Saint Paul families with young children face an inequitable and often unsolvable crisis, one that has grown more challenging in the last few years. For too many Saint Paul families, finding quality and affordable early learning programs is impossible. Children don't receive the critical early learning they need to show up ready for kindergarten, and that gap can continue to grow throughout their school career. Without options for care, parents are forced to make hard decisions about work, whether it's leaving the workforce or being unable to build their own long-term careers.
A coalition of parents, child care providers, educators and community leaders have come together to advocate for a citywide program that will make early learning free for low income families and affordable for all others. Saint Paul is working toward lowering education inequity, and ensuring every parent who wants to can enter the workforce.
Saint Paul All Ready for Kindergarten (SPARK) is an effort by a broad coalition of education, business and civic leaders to ensure that early learning is accessible to all children in Saint Paul. The program will supplement existing funding so that all zero to five year olds in Saint Paul, who live at or below 185% of poverty, will be able to attend an early learning program for free, while other households will qualify for subsidies.
All families deserve quality, culturally responsive early learning options that are right for them. The program will make early learning free or highly affordable for Saint Paul families and bridge racial disparities in access to early learning programs.