4C for Children has received a $100,000 grant from the L&L Nippert Charitable Foundation to ensure that local child care providers can access the coaching and training resources they need to increase their Ohio Step Up To Quality (SUTQ) ratings in accordance with state goals This is critical support for programs as they continue to care for and educate the youngest children in our community during the COVID-19 pandemic. Grant funds will directly support child care providers involved in 4C for Children’s Advancing to High Quality program.
The Advancing to High Quality initiative is designed to significantly increase the number of SUTQ highly-rated child care programs in our community. The goal of the program is to level the playing field so that every child receives quality care and early learning so they can enter kindergarten ready to succeed, even during a pandemic.
“We cannot have a generation of children who, because of the crisis caused by the pandemic, don’t receive the tools they need early on and as a result, struggle later in school and life,” says Vanessa Freytag, president and CEO of 4C for Children. “We are so grateful to the L&L Nippert Charitable Foundation for funding this critical work in our community and for helping ensure our children don’t get left behind.”
Today, there are nearly 900 child care providers in Southwest Ohio who care for more than 16,000 vulnerable children living below the federal poverty level.
When reflecting on these children and the importance of their early learning experience, Carter Randolph, trustee for the L&L Nippert Charitable Foundation referenced a quote from Abraham Lincoln:
A child is a person who is going to carry on what you have started…the fate of humanity is in his hands.
“I cannot improve on his words,” Randolph says. “4C for Children provides better outcomes for children and therefore better outcomes for humanity and I cannot think of a better place to invest than in making the fate of humanity better.”