Welcome back to EdNews. We've been away for a couple of weeks advocating for providers and children with legislators. This week's edition includes our view on TK, legislative news, and writing job descriptions to get more candidates. Did someone forward you this? Join 14,000 childcare leaders by subscribing.

Editorial

Transitional Kindergarten has the intent to serve more children, but fails in the details

TK is in the Governor's Budget, but is it the right program for California children and families?

The COVID-19 crisis has highlighted both the indispensable need for child care and the fragility of the system. The pandemic is devastating, but so will be its consequences if we don't invest in childcare now.

While Transitional Kindergarten captures the intent of providing education access to more California children, it falls apart in the details. It is not the path forward for California children and families. We know - we're thousands of early educators working statewide to educate and care for young children, many of us for over 40 years.

We appreciate the enormous progress legislators and the Governor have made in supporting providers, including pursuing provider rate reform, waiving family fees, and proposing 200k additional slots.

CQEL has personally met with dozens of legislators the last two months, and it is apparent that childcare has at least temporarily gained recognition as the absolutely necessary service it always has been.

While we acknowledge this progress, we are asking the Governor to consider pause the implementation of Transitional Kindergarten so stakeholders can be heard and a better system be built to serve low-income families.

Implementing this program will have a disastrous impact on children, families, and providers. As currently written, TK is not going to serve the low-income families that need it most, and it will put many women-owned small businesses out of business forever.

What's the problem?
Many other states and cities have pursued universal or expanded preschool, and the successful initiatives have leveraged mixed delivery programming, supporting both public and private childcare programs with blended streams.

California's proposed TK will only put 4-year-olds in public school, with limited hours and days of care that do not work for low-income families.

Mixed delivery allows families to pick the program that will best serve their needs - hours, location, setting, curriculum. Children do best when their parents can choose which type of setting is best – whether family child care, center-based (public or private), or school-based.

Those governments that tried to exclusively use public schools for preschool soon realized their mistake: low-income families don't want 3 or 4 hours of care a day. And they can't take summers off or pay for camp. Middle and upper-income families prefer smaller preschool settings and more convenient hours and locations, too. Many of these pilots and government programs have reversed course. New York City is learning this lesson right now.

States have successfully launched universal preschooling with mixed delivery in a number of ways:

Paying teachers livable wages with state dollars to teach in private child cares,
Leveraging blended funding to support full-day and full-year education at single locations.
Creating local administrative "hubs" to collectively manage repetitive administrative tasks between providers, and strategically leveraging voucher and stipend programs.

Local governments nationwide are figuring out how to mesh private and public preschooling to make it work for families. Even California acknowledged the importance of mixed delivery in its Master Plan for Early Learning and Care, which was released just seven months ago.

It's time for California to lead.
Pause TK so we can build a system for all California children.

Legislation

What's in legislators' budget proposal for early education?

With pressure from advocates and a push from the Senate, legislators agree on rate reform.

Legislators are working very quickly to present the budget ask to the Governor by the June 15th deadline, and they've now come to an early agreement. Now the ball is in the court of the Governor. Here's what it includes:

Child Care Rate Reform. The budget proposal includes $1.1 billion in ongoing funds beyond the May Revision to implement Child Care Rate Reform for child care and state preschool providers. This will help ensure providers can be fairly compensated and run successful businesses that provide vital services for families.

Child Care Slots. Increases child care access by 206,500 slots in Alternative Payment, General Child Care, Migrant Child Care, bridge program for foster children, and prioritizes ongoing vouchers for essential workers currently receiving short-term child care. The package provides a total of $1.469 billion ($1.026 billion General Fund) in 2021-22 and $2.724 billion ($1.809 billion General Fund) in 2022-23 for new child care slots.

Universal Transitional Kindergarten. Adopts universal Transitional Kindergarten (TK) as part of a mixed delivery system, phasing in expanded age eligibility to full implementation in 2025-26 and rebenching the Proposition 98 Guarantee to provide ongoing funding for the TK expansion of approximately $2.7 billion at full implementation. Note: see our view on TK above - mixed delivery should allow providers to provide full days and years of care, not just wraparound care.

Key One-time Investments. Provides a variety of one-time investments to stabilize providers growing out of the pandemic, including stipends, hold harmless policies. Makes additional investments in child care facilities ($250 million one-time General Fund and $205 million one-time federal stimulus funds) and the early care and education workforce ($250 million one-time federal stimulus funds).

Hiring more staff

How to write job descriptions that attract candidates

This is the beginning of our Hiring Up series on hiring tips, and a peek at the content we'll cover in the Hiring Up training starting July 8th. Register now with early bird pricing.

Job descriptions are hard to get right. Let's be frank: they’re often way too long and boring. This is good news. You can write a job descriptions that stand out from the ocean of bad ones.

Remember, your job description is your one chance to “sell” the job to the candidate. It’s your sales pitch, the candidates’ compass going into the interview, and a stake in the ground on your basic expectations. It’s well worth your time to get right.

What do all great job descriptions have in common? They're all:

1. Short

The best job descriptions are short and punchy, with no big blocks of text or endless lists of jargon. That's because today’s candidates read on their phones more than ever before.

While long and boring is easy to create, it takes work to make a description brief yet engaging. The job description is more an ad than an HR document, and you should treat it as such. Here are some tips for how you can shorten your own:

Cut the long paragraph about your company

That’s why you have a careers site and LinkedIn Company and Career Pages. Candidates will learn about you elsewhere, so keep your company overview to about two sentences.

Ruthlessly delete buzzwords

Write simple sentences. Just like this. Use bullets. If you have legal requirements, set them apart at the end.

Get straight to the point by telling readers what they'll experience and get if they’re hired; in other words "experience this" instead of "learn about that." For example, say “You will be responsible for developing lesson plans” rather than saying “Your day would consist mainly of making documents here at our companuy every few hours throughout the week".

2. Conversational, not too formal

You're not writing a college paper, so remove the dry tone and use more vivid language. The person on the other hand of your description is just that – a person. So write as if you were speaking to them; don't be too formal or academic-sounding. Here’s how to make your job description more approachable:

Replace ‘the ideal candidate’ with ‘you’

Be direct and personal so that your top candidate thinks, “Yes! That’s me.” Read it out loud: if you wouldn’t say the words, don’t use them. Go a step further by describing the job description to a friend or colleague, and having them then repeat it back to you. As they do, write it down!

Change the sub-headings

Eyes glaze over standard job description headings such as “Skill requirements” and “Job Qualifications.” Breathe some life into them so candidates stay on the page. It can be as simple as, “You’re good at:” or “You’ll love the role if….”

3. Packed with personality

You get a good sense of what it’s like to work for the companies above and the kinds of people who fit in. Remember, your goal is for the right talent to apply and the wrong talent to pass.

Here’s how to add character to your job description:

Describe a day in the life

Paint a vivid picture of the nitty-gritty and you’ll help candidates self-select, saving time for all. Get input from the hiring manager, but also from those who've held and worked with that position to make sure they have what it takes!

Talk problems and projects

Great candidates want to make an impact, and they don’t shy away from challenges. The more specific you can be about what the day-to-day work is like on your team, the better!

Join CQEL and get $100 off the training

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