunity?
Posted: October 1, 2013 Filed under: "Race to the Top", Administration for Children and Families, Allies for Quality Care, CCPP-approved Provider, Child Care Advisory Council, Child Care Development Fund, Child Care Licensing, Child Care Mississippi, DECCD-MDHS, Delta Licensed Providers, e-Childcare™, General, Hechinger Foundation, Kellogg Foundation, Mississippi Legislature, MS Department of Human Services, Office of the Attorney General, SECAC, SECAC Mississippi, Suel v MDHS, Uncategorized, Xerox | Tags: "Race to the Top", 2007 Market Survey Rates, Administration for Children and Families, Allies for Quality Care, CCPP-approved Provider, child care Mississippi, DECCD, DECCD-MDHS, e-Childcare™, equal access, Hechinger Report, Kellogg Foundation, Market Survey Rates, MDHS, Mississippi CCDF State Plan, Mississippi child care, Mississippi licensed child care, SECAC, SECAC Mississippi, Xerox Leave a commentFlouting Law with Impunity?
Agency Division Directors proposing Significant Amendments to a set of regulations should be required by the legislature to attend public hearings for the proposed rules adoptions and to give the rationale determining the agency’s decisions in that public forum.
The Mississippi legislature should also reinstate a Board of Directors for the Department of Human Services. Direct Board oversight would likely bring about rapid response to alleged Division incompetency and/or the flouting of law and block grant regulations with impunity.
As it stands now, there is no apparent state or federal consequence or any consequence of sufficient significance to change the alleged pattern and practice demonstrated by DECCD to defy federal Program guidance and the fair rule making process.
Some have said, regardless of whether or not CCDF Directors have served at the pleasure of Republican Governors or Democratic Governors, never before, in the history of Mississippi’s Child Care Development Fund, has there been an administration to just up and change CCDF Program policy – sometimes in mid-stream – through a careful play of words and/or personal interpretation often resulting in a new and unexpected application opposite an adopted rule’s understanding or intent.
And the safeguards in place to allow for a fair hearing on the merits of adverse application has not served as the deterrent it should because the DECCD Director, the individual most likely to be instructing “new and unexpected” adverse policy implementation, is also the Hearing Officer! 🙂
Jill Dent was appointed following the establishment of the State Early Childhood Advisory Council – the foremost public entity she identifies as responsible for approving the Proposed FFY 2014-2015 Mississippi CCDF State Plan.
At a recent meeting, however, child care providers questioned whether or not SECAC actually approved or even saw DECCD’s Proposed CCDF State Plan as initially filed with the Secretary of State and published in the Administrative Bulletin. After all, the Plan sought to adopt payment to providers through the Xerox e-Childcare™ system of payment without benefit of an Economic Impact Statement and during a time in which MDHS was restrained from doing so under Chancery Court decreed Preliminary Injunction. (Click here to review page 29 of the Administrative Bulletin.)
Child Care leadership further mocked the results and questioned SECAC’s actual acceptance of the DECCD 2013 Fair Market Rate Survey which found that without any increase in child care assistance fees whatever since BEFORE three Minimum Wage increases, coupled with the rising annual costs of doing business over almost eight years, the State’s share of payment to providers in some regions has GROWN to provide a greater percentage of the 2013 fees now charged than was provided in 2011. 🙂
At last week’s public hearings, child care leadership presented comments addressing many such concerns and raised formal objections to alleged Administrative Procedures Law violations so that further legal action, if necessary, may be taken.
Jill Dent did not attend.
A Court stenographer was present.
The public hearing facilitator concluded the meeting saying all comments would be posted to the MDHS website.
Sen. Wiggin’s PreK Collaboration Meeting Friday February 15th
Posted: February 8, 2013 Filed under: "Race to the Top", Allies for Quality Care, CCPP-approved Provider, Child Care Advisory Council, Child Care Licensing, Child Care Mississippi, DECCD-MDHS, Delta Licensed Providers, Disaster Preparation, e-Childcare™, Early Childhood Education Mississippi, Early Learning Guidelines (ELG), General, HB1174, Head Start, Hechinger Foundation, Kellogg Foundation, Mississippi Board of Health, Mississippi Building Blocks, Mississippi First, Mississippi Health Department, Mississippi Legislature, MS Department of Education, MS Department of Human Services, Office of the Attorney General, QRS Mississippi, Quality Rating System, School Readiness, SECAC, SECAC Mississippi, T.E.A.C.H., Uncategorized, Xerox | Tags: "Race to the Top", 2007 Market Survey Rates, Allies for Quality Care, CCPP-approved Provider, Child Care Licensing, child care Mississippi, child care quality rating systems Mississippi, DECCD, DECCD-MDHS, e-Childcare™, Early Childhood Education Mississippi, Early Learning Guidelines (ELG), equal access, Hechinger Report, Kellogg Foundation, Market Survey Rates, MDHS, Mississippi CCDF State Plan, Mississippi child care, Mississippi Child Care Quality Steps, Mississippi Child Care Resource and Referral, Mississippi early childhood education, Mississippi School Readiness, Quality Rating System, Quality Rating System; DECCD-MDHS; CCDF Quality Improvement, SECAC Mississippi, The Mississippi Center for Education Innovation, Xerox Leave a comment
BREAKING NEWS: PREK PASSES SENATE!
Posted: February 8, 2013 Filed under: "Race to the Top", Allies for Quality Care, CCPP-approved Provider, Child Care Advisory Council, Child Care Licensing, Child Care Mississippi, DECCD-MDHS, Delta Licensed Providers, e-Childcare™, Early Childhood Education Mississippi, Early Learning Guidelines (ELG), General, HB1174, Head Start, Hechinger Foundation, Kellogg Foundation, Mississippi Board of Health, Mississippi Building Blocks, Mississippi First, Mississippi Health Department, Mississippi Legislature, MS Department of Education, MS Department of Human Services, Office of the Attorney General, QRS Mississippi, Quality Rating System, School Readiness, SECAC, SECAC Mississippi, T.E.A.C.H., Uncategorized, Xerox | Tags: "Race to the Top", 2007 Market Survey Rates, Allies for Quality Care, CCPP-approved Provider, Child Care Licensing, child care licensing Mississippi, child care Mississippi, child care quality rating systems Mississippi, DECCD, DECCD-MDHS, e-Childcare™, Early Childhood Education Mississippi, Early Learning Guidelines (ELG), equal access, Hechinger Report, Kellogg Foundation, Market Survey Rates, MDHS, Mississippi CCDF State Plan, Mississippi child care, Mississippi Child Care Licensing, Mississippi Child Care Quality Steps, Mississippi Child Care Resource and Referral, Mississippi early learning system, Mississippi First, Mississippi Health Department, Mississippi licensed child care, Mississippi School Readiness, Mississippi State Early Childhood Institute, QRS Mississippi, Quality Rating System, Quality Rating System; DECCD-MDHS; CCDF Quality Improvement, SECAC, SECAC Mississippi, The Mississippi Center for Education Innovation, Xerox 3 Comments
Click Here to Read Senate Bill 2395 PreK Collaboration Act.
Click here to View Lt. Governor’s and Speaker’s Press Conference.
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