Our Programs — The Kids First Communities Campaign
64,000 West Virginia children under age six spend a large part of their day in the care of someone other than their parents, because their parents are working. Unfortunately, in West Virginia, there has not been a good way to measure the quality of that care.
Many states have implemented childcare quality rating and improvement systems (QRISs) to assess, improve and communicate the level of childcare quality in a community. A QRIS similar to the "five-star" system of rating hotels, movies or car safety. The more stars a childcare center is awarded the higher the level of quality. In a QRIS, financial incentives from the state and competition for children combine to improve program quality.
In 2008 KIDS COUNT launched a year-long awareness and advocacy effort called the Kids First Communities campaign to advocate for a QRIS in West Virginia. To ensure the success of our grassroots advocacy campaign, we selected six non-profit organizations to serve as regional Kids First Leaders and awarded each of them a $5,000 grant and extensive technical support to carry out their mission. KIDS COUNT launched Kids First Communities in Beckley, Charleston, Huntington, Morgantown, Parkersburg and Wheeling.
During 2008 and 2009, the Kids First Communities :
- actively recruited more than 2,000 parents and childcare providers to join KIDS COUNT's e-mail Action Alert system;
- helped secure the endorsement of over 100 community leaders and organizations;
- met with local legislators in their home districts and capitol offices to discuss childcare quality concerns;
- honored the work of childcare providers with a wildly successful "Take a Flower to Childcare Day" celebration;
- helped organize a letter-writing campaign that resulted in more than 300 postcards to the governor in support of a QRIS ; and
- participated in a successful "We Put Kids First. Do You?" legislative reception attended by 150, including 40 legislators.
To cap off those grassroots successes, a KIDS COUNT-initiated bill was passed - and subsequently signed by the Governor - launching West Virginia’s first childcare quality rating and improvement system. Veterans of the legislative process told us to expect at least three separate tries our bill would pass, but our legislation made it through on the first attempt, thanks in large part to grassroots outreach and education efforts of our Kids First Communities Campaign!
The Claude Worthington Benedum Foundation was a major funder of the Kids First Communities Campaign.