It’s time to rethink what we mean by ‘high quality childcare’

We often measure quality through things we can count: credentials, professional development hours, assessments, curriculum, environmental standards, and program practices. Many of these things are important and contribute to strong early childhood programs. But they are not necessarily how a family experiences quality.

A parent choosing child care may be asking very different questions:

Will my child be safe here?

Do the teachers know my child?

Will someone recognize when my child needs a hug, a challenge, or a little extra patience?

Does my child feel like they belong?

Can I depend on this program so I can go to work?

Can my family afford it?

Those questions should challenge us to think differently. Rather than asking only what makes a high-quality childcare program, New Hampshire could begin with a broader question: What conditions must exist for children, families, educators, and early childhood programs to thrive?

Four ideas offer a place to start: Safe. Stable. Responsive. Thriving.

Every child deserves to be physically safe. Licensing standards, background checks, appropriate supervision, health practices, and other protections are essential responsibilities of our early childhood system. But safety is more than preventing harm.

Young children also need emotional safety. They need adults they trust. They need to feel welcomed, valued, and included. They need caregivers who know their personalities, understand their cues, and recognize when something is wrong. Families need that sense of safety, too. They need to trust that the people caring for their children know them and care about their well-being. Safety should be our foundation. But safety should be the floor, not the finish line.

If we want to rethink quality in New Hampshire, stability may be one of the most important places to start. Young children learn through relationships, and relationships require consistency. Yet we ask early childhood educators to provide that consistency while many struggle to make a sustainable living doing the work.

Programs are trying to recruit and retain educators while managing increasing operating costs. Families need dependable care but are already stretched by what they pay for it. We cannot separate those realities from our conversation about quality.

When an educator leaves because they cannot afford to stay in the profession, a child loses an important relationship. When a classroom closes because a program cannot hire enough staff, families lose care. When a childcare business closes because the economics no longer work, an entire community loses infrastructure. A stable early childhood system means children have consistent caregivers. Families have dependable care. Educators can build sustainable careers. Programs have enough financial predictability to retain staff, invest in their classrooms, and keep their doors open.

If stable relationships are essential to children’s development, then educator stability and program sustainability are quality issues.

New Hampshire is not one community, and our early childhood programs should not be expected to look identical. A family childcare provider in the North Country may serve families differently than a large center in Manchester. A Head Start program may look different from a public preschool classroom, Montessori school, or nature-based program.

Different does not mean lower quality.

What matters is whether a program can respond to the children and families it serves. Does an educator know what interests a child? How that child communicates? What makes them laugh? When they need help? When they need encouragement to try something on their own? Are families treated as partners and experts on their children? Do educators have the knowledge, resources, time, and professional autonomy to respond to the children in front of them?

At its heart, early childhood education is relational. Our definition of quality should be, too.

Ultimately, a childcare program earning the label “high quality” should not be the end goal. Thriving should be.

Children should thrive in an environment that encourages playing, exploring, building relationships, developing confidence, and experiencing joy and belonging. Families should thrive, knowing their children are cared for while they work, pursue education, and participate in their communities. Educators should thrive, respected as professionals, supported in their work, and compensated in ways that allow them to remain in the profession. Programs should thrive, financially stable enough to retain educators, serve families, and plan for the future. And communities should thrive because families can work, employers can find employees, and young children have strong foundations for their futures.

That is a much bigger vision of quality. Quality cannot be the provider’s responsibility alone. This reframing also forces us to confront an uncomfortable question: Who is responsible for quality?

Too often, our systems place that responsibility almost entirely on providers. Take another training. Earn another credential. Complete another assessment. Document another practice. Meet another benchmark.

Continuous improvement matters. Professional development matters. Standards and accountability matter. But we should be equally willing to examine whether the system surrounding providers creates the conditions necessary for them to succeed.

If educators cannot afford to remain in the profession, that is a quality issue. If programs cannot charge families the true cost of care without making childcare unaffordable, that is a quality issue. If administrative requirements consume educators’ time without meaningfully improving children’s experiences, that is a quality issue. If families cannot find care where they live, during the hours they work or at a price they can afford, that is a quality issue. These challenges cannot be solved by asking individual providers to simply “improve quality.” They require shared responsibility.

Providers have a responsibility to create safe, nurturing, and responsive environments. But state agencies, policymakers, employers, communities, and others who depend on the early childhood system have responsibilities as well.

New Hampshire has an opportunity to change the conversation. Not by abandoning standards. Not by lowering expectations. But by raising our expectations for the entire early childhood system.

Imagine defining high-quality early childhood education not as a designation a program earns, but as a set of conditions we collectively create: Children are safe. Families, educators, and programs are stable. Early childhood experiences are responsive to individual children, families, and communities. And children, families, educators, programs, and communities have the opportunity to thrive.

Some of those things can be measured. Some can be observed. And some may be best understood simply by asking children, families, and educators about their experiences. Not everything that matters needs to become a rating.

For New Hampshire, the next chapter of the quality conversation could begin by asking a much simpler question: When early childhood education is working the way it should, what do children, families, and educators experience?

Safe. Stable. Responsive. Thriving.

Perhaps that is the definition of quality we have been looking for.