This week CSN would like to highlight the Local Planning Council for Child Care Development (LPC). Read below to hear about the amazing work LPC is doing along with the childcare needs of the families in Nevada County.
The Local Planning Council for Child Care Development for the County of Nevada (“LPC”) expands access to high-quality, early learning and childcare programs for children under 12 and promotes quality early care and education services through community assessment, county-wide partnerships and advocacy to meet the needs of children, families, and early care and school age educators. Our services provide ongoing community benefits by improving young children’s health, social-emotional, and cognitive outcomes; enhance school readiness; and help close the wide school readiness gap that exists between children with high needs and their peers at kindergarten entry.
Since 1991, the LPC has served as a forum to support and address the childcare needs of all families in the community for all types of childcare settings. We have found that many working families in Nevada County lack access to the childcare they need when their children are very young. Each year the parents of nearly 12,000 Nevada County children under age 12 struggle to find suitable childcare to support their employment and career advancement.
Inadequate childcare acts as a barrier to worker productivity and to economic growth. Our county also continues to have a critical shortage of highly skilled early educators and providers, which is an impediment to expanding early learning and care programs while maintaining or improving quality.
To this end, the LPC offers stipends, grants and professional development incentives to all early learning and care programs for children under 12, including licensed private and subsidized preschool and afterschool programs, and license-exempt centers to help improve and sustain long-term quality of early care services in our county. Our support services include grants to support a safe and positive environment where children play and learn and educational
stipends to support early learning educators and caregivers in acquiring or increasing their knowledge and skills to promote positive relationships, interactions, and activities that enhance all children’s growth and development to prepare them for success in school and life. These services also raise the quality of childcare services, which keeps children safe and learning, gives parent(s) access to childcare so they can continue to earn, which keeps our economy thriving.