Empowering Women while Improving Quality of Childcare
Bernadette Lamboy found her real calling as a childcare provider thanks to WHEDco. Fourteen years ago, her position at the FDNY was eliminated, and she found herself without a job and without childcare for her autistic son. She was referred to WHEDco and was able to receive the guidance and assistance she needed to create her own childcare business. When she started 14 years ago, she had 10 children in her care. Today, she owns two successful group daycares and one aftercare business that, together, serve a total of 60 children and employ six staff members. To learn more about Bernadette’s story, check out this feature by El Diario.
Our Home-Based Childcare (HBCC) Program, established at WHEDco’s inception 25 years ago, is made up of countless success stories, like Bernadette’s. The program -which aims to improve the quality of childcare available to New York City families and increase children’s access to early structured learning, while supporting home-based childcare providers throughout the city with professional training and licensing assistance- serves thousands of providers and children each year.
In 2017, WHEDco served over 1,400 childcare providers through training, professional development, and technical assistance, including 432 licensed & registered providers who are part of our network. On average, providers in our network earn $58,000 per year.
In addition, WHEDco enrolls childcare providers in the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP), a federal healthy food cost reimbursement program, through a NYS Department of Health contract. We help providers to develop the skills to plan, budget for, serve, and report on meals and snacks that meet strict nutrition guidelines as required by CACFP, and ensure they are properly reimbursed.
In 2017, 835 providers enrolled by WHEDco served more than 2 million meals and snacks to 11,088 children. Altogether, these providers were reimbursed a total of $4 million for the healthy food they served.
For more information on WHEDco’s work to ensure that children in childcare settings have access to nutritious meals through the CACFP Program, check out this News 12 Brooklyn story on one our longstanding providers, Beverley Forbes!