California child care workers from across California advocate for children’s learning opportunities and women’s economic empowerment.

Child care has been called ‘The Work that Makes Work Possible’ and child care providers are proud of the crucial role we play in California’s economy. Not only do we prepare little learners for a lifetime of education and earning, we fight poverty by supporting working parents in achieving employment and succeeding on the job.

Tomorrow, we’re taking the strength of our numbers and our voices to the State Capitol to advocate for improvements to the child care system that help us do our jobs better, support working families, and lift our own families out of poverty.

• Child care providers live paycheck to paycheck. We finally achieved the promise of a pathway out of poverty in 2016, but now these gains are threatened in the latest budget proposal. We are here to send the message that when you keep child care providers working, you keep California’s economy working.
• Child care workers face high risks of on-the-job injury, which is especially troubling considering our jobs don’t come with healthcare benefits or workers’ compensation. That’s why we are pushing for AB 676 (Limón) to prevent workplace injuries for early educators through workplace safety training.
• The parents we serve are just above the poverty line. But instead of supporting these predominately working women in finding stable jobs and climbing the ladder of success, parents worry taking an extra shift means losing access to child care. That’s why we are advocating for AB 60 (Santiago, Gonzalez-Fletcher) to stabilize a family’s child care subsidies for 12 months so parents aren’t caught in a child care catch 22.

You don’t have to be in Sacramento to show you support a child care system that truly serves California’s children, working parents and child care workers. Show your support by emailing our leaders in Sacramento and ask them to support the transformation of our early care and education.

As a workforce overwhelmingly comprised of women and people of color, Legislators need to hear directly from child care providers about the challenges facing the families and children we care for. We are proud to represent the strength of California and to fight for the essential California value of opportunity for all.