Grants available for child care centers

Money is being made available to boost staffing for licensed child care programs in Carlton County and the region as northeast Minnesota continues to be mired in a major shortage of child care openings.

The Northland Foundation announced Wednesday that it has received $300,000 in funding and can provide eligible programs grants of $1,500 to $12,000 for spending on staff recruitment and retention strategies.

Data released in June from First Children’s Finance, an advocacy group for improving child care opportunities, showed that northeast Minnesota needs 3,739 more child care openings to accommodate families with children under age 5. Current services would have to be more than doubled to meet demand.

Eligible programs must provide services in the northeast Minnesota counties of Carlton, Aitkin, Cook, Itasca, Koochiching, Lake and St. Louis, and the tribal nations of Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Bois Forte Band of Chippewa, Grand Portage Band of Lake Superior Chippewa, Leech Lake Band of Ojibwe and Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe. Some pilot projects will also receive peer learning opportunities and specialized training.

Applications are being accepted through Dec. 13 on the Foundation’s website at https://northlandfdn.org/grants/apply-report.php, with awards finalized the week of Jan. 24.

Funding for the awards is supported by a $300,000 grant from the City of Duluth 1200 Fund with additional funding from partners including the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota Foundation.

The Northland Foundation reports that the child care crisis was well-known even before the Covid-19 pandemic created a “massive strain on providers who battled with inconsistent attendance, closures due to Covid exposure, supply shortages and high costs, and staff burnout. Now the competition for workforce is putting added stress on this sector.”

In June, the Northland Foundation partnered with Northspan to conduct a survey of licensed child care center owners and directors in the region to learn more about how the workforce shortage is affecting child care programs. Key findings included:

• Pay rates and retention rose to the top of the list of current difficulties. Just over one-third reported serving fewer children due to staffing shortages.

• A number of owners/directors are filling in for teachers and assistants to meet adult-to-child ratios, leaving little time for administrative tasks.

• A major challenge within the child care industry revolves around providing teachers and other staff a competitive wage, while keeping the program operable and affordable for parents. Nearly 80 percent reported losing staff to other jobs with higher wages.

Two efforts have been initiated to support child care. In August, Northland formed a Child Care Talent Pipeline Workgroup tasked with pursuing strategies to help child care providers find and keep talent. The group is facilitated by Northspan and counts center directors, higher education, economic development and business interests, and community organizations among its members.

Now, the Foundation is launching a Child Care Center Workforce Solutions Pilot Project to make available flexible funding through a competitive process to licensed child care centers and family programs to help with staff recruitment and retention.

“Northland and our partners are doing what we can to support workforce attraction and retention to help address our region’s significant child care shortage,” said Tony Sertich, Northland Foundation president. “The (grant) to our organization provides a major boost to extend the reach of this pilot … across the region.”

The Northland Foundation is a publicly supported foundation serving northeast Minnesota through grantmaking, small-business assistance, KIDS PLUS Program, Maada’ookiing, and special initiatives.