Massachusetts child care providers – get ready to apply for a federal COVID-19 relief fund grant!
The funds are coming soon, and they will help providers emerge from the pandemic and rebuild.
Based on feedback from the field, the Department of Early Education and Care (EEC) is committed to creating an “accessible application process.”
There are a number of ways that you can learn more about these grants before the application is released.
The first thing to know is that the funding — Federal ARPA Child Care Stabilization Grants – will be distributed using a formula called Commonwealth Cares for Children or C3.
C3 uses “the CDC’s Social Vulnerability Index (SVI) as an indicator of community need to incorporate an equity adjustment for programs serving traditionally marginalized communities,” EEC Commissioner Samantha Aigner-Treworgy explains in a recent email.
A detailed summary of the formula is posted here along with recent recordings of EEC’s C3 information sessions.
EEC is also working with Strategies for Children and SEIU to provide additional information sessions.
One of Strategies’ sessions will be TONIGHT from 7 p.m. to 8 p.m. You can register here.
A previous Strategies’ information session is posted here.
Have feedback to offer on the C3 formula or the grants? Submit it on a Google form here.
You can also email questions and feedback to projectmanager@earlyeducationforall.org.
Strategies for Children will compile the feedback and regularly share summaries with EEC.
Be sure to also check out SEIU’s information sessions for family child care providers, which will be held in several languages. The sessions in Spanish and English have already occurred. The other two sessions will take place at:
• 6:30 p.m. Wednesday, July 21 in Portuguese, and
• 6:30 p.m. Thursday, July 22 in Cambodian Khmer
To keep up with EEC, subscribe to the Commissioner’s Update email list and follow EEC on Facebook and Twitter. And be sure to read up on EEC’s Strategic Action Plan Engagement Portal.
Please check out these resources and share them with your networks!
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