PIllar 1: Equip

GOAL: To equip childcare providers and early childhood professionals with the tools, training, knowledge, and supports they need to deliver high-quality care, operate strong programs, and flourish within a complex and evolving early education landscape.

OBJECTIVES: We will achieve our goal by

• Providing High-Quality Training & Professional Development: Deliver relevant, evidence-based training that strengthens classroom practice, improves behavior management, builds quality, and addresses the evolving needs of providers and educators.

• Strengthening Provider Operations & Business Capacity: Offer tools, templates, coaching, and guidance that help providers establish policies and procedures, improve business management, navigate requirements,and create stable, sustainable operations.

• Offering Practical, Actionable Coaching: Provide one-on-one or small-group coaching that helps providers implement new skills, troubleshoot challenges, build confidence, and put learning into practice in real time.

• Expanding Access to Reliable Information, Tools & Resources: Provide tools, classroom materials, and updates related to early childhood education, licensing, regulations, and system expectations to support informed decision-making and reduce confusion.

• Facilitating Communities of Practice: Maintain ongoing groups where providers can learn from peers, share strategies, reduce isolation, and strengthen the collective capacity of the local ECE workforce.

PILLAR 2: Empower

GOAL: To empower childcare providers, families, and community stakeholders with the confidence, voice, and agency to advocate for early childhood education, influence local understanding, and actively participate in strengthening the early childhood learning ecosystem.

OBJECTIVES: We will achieve our goal by

• Building Advocacy Skills: Providing simple, practical advocacy tools and introductory training that help providers and families speak confidently about early childhood education and communicate their needs to community leaders.

• Developing Voices of Influence: Creating opportunities, such as story-sharing sessions, panel participation, or short testimonies, for providers to practice expressing their experiences and shaping local conversations about early childhood.

• Expanding Stakeholder Understanding of ECE: Delivering accessible information, infographics, fact sheets, and presentations that strengthen community understanding of early learning and counter misinformation.

Pillar 3: Elevate

GOAL: To elevate early childhood education as part of a healthy community’s infrastructure by increasing public understanding, shifting attitudes, and strengthening the shared belief that ECE is essential to the region’s economic, social, and long-term success.

OBJECTIVES: We will achieve our goal by

• Maintaining Public Awareness Efforts: Creating and distributing clear, compelling messages, visuals, and materials that explain the importance of investing in early childhood education for families, employers, and the broader community.

• Engaging Community Stakeholders: Delivering presentations, hosting conversations, and sharing data with employers, civic groups, chambers, and community organizations to deepen understanding of ECE’s role in workforce and community well-being.

• Amplifying ECE Knowledge in the Community: Sharing accurate information, research insights, and local stories that help residents understand the real conditions affecting early childhood education and encourage community support.

Pillar 4: Endure

GOAL: To ensure long-term strength, stability, and resilience of early childhood education in Delaware County and surrounding areas by securing sustainable funding, reinforcing organizational capacity, and bringing policy in alignment to realistically support providers and families.

OBJECTIVES: We will achieve our goal by

• Developing Sustainable Funding Pathways: Pursuing grants, partnerships, philanthropic opportunities, and diversified revenue streams that safeguard BY5’s long-term ability to serve providers and the community.

• Strengthening Organizational Capacity: Building internal systems, processes, data practices, and staff capabilities that enable BY5 to adapt to changing environments and respond effectively to emerging needs in early childhood education.

• Forging Strategic, Long-Term Partnerships: Establishing and nurturing relationships with employers, civic leaders, funders, schools, and community organizations to reinforce the early childhood infrastructure and create shared responsibility for its stability.

• Monitoring Trends and Anticipating System Needs: Tracking policy changes, demographic shifts, funding patterns, and community needs to proactively adjust strategies to bring more alignment across the local early childhood ecosystem.****