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Years from now, I want to look back and say we made decisions that strengthened both Hoosier children and Indiana’s workforce.
Instead, we may be asking why more children are entering kindergarten behind their peers, why schools are spending more time and resources helping students catch up or why employers are struggling to find workers with strong foundational skills.
Indiana’s child care challenges are undeniable. Providers are struggling with rising costs, staffing shortages and uncertainty around public funding. Families are struggling to find and afford quality care. And businesses are struggling to recruit and retain talent because employees need reliable child care today, while employers also face a long-term skills gap that begins decades before someone enters the workforce.
But, as Indiana considers changes to child care licensing regulations, we must be careful not to solve one problem by creating another.
Among the proposed changes are reduced education and training requirements, which state that some early childhood educators would not even need a high school diploma to serve in such an important role. While the changes are intended to reduce costs and ease hiring challenges, lowering expectations for the people who educate our youngest children is not the answer.
Every policy decision affecting early learning should begin with one important question: What gives children the strongest possible start? Today’s early learners are tomorrow’s employees, entrepreneurs and community leaders. If we lose sight of that, we risk making decisions that may solve short-term operational challenges while creating long-term consequences.
The years from birth to age 5 represent a period of extraordinary brain development — up to 90% of a child’s capacity to learn is formed during this time. Early childhood educators play a central role in shaping early literacy and math, social-emotional development and long-term success.
When children enter kindergarten, the skills they bring with them are highly predictive of their long-term success. Unfortunately, Indiana’s own data shows too many children are already arriving unprepared. Lowering standards for those working in early learning environments all but ensures the learning gaps will persist — if not widen.
This conversation often frames child care as a business and service that allows parents to work. Certainly, accessible and affordable child care is critical to Indiana’s economy. But child care is much more than a business operation. It is an early education program where children come to learn and prepare for success in kindergarten and beyond. Learning does not happen by accident. It is created through the deep knowledge and skill of educators who understand how young children learn best. Therefore, we cannot ignore the importance of the adults we entrust to educate our state’s youngest learners.
At a minimum, individuals working in early education classrooms should understand child development, responsive classroom management, and basic health and safety practices. These requirements are not excessive. They are foundational competencies. Every employer understands that qualifications matter. We expect nurses, accountants, mechanics and electricians to have the knowledge needed to perform their jobs well. Early childhood educators should be no different.
For years, Indiana has worked to elevate early childhood education. We must continue to recognize that adults working with young children are educators, not babysitters. Removing those expectations does not strengthen early education. It weakens it. And it sends the wrong message about how significant the early years are in children’s development.
We should remove unnecessary barriers that make it harder for providers to grow their business, but we cannot compromise the quality of the early education children receive. Indiana’s future workforce depends on it.
By updating child care regulations, the state has an opportunity to strengthen its economy while supporting children and families. Maintaining high standards and making sensible reforms that help providers succeed without sacrificing quality will enable us to build an early childhood education system that prepares the next generation for success. Investing in children is one of the smartest long-term economic investments Indiana can make.•
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Kissling is president and CEO at Early Learning Indiana.
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