Reflections from NFF Staff Visit to Children's Village

On Thursday, May 29th, a group of NFF staff spent the afternoon at Children’s Village (CV) with Executive Director Mary Graham, the CV staff, and children served by the center. Our relationship with CV began back in 2006, and has evolved from client to thought-partner in the early childhood education sector.

Children's Village is a non-profit organization that provides early childhood education and educational enrichment to children for families of all economic levels and diverse backgrounds. Not surprisingly, providing quality programming for all children served within CV’s walls is no easy feat. Given the high cost of truly quality programming (high teacher-to-child ratios and ongoing facility investments for regulatory and accreditation purposes), leadership must manage around the insufficiencies of key revenue sources, especially government subsidies for low- income children.

Despite these challenges, CV’s leadership and staff pursue quality programming for all 430 children (of which 80% are from low-income households). As there is little business or financial reward associated with providing in-depth programs, the decision to provide quality care for low-income children is deeply personal. Mary and her staff pursue quality programs not only because “it is the right thing to do,” but also because of a fundamental belief in the short- and long-term impact that the program makes on some of Philadelphia’s most vulnerable children, their families, the surrounding community and, ultimately, the regional economy.

The importance of Mary’s outstanding leadership—in terms of personal conviction, deep sector knowledge, and business, financial, and political savvy—is strikingly obvious:

• Since government and private funding sources typically do not cover the full cost of care and typically pays for a portion of a “particular child,” Mary plays a continuous “game of Tetris” and is creative in identifying and blending a variety of government, private foundation, and donor funds.
• Mary is also creative in the use of facility space, and leverages in-kind services of volunteers and post-secondary students to optimize the ratio of children to caring adults.
• Lastly, Mary’s community and political network has been instrumental to working through the inevitable gridlock that can disrupt programming. In one example, she directly contacted Mayor Nutter to expedite a delayed construction permit for renovations to the kitchen (which serves 260,000 meals per year); Mayor Nutter issued the permit to Mary within an hour of her phone call.

The end result of all of these things is a cohesive program that provides invaluable early care and education services for all children within CV’s walls. One NFF staff member reflected on the overall experience of walking through CV's halls: “Their commitment to quality is clear: from the look and feel of the space/classrooms and talking with teachers, you don’t walk away with the impression that this is a program for a ‘subsidized’ population-this is a program that could just as easily be serving a fully private pay population.”

Children’s Village’s example, however, raises questions about the sustainability of a field that over relies on individual heroes such as Mary. It also raises questions for NFF in terms of:

1. How do we better serve organizations like Children’s Village in our trusted advisor role and as a financial consultant/coach?
2. What is NFF’s role in shining a light on exemplary programs and leaders like CV/Mary and advancing the public dialogue about the existing systems in which nonprofits are funded and financed? For example, what is NFF’s role in shedding light on the deficiencies of the current funding system, e.g. low state reimbursement rates and conflicting goals of the agencies (workforce and education) that source child care subsidy payments?

Getting to the full cost of operations and complete capital is an ongoing challenge during a time when the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is publicly calling for the expansion of quality Early Childhood Education (ECE) statewide. In the context of this public dialogue, the time is ripe for legislators and electorates to revisit the existing funding infrastructure for quality ECE: what is a fair and reasonable subsidy rate for varying levels of quality programming? How do we weigh the short- and long-term economic/societal costs versus the gains of quality ECE?

One NFF staffer, who previously worked with educational services to transition-age youth, reflected: “Children's Village understands (both empirically and anecdotally) what it means to design, implement and--most importantly--to maintain a quality ECE program … I can empathize with the frustration that they feel in regards to identifying consistent, logical, and complete funding for what they would envision to be their perfect model … you know what works, however, some compromises are having to be made in the provision of services, the maintenance of facilities/educational resources, and/or the compensation for staff and executives due to the realities of inadequate funding.”

Mary and team are not waiting for the system to change in their favor, and will continue to make it work in service of CV’s children through boot-strapping and fearless optimism that the system will someday incentivize quality care in the larger ECE field.