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In this week's edition: With less money from Washington, some states view early learning programs as a place to slash funding. More Head Start centers and food aid programs are at risk as the government shutdown drags on. Plus, testing young children for “giftedness” has a long history, but experts say there’s not much science to back the process.

_{A Head Start teacher in Alaska spends circle time with children in the program. Alaska is among several states that have recently trimmed, or stopped increasing, spending on early childhood programs. Credit: Lindsey Wasson/AP Photo}

Child care crisis deepens as funding slashed for poor families

The first hint of trouble for McKinley Hess came in August. 

Hess, who runs an infant and toddler care program in Conway, Arkansas, heard that the teen moms she serves were having trouble getting their expected child care assistance payments. Funded by a mix of federal and state dollars, those subsidies are the only way many low-income parents nationwide can afford child care, by reimbursing providers for care and lowering the amount parents have to pay themselves.

In Arkansas, teen parents have long been given priority to receive this aid. But now, Hess heard, they and many other families in need were sitting on a growing wait-list.

Hess had just enrolled eight teen moms at her central Arkansas site, Conway Cradle Care, and was counting on state subsidies to pay for their children’s care. As the moms were stuck waiting for financial assistance, Hess had two options: kick them out, or care for their infants for free so their mothers wouldn’t have to drop out of school. She chose the latter. 

Just a month later, another hit: Arkansas government officials announced they were going to cut the rates they pay providers on behalf of low-income families. Beginning Nov. 1, Hess will get $36 a day for each infant in her care and $35 a day for toddlers, down from $56 and $51 a day respectively. She’s already lost out on more than $20,000 by providing free care for 8 infants for the past two months.

“Financially, it really is going to hurt our day care,” Hess said. But the stakes are also high for the parents who need child care assistance, she said: “For them to be able to continue school, these vouchers are essential.” 

As states face having to cut spending while bracing for fewer federal dollars under the budget bill President Trump signed in July, some, including Arkansas, view early learning programs as a place to slash funding. They’re making these cuts even as experts and providers predict they will be disastrous for children, families and the economy if parents don’t have child care and can’t work. 

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‘The clock is ticking’: Shutdown imperils food, child care for many

For families in more than a hundred Head Start programs across the country, November could mark the beginning of some hard decisions.

Last Saturday, 134 Head Start centers serving 58,400 children would have received their annual federal funding, but the ongoing government shutdown has put that money in jeopardy. The federally funded Head Start provides free preschool and child care for low-income families, and is particularly important to rural communities with few other child care options. 

At the same time, the federal government has said that because of the shutdown, it cannot distribute Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits that families also expect on the first of the month. Plus, a program that provides extra money for families to buy milk, baby formula, and fruit and vegetables is also running out of $300 million in emergency funding provided to it earlier this month.

All this means low-income families are facing upheaval on multiple fronts, said Christy Gleason, the vice president of policy, advocacy and campaigns for the nonprofit group Save the Children. Families in Head Start often receive other federal benefits, so they could simultaneously be facing a disruption in child care — and the meals provided there — and public food assistance.

“You’re going to end up with parents and caregivers who are skipping meals themselves, because that’s the way they put food on the table for their kids,” Gleason said.

We’re testing preschoolers for giftedness. Experts say that doesn’t work

The widespread practice of searching for gifted young children is rooted in shaky science.

Column: What research says about Mamdani and Cuomo’s education proposals

Only 18,000 students are in New York City's gifted and talented program out of more than 900,000 public school students.

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