Understanding Minnesota Families’ Access to Child Care Choices That Align With Their Priorities and Preferences

Parents weigh many factors when searching for and choosing a child care option for their child.[i] While research typically examines factors such as the cost and availability of care within a specific location, families may have additional priorities and preferences for their family’s child care arrangement. For example, perhaps a family would prefer a provider who offers both instruction in the child’s home language and transportation services, all while prioritizing care that is within their budget. Ideally, all three of these criteria would need to be met for the family to have an arrangement that fully aligns with their family’s priorities and preferences.

A family-centered definition of access that considers family priorities and preferences offers a more complete understanding of the facilitators and barriers families experience when accessing child care. As described in Defining and Measuring Access to High Quality Early Care and Education: A Guidebook for Policymakers and Researchers,[ii] access is defined as a combination of four interrelated dimensions, which include:

• Reasonable effort: The level of effort that is required for families to find information about a program, enroll, and prove eligibility, and to access the physical location of the program.
• Affordability: The financial costs associated with using a service.
• Meets the parents’ needs: The extent to which available programs and services meet parents’ needs and preferences.
• Supports the child’s development: A family’s ability to access child care that supports the child’s developmental needs, including their language and literacy development, cognitive skills, social and emotional development, and physical development.

Together, these four dimensions provide a family-centered approach to conceptualizing access. These dimensions can also be used to better identify specific barriers or challenges parents and families may face in searching for child care that they want and need, as compared to simply examining general population characteristics and the capacity of child care programs. While the four access dimensions highlight important considerations for a family’s child care search, there are few examples of how to measure them individually and collectively.

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Acknowledgements

This brief was made possible by Grant Number HHS-2019-ACF-OPRE-YE-1591 from the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Its contents are solely the responsibility of the authors and do not necessarily represent the official views of the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, the Administration for Children and Families, or the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. This study was conducted in partnership with staff from Child Trends and the University of Minnesota.

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References

[i] Chaudry, A., Henly, J., & Meyers, M. (2010). Conceptual frameworks for child care decision-making. office of planning, research and evaluation. ACF-OPRE White Paper. Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.

[ii] Friese, S., Lin, V., Forry, N. & Tout, K. (2017). Defining and measuring access to high quality early care and education: a guidebook for policymakers and researchers. OPRE Report #2017-08. Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.