Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Welcome to House Human Services on Tuesday afternoon. We're going to be taking up prekindergarten and our committee's input into the continuing implementation of Act 73, which as you all know was passed last year. So before we do, first off, the agency of education witnesses were not able to come today. They canceled at the last minute. And so we are looking to hopefully get them back tomorrow. We'll see. I am still hoping that we have something out of this committee by Thursday because other committees are awaiting our work. So one of the things that I just wanted to do before we launch into testimony this afternoon is just to set the stage a little bit about what are we doing and what should we be thinking about as we listen to testimony and as we ask questions? And we've had some preliminary testimony already from Doctor. Crossman at Building Bright Futures and the national folks about where Vermont stands and from Legis Council and of course the JFO report. So they've been spread out over several days. So it might feel like, oh, this we're just starting pre K. Well, we're not just starting pre K. We've been doing it for a little bit now. But several of the things that I'd like you to keep in mind as we think about this, and it's I'm going to harken back to Act 76, which is where the Pre K Implementation Committee was charged with looking at and making recommendations about pre K. So one of the things I'm just gonna give you three or four things to keep in mind. One, we've heard testimony about a mixed delivery system, public and private. So one, that's a question we need to answer in our bill. Should we continue with a mixed delivery system? And the other option is public only or I guess private only. So right now we have a mixed delivery system. Should we continue in that vein? How do we increase equity in the state in terms of equity to access for children who do not have access to pre K right now? We saw in testimony last week, only 11% of eligible children in the Northeast Kingdom have access right now to pre K. So how do we increase equity in the system? How do we assure that there is more equitable access? Are we able to increase the number of hours of pre k that we are able to provide and to do that without costing the Ed Fund more money, essentially. And what would how could we do that? Or can we do that? We don't know. But we will be getting information from JFO about that. And I'm also gonna ask you to consider whether we're doing this for three year olds and four year olds or whether we're doing this for four year olds and looking at three year olds and obviously continued access to CCFAF. There have been questions in the building over time about public education dollars going to private entities. And I think one of the things that I'm hoping maybe our current witness is able to share with us is some of the things that I started to learn is that there's actually dollars going the opposite direction as well. And there are more schools that are taking up CCFAP as a potential source of funding to narrow the gap for the programs that they have in pre K. So it's not easy answers to the questions. But those are the kinds of things that I would like for you to be thinking about and thinking about in terms of questions as we go through this process over the next three days and be thinking about the information that we've already received. I think it's important we did hear from Doctor. Crossman information that we had not had access to previously. That was fabulous from my perspective. And it answered some of the questions, though, of course, not all the questions. And if there are other questions that you think need to be answered in this area, those are things to be bringing up as well. And we might not have sufficient time to answer all of those questions. And there may not even be sufficient data to answer those questions. But what should we expect from the Agency of Education and the Department for Children and Families in terms of data on pre K? So things like, what constitutes a full day? Things like which schools are offering how much pre K in the public sector? Which schools are not offering any pre K in the public sector and sort of like all the variants in between. And where should we have a targeted focus in areas of the state even before we think about, is there potential to expand pre K? So does that help frame the issues for folks? Yeah.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: I'm curious. I'm not sure I understood the point you're making about how there's been a discussion about public dollars going to private entities, but you said money is also going things are going the other way. Can you expand on that? I wasn't sure.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Started to learn that school districts are becoming and applying for and we'll hear from the witness, CCFAT money. So there's been this discussion about public education funds only in public schools. And so there have been some people in the building who said that we should keep it pure. That's the way it should go. And of course, we've heard a number of folks talk testimony to us already about a mixed delivery system being best practice. And I didn't add to that other thing. We're doing well in terms of some of the indicators, terms of overall access when compared to our other states, but also in terms of readiness for kindergarten. And we don't want to upset the apple cart. So the money going the other way, I was talking about CCFAP funds going into public schools, whether through a contract with a private provider in the public school, or I'm learning about some public schools themselves starting to tap into CCFAP. And so I don't think there's wide knowledge of when I said the money going the other way. So there's money going both ways. I think that the perception has only been money going in one direction, and that's from public education funds into the private pre K. And in reality, there's money going in both directions. So, okay. Thank you. Thank you, Deputy Commissioner McLaughlin. Welcome to House Human Services. Glad you're not hopping around. I got matching shoes on now.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Yeah. Happy to be here. Again, Jenna McLaughlin. I'm Deputy Commissioner within the Department for Children and Families. I oversee the Child Development Division, which is all things child care, child care licensing, child care financial assistance, child care quality and capacity, and also children's integrated services, which is really early intervention and other supports for children primarily under five who need some additional developmental supports, both at home, in their talker program, or potentially in their school. I sent over two things, because were at this as we all know, we've all been kind of flexible right now, trying to be flexible on scheduling and things. So you guys have both is longer written remarks, and I have a few slides to try to guide the conversation. I have reviewed notes or listened to most of the testimony that you guys have heard already. So hopefully, I'll be ready to answer most of your questions. And I I would think say the biggest picture thing I would like to say is there's two things about that. One is that I think Vermont should be really proud of everything that we've done for children under five and for pre kindergarten education in the state. We are a leader nationally. And we should feel really proud of what we've developed. I want and I have let's see, make sure this goes forward. And I know that you've had testimony that has gone over the basics of prekindergarten, so I won't do that. But I do have this slide that just goes over some of the four key elements as you're thinking about, again, what are the factors that you guys want to make sure you're considering. When it comes to pre kindergarten in Vermont, I look back. 1987 is when Vermont started allowing public schools to start serving three and four year olds. 2007 is when that was and that was more like a grant program. 2007 is when schools were allowed to start building that into their school budgets and just start serving three and four year olds. And then right before Act 166 passed in 2014, the state had realized that some school districts really took the opportunity to serve three- and four year olds, and others did less. And so you did have a lot of inequity in terms of access once before UPK was established. I didn't go back and check this for statistics, but I'm thinking the number was 40% of children had access to pre kindergarten education. And so 166 was created to or was passed to provide greater equity and access. And now we're at about 70% of age eligible children. So really, it's accomplished a huge part of what it wanted to accomplish. But we agree that we can strengthen it, that we can grow. We really want to build from this foundation that's been laid right now. My understanding of the decision at the time and our current view of it is it's really about setting it has been about setting what is the minimum standard of saying we want all children to at least have access to this minimum number of hours. And that's been something that allows school districts and others to make sure they have eyes on more children before they're showing up in kindergarten so they can get identified for services, so that their families can get extra supports if that's what they need, and so they can be exposed to some of the social emotional development, the early literacy, early math skills. So that was the tiniest real lesson. Probably not inclusive. And so portable was the new thing that was really added, I think, with ACT 166. And so with universal pre kindergarten, it was recognizing that some school districts hadn't taken up that opportunity. And also, families needed full time care, needed full year care. They might be in a high quality early childhood education setting already. And so if they're already there, why take them out and deal with more transitions? But instead, let's make sure that more kids have access there. So that was that change. And mixed delivery, again, some of this with the change that happened in 2007. Some schools had already some school districts were already contracting and partnering with different in their community to meet the needs. But it was very different across all the different settings. And so ACT 166 aimed to standardize that. And it has, in some ways. It standardized it, I think, for the community based and private nonprofit programs in terms of some of the standards, in terms of the hours, in terms of the payments. But on the public school side, because it's been built into school budgets, schools have a lot of choice in Vermont, and they have a lot of self selection. And so some school districts have chosen to raise additional revenue and to additional funds in pre kindergarten beyond the minimum ten hours. So I think that's why we've ended up with one funding structure for community based programs and a different funding basis in many places for the public school based programs. Are you Okay with people asking questions as you go? Yes. Okay.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: I have a question about that because about the some school districts deciding to provide more and some none lots of variations in between. So as we think about new policy for prepay, because that's what we're about to entertain, should it be allowable for school districts to build budgets that include more than or should there should there be a sort of a standardized amount? Or should should we yeah. I mean, a a a cap that for which you would receive. But we're talking about changing the financing system part of this as well. Should there I am trying to attack this equity issue on, I guess, on multiple fronts. And while in the same breath that I say that, I know that some school districts may have greater needs for some children at that age than other school districts may. And so the question I realize is not a simple question, but I feel like we continue to have issues with equity if we're not setting some standard someplace. Right. So, and

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Let's see. I'm trying to speak. I can't necessarily speak to a policy question that I haven't reviewed with, because we don't have a bill to respond to yet officially. Neither do we. Sorry. But we agree that we want to try to tackle the equity issue more and to make sure that there is And ideally, we'd be figuring out, I think, from those school districts who are doing or regions that maybe have partnered together that are doing a really excellent job to look at what those practices are and how can we support that happening in more parts of the state. I agree. It's this balance between what local needs are and how are we doing mean, it's what you and everybody is dealing with in terms of and how do you do cost control. I think with the changes in funding proposed in Act 73, that would say this is the amount, not that you get to just choose. And then once you have your amount, you can make some choices about how you want to spend it. But I think that will allow some of that. And I do have one slide that speaks a little

[Chair Theresa Wood]: bit to that. And we are considering categorical aid for pre K as opposed to the average daily membership conglomeration. Representative Eastes? So in the same vein,

[Representative Zon Eastes]: I don't know. Can someone speak to the idea, are there districts where there is a public program and there are also private programs? So choices Many. Yeah. Are available there. And is but do do you wanna get into speaking about to or about that in any way in this process? Or

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Well, I I think that the that's one that's one of the questions I just laid out. You know? Yeah. So do we continue with a mixed delivery system Yeah. Or not? You know? And I

[Representative Zon Eastes]: get that we call it a mixed delivery system because it's all over the state.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: But No. Mixed delivery means that part of it is public and part of it is private. Right.

[Representative Zon Eastes]: But in the same community.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Yes, absolutely. Okay. Right. And that ends up being one of the challenges that comes up, right? Because a school district needs to work with a bunch of different partners and run the run program, but also community based programs might need to work with multiple school districts. So people have flagged the administrative complexity, and it is real.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Yeah, it is real. And I think that one of the So when I think about the equity question again, I'm just gonna Hopefully, people from Winooski don't think I'm really singling them out. But there's the one that pops to mind most. Winooski has, or at least they did when we were taking testimony in Act 'seventy six, a full time pre K as compared to Don't ask me what full time means because It varies. It varies. But they offer more than 10 and something more comparable to what the other students get, the other elementary students get. But if you've got pre K in the private setting, you're only going to get ten hours a week in Winooski. So right in the same community.

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: But you're only going to be funded.

[Representative Zon Eastes]: You're on funded piece.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Right. And the payer would

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: be available for additional hours, but you would either have to use CCFAB or pay for it in some other way. But it's pre K. It's not K. Not necessarily

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: the K quality level and it's not necessarily And it's not funded publicly. Publicly through the Ed Fund. That's right.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: And that makes a difference. Go ahead. And that's where

[Representative Brenda Steady]: I'm confused. So where does the money come from?

[Chair Theresa Wood]: There's two sources of funding right now. There's only one source of funding right now. For pre K, it's in the Ed Fund.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: But that would be taxpayer dollars? The Ed Fund. You pay

[Chair Theresa Wood]: your property taxes, that's

[Representative Brenda Steady]: additional where it than what's already there.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: No. We're not talking about anything additional right now. We're just talking about what the current system is.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: This is where I get confused, though. When we have to vote on something, we're not given a dollar amount. Right now, with all the stress of people not being able to pay their taxes, how can we vote on this?

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Brenda, I'm not talking about increasing any costs right now. We're just talking about what the current system is. I'll just have

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: understand We

[Representative Brenda Steady]: won't vote on this unless we get a dollar figure.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: We're going to have testimony from JFO later this week. Thank you. You're welcome.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Meanwhile, take care.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: We haven't gotten off slide one. Yep.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Think that's my two for you guys. I'm just trying to learn.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: No. No. That's that's I just wanna make sure that the witness has a chance to say everything she wants to. I started it, so I know.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: On this question of the mixed delivery in a public school setting versus a private provider and looking at the JFO report, talks about if the triggers of X73 are met, we'll call it a $6,900 figure. But currently, private provider receives roughly $3,900 Currently, what does a public pre K receive if the student is educated in that district school setting?

[Representative Brenda Steady]: It depends on what they put in their

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: school budget. Depends on what that community my understanding somebody else who knows school finance better than me, depends on what the school put the local district voted on,

[Chair Theresa Wood]: and then it's divided by the presentation Yeah. That we had back a month ago.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: So That includes off of their reports.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Yes. But in in the in the slideshow, it's it's they they bulleted it and showed Yeah.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: So does average to

[Chair Theresa Wood]: about that amount. Will offer you that.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: But it could be very different in different communities, again, based on what they passed in their budget.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: And if he's giving more than some other school

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: that's Well, not out also probably using some of its Title I dollars for being a Right. Mhmm. Yeah.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: But it it appears, and I'm trying to figure out if this is the case, why would it be the case that if we go with the the standard ten hours a week Yeah. In a public school setting versus a private setting, the dollar amount received by the public school is different than the amount received by the private provider.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: So I was starting to touch on that. And I don't think I have a slide specifically on that. I have something in this written testimony thing I submitted, which is just and again, it has to do with it. When 166 was passed and this is about when I started working early childhood in Vermont. So I remember I joined this field in the first year of full implementation of 166 and was really connected to the Vermont Community Preschool Collaborative at that time. Essentially, the interagency committee that was doing the planning for 166, they got estimates for how much it would cost to offer ten hours of high quality pre k. That amount was about 3,000 was $3,000, and then it's been set in an index. And it's just been increasing on that index for ten years, But perhaps the underlying cost structure hasn't been reexamined in that amount of time. But also, at that same time, the schools were not bound by that same index in increasing the amount that they were spending on pre And they be increasing for a variety of reasons. They could be increasing because they were offering more services or because they offer fuller benefits package, perhaps, than a community based program. So they just weren't moving in sync with one another at all. There was no mechanism for them to move in sync with another. And I think that is something that I have definitely talked about with leadership at Agency of Education of figuring out how we do get those synced up so that there's more equity between the settings. Does that help answer the question?

[Representative Doug Bishop]: It does.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Okay.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: That would be one of my goals, I'll be honest. Is that we have the same payment to private as we have for public. Public would get an admin addition because they have to manage the contracts, and they potentially have a pre k coordinator and stuff like that.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Mhmm.

[Representative Zon Eastes]: It's But the per pupil cost, the per pupil spending would be the

[Chair Theresa Wood]: same in each situation. That's one of the questions.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: It seems important if the community decides to move towards and maintain a mixed delivery system, seems like that would be a key aspect of maintaining that.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: And we certainly couldn't require a licensed teacher in the classroom unless we increase the amount going to the private to be comparable to what's being done in the private. All things that are up there. Go ahead, representative. Well, maybe this

[Representative Brenda Steady]: is a follow-up for when that conversation happens. But like you said, needing to pay teachers more, but also at the same time requiring that licensure is a part of that. So if we are showing up the funding that we're also showing up, I don't want to say expectations because childcare is No, qualifications of

[Chair Theresa Wood]: staff would definitely be part of that.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: And other things that we put on our public schools in general for criteria to make sure we're providing equitable access to education. Just making sure it's all lining up. Which we'll talk about. And

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: I think that when 01/1966 was passed, that was part of the discussion was that part of the priority was on universal access at the time. And if they had moved directly to requiring AOE educator licenses across all settings fully at the same level at schools at that time, then they wouldn't have been able to achieve some of the expansion access goals that they've had. And partially just because people who were working in community based programs, some of them might have had a master's degree in early childhood education. They just didn't have an AOE educator's license. So they needed time. It had been ten years. So that's totally valid to reopen this question. I will offer that in the Prepaid Committee report, there are several pages devoted to this issue. It looks at the quality standards for pre kindergarten education. It looks at the near standards. So you heard from Gigi last week, and compared it to the NAUIC standards. And you heard from Sharon, who's with the Vermont EUIC chapter. It also compared it to the Head Start standards. And I think you hear from Christy next. So you guys will all of those standards were compared across and looked at how are we doing across settings. We're doing pretty good. Again, we do and then it went more deeply into educator qualifications, both lead educators as well as the assistant educators, and really outlined where we stand right now and then explored the concept of when we look at other states that have made some of these changes, what were some of the supports that they put in place, and what is the transition timeline? And so I think that's for us, as I know that you guys are really motivated to get a bill out. And I do think we really honestly are pretty directionally aligned with what we want for children in Vermont within the bounds of our budget realities and all of those things. I think that it's just we just do need technology. There would need to be transition time and the resource questions and that they all interplay together. So again, this quick overview slide is just I wanted to talk about a few things here. So first and I have slides on for the three bullets there, I have a few slides on them. So one is just really quickly related to X-seventy three. And the next is just to make sure you guys know what's happening with a preschool development grant for the five project that's funded this year. And the next are just some bullet points in terms of considerations for UPK design, which I know you've talked about, but I had some thoughts I wanted to share with you about them. So again, big picture, all of this is part of, from our perspective, part of this cradle to career vision for Vermont to create and part of that does include a robust, equitable, high quality, publicly funded pre kindergarten system. And we do believe that some of the changes, the changes in Act 73, that can improve the effectiveness and efficiency of UPK in terms of fewer districts, would ideally allow for better coordination and support, allow us to get a little more clear on the resource allocation. Because when you have one group is figuring this out for 500 students, one group is figuring this out for 50 students, you're like, well, what is the overhead that's needed? How do we think about that? That ends up being one of the challenges. And it makes it tricky to think through how are we supporting the governance. So as the administration, our perspective is really some of those key decisions around governance and funding for for the public education system overall really need to be made to provide that clarity on how to adjust our pre kindergarten program. We really need to know what we're hanging the pre kindergarten structure onto. So that's the big picture. This is just making that this map, I know you guys saw different data from Morgan, which, again, she did a good job of giving us shared credit, because definitely, AOE, CDD, and BBF worked together on those maps and data that you saw last week. But again, this is just to paint that picture of when you got 20 students in one district and you got four eighty six, just how you organize things, it's just going to be different. And the other thing I want I'm sure you guys know I mean, you pass this bill. For Act 73 or 25, it does talk about that there's a funding study that's due in December from JFO that talks about recommending the CALS Factor formula for special education weights and disability categories, but also to update any other weights determined to be empirically necessary for an adequate and equitable education. So from our perspective, this study is the place to figure out what we think is to set new weights, to make sure that we're coming up with a funding formula that we want, and that there already is a legislatively mandated mechanism in place to address the equitable funding formula. So that's what I personally had to say related to Act 73. Another thing I wanted to make sure that you all know, and I know it ends up being a lot of words on this slide. And I'm actually going to read some of them out loud because I think they're really important. I just also want to remind people, the Prepay Committee report came out in December 2024. So in the months leading up to that, that was like, oh my gosh, what are we doing for education transformation? And then, as you remember, a year ago, we were all like, what is going to happen? Are there federal funding? What's going to happen? We were all really worried and concerned about that. And it was a really difficult time to make plans related to those pieces of it. And one of the pieces within that was this preschool development grant

[Representative Brenda Steady]: that Bless you.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: It's a preschool development grant, birth to five. So Child Development Division has been the applicant for this fund, because it is supposed to be for the birth to five system. And again, that was something that the for a proposal, the notice of funding availability was supposed to come out from the federal government by June, July. We didn't get it until November, mid November. And we needed to turn our under grant application in five or six business days. So this has been very much on our minds. And I just want to remind all of us, it's been alongside some other heavy things, which I know you guys know. But just a little just mentioning that. But it was on our minds, we were ready when this application came when the application finally was released for us to say, we know what we want to do to answer some of these key questions around pre K. And so CDD, we, AUE, and BBF are leading on a project around EBK systems alignment. We put out a request for consultants, and we reviewed bids yesterday. We got a lot of really capable, qualified organizations wanting to help the state of Vermont with this for a small fee. And we are with PDG funding. And these are the goals that we're going to be working on, again, with the goal to have an implementation plan or recommendations by December. And again, I think these goals are the same as yours, improving access by ensuring UPDA policies and supports work consistently for families across the state and across program types. We know that we need to clarify and align UPK governance and expectations across agencies and settings so that public schools, community based programs, family childcare, everybody's operating within what feels like a really coherent framework. We want to reduce the administrative burden and duplication by identifying if there's any places where there's unnecessary differences in oversight, monitoring, or reporting. Again, we want to create that foundation for shared UTK data governance and integration so that Vermont can track participation, quality, outcomes across the mixed delivery system using consistent definition and low burning processes. So I just want you to know, are committed to these goals. We have secured resources to do it. Staff across CDD, AOE, and BBF have all set aside time to prioritize this work in the next year.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: That's great. We heard the same thing from Building Bright Futures, and I'm hopeful that we'll hear the same thing from AOE.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: And then I wanted to flag a couple of things that, again, I know you are aware of them. But I heard some questions about it. Then you'll hear more about it. But again, interaction with the Head Start program and funding model, we have $28,000,000 or so of federal funding that comes in for some of the highest need children in Vermont through Head Start. Head Start is a model for three four year olds. And any changes hopefully would not impact children who are eligible for Head Start's access to the full family wraparound services. Does that even come through you? No, doesn't. It's direct. We host the Head Start Collaboration Office with our Head Start director. And so we have an eye on all of it, but the money goes directly to those grantees. And then there's a matching requirement. So universal pre kindergarten or childcare financial assistance can be matched for some of those pieces. And there's just some really excellent I would say, really excellent community school districts, I guess, non Head Start community spots, Head and school district partnerships in different parts of the state are built connected on having both 3s and four year olds in that community. So if we start pulling one string, it's going to have an implication for that structure overall. And so I think that that needs to be done pretty planfully. The second piece is around early childhood special education. And that is legally mandated to be offered through the LEA, through the school district, starting at a child's third birthday. So Children's Integrated Services serves children with early intervention from zero to three. And then we have some other family support, specialized childcare, some other supports that wrap around that go up to five and maybe a little older than that. But the transition for early childhood special education is the third birthday. So school districts are responsible for making sure that children get early childhood special education. And the best practice is to have children in their least restrictive environment. And so for many schools, having a classroom that includes maybe a typically developing three year olds as well as three year olds are eligible for early childhood special education. As long as not more than fifty percent of the kids have disabilities, then it still is that least restrictive environment, which fits what we know as best practice in a terms of community of peers, both for all children. That's definitely an important consideration as you think about ages.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: I just want to be clear that I don't envision us messing with any of that stuff up there in terms of we can't do anything about Head Start, nor it's not under our purview. I understand it's a blended and braided funding system. But we also, like for instance, because on the table is whether three year olds continue in pre K or not. So that doesn't mean that they wouldn't be eligible for special education. And it doesn't mean that they wouldn't be eligible for high quality child care and funding under that.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Just Right. If the school district wasn't allowed to serve three year olds and wasn't allowed to offer pre kindergarten education for three year olds, then the school district would no longer have classrooms that serve typically developing three year olds to include those children who are eligible for early childhood special education services in it. And it already is really challenging to coordinate early childhood special education services within the mixed delivery system. And so this would be eliminating one option that many school districts are used to achieve those goals. Again, in Prekindergarten Education Implementation Committee report, in the appendix, there was surveys that we did of school districts around what would they if it moved to being a full day four year old program or it moved to being just four year olds, what would that mean? Would that have to change how you deliver early childhood special education? And they said, yes. They did not say no. They said, yes. Will change how we have to deliver special education. And they weren't sure how they were gonna do that. And they were concerned about their ability to best meet the needs of children and to connect them with the special services that they provide, as well as giving them a in a natural environment, essentially, for those children. Rather than just having them come in and work on one on one, The best practice is to have somebody ideally in the classroom with that child and supporting them in some place that's a natural environment. And it's also more time and cost effective for the districts as well to be able to do that. It really depends again, we know it does depend on the district. But the districts that really are taking a planful approach to this or are looking at things at a regional basis with a mixed delivery system, they are aware of what pre K gives them this place for both their threes and their fours to be aware of what are the programs in their community, what are the services that can be offered. And there might be some kids that they would say that the school district might prioritize enrollment in their own program. Maybe they're English language learners. And I think that the district can support that better. Maybe they're eligible for early child special education. And so I just am flagging. It would make a difference, I think. That's what our research showed. And that's we've been hearing from districts. And just when we

[Chair Theresa Wood]: heard from MIR, Vermont is definitely an outlier on their pretty little math. Yes. So Vermont and Green and the rest of the country not. And when it talks about access for three year olds. Have Other the same kind of requirements as we do and they're figuring out how to provide services to three year olds, I would imagine.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: No, they're not. Vermont is tops. I know we're tops. We're also tops in early childhood special education. And you could get the early childhood special education folks in right there at AOE to come in and talk to you about that. But we also are leaders in the nation in terms of providing early childhood special education in the least restrictive environment. So we're leaders in that as well. So then the other piece, this is all tied, is, again, the impacts on the early childhood education ecosystem, especially on infant and toddler care. Know that infant and toddler care is more resource intensive just because you need more hands and more brains to support even younger children. And the way that has developed historically is that oftentimes, programs are they might be thinking about how they are managing their costs based on the child from zero to five. So they know they're going to lose money on that kid when they're an infant or a toddler, but by the time they're in preschool, they're going to be able to have enough revenue that can cover their losses for that child when that child was younger. That's the way it has worked, partially because those parents have not been able to afford that low level of resources that are needed for real infant toddler care. And that's the system that we have. And And it has been reinforced in the ways that Tucker Financial Systems has been structured to because that's based on has been based on market rates, not necessarily on and it still is based on market rates officially, not based on estimates of cost of care. And so again, if we have children, if the incentives get structured in such a way that school districts are maybe offering certain kinds of programs, I guess, just an age of three programs that decide to specialize in this. If the incentives are structured in such a way that threes, fours, fives might get enrolled in kindergarten are peeled out of the zero to five environment, it will leave a big hole in the budget for children zero to for the younger children.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: When you say feel that the budget, what do you mean?

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: I mean, if so maybe there'll be a program that it could be that a public school decides to invest in full school day, full school year, pre K at a different rate. And for a family, that's free. And so the family is going to go to that. And so they're no longer in their zero to five setting anymore.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: So anecdotally, we're seeing that happen already. Absolutely. So this is kind of like one of the underlying questions. And I don't know if school districts, if we had a different funding system where pre K wasn't part of the average daily weighted membership, so it doesn't reduce their cost per student. Like right now, it does. Whether that would sort of change that dynamic for school districts. But I think we're seeing an uptick in school districts looking at of all the different combinations of pre K and CCFAP and all of that and trying to figure out how to keep those kids in the school or to entice kids to come to the school, at least in the two school districts that I represent, that's happening.

[Representative Zon Eastes]: And

[Chair Theresa Wood]: so I think we're actually, depending upon the decisions we make here, are at risk of upsetting the very tenuously balanced apple cart of private and public pre K right now. Because of all those things you just said in terms of if school districts figure out a way to not have the disruption for the parents' schedule

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Mhmm.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: And are

[Chair Theresa Wood]: able to keep the kid for the the kids for, you know, the whole day, whether it's some combination of CCFAP in pre K and private pay and all of the above. I think that the balance that we have right now that is tenuous in terms of those three, four and five year olds being in the private system and helping to offset the cost of the more expensive younger children could be upset considerably.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Yes. And I guess the question is, and that's why our position is we've got to there's too many moving pieces right now to make a big change in pre K right now. I think it is in terms of hours, in terms of ages. That's the situation's perspective. Maybe next year, but right now, there's too many moving pieces, and we could have some unintended consequences. I agree with you. And it's different in different communities, because in some places, they've got school buildings they need to build. In some places, they don't have enough spaces that would be developmentally appropriate for young children. So I think it's just something really It's just a really I just want to say, it's not just a theoretical question. It's a real one. So that was the main point. And California introduced what they call TK, which is really transitional kindergarten. So it's kindergarten for four year olds. And last year or the year before, and childcare centers closed as a result of it. And there was less infant toddler care in those communities. And they found most of the children who were newly accessing traditional kindergarten were children who had more resources. So again, there's a cautionary tale there. There's cautionary tales elsewhere on this. And so that's all. I'm just saying, be cautious. Let's be cautious on this one. And I know caution sometimes leads us to just not making any progress. So I don't want that. I am motivated to make progress in terms of access for children. But it is an ecosystem. And there might be

[Chair Theresa Wood]: things we can make progress on incrementally. Yes. Terms of we might be able to address maybe one and a half of the big questions. Go ahead.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: I would say we're in a position where our progress is going to be incremental because Vermont has been a standout. We've got 70% of kids. We're number two in the nation for access. We need to improve geographic access. For 91% literacy rate for four year olds and 85% overall for kindergarten readiness. So I'm also curious what are our endgame goals. And to the point of not upsetting Apple cart, the part we were just talking about merited several stars as I highlighted this report about the mixed delivery system and what will happen to private providers that we depend on. I mean, we talked about even if more public schools would get into this at an increased capacity than they currently are for more hours during the school day, we're not talking all about summer yet. What do working families, working parents do with a service that ends on the last day of the school year? So

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Yeah. And school vacations. And school after school programs.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: I haven't got school. Going to a different world where, there's camps, transitions

[Chair Theresa Wood]: have much more of an impact

[Representative Doug Bishop]: That many camps are for three and four year olds.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Right, right. So that is the thing. So there are summer camps the CDD does regulate summer camps for three- and four year olds. For summer camps for school agers, many of them are exempt. That means they can't draw down child care financial assistance to help pay for them. But they are exempt from CDD regulations if they run just for the summer period. But not for three and four year olds, because there are just some foundational health and safety issues that we want to make sure are there. So we would need to look at it might mean we have to look at regulations. There would be a whole other again, relative to transition, there'd have be a whole other industry to stand up. I will say another thing that's in the Preschool Development Grant is working with Vermont After School to do some more analysis related to after school and summer options for pre kindergarten children. So it's absolutely something that's a priority for us. It certainly comes up in the after school advisory committee, which I think is meeting right this second, is something that we're looking at.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Yep. Can

[Representative Doug Bishop]: I take a

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: quick Sorry? That's all Sound like Mindy.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Question. Go ahead. So

[Representative Doug Bishop]: your statements, be careful about not upsetting the apple cart. Would CDD and the agency be in a better position to be making recommendations after the UPK systems alignment and working with the consultants over the next x number of months? Would you feel that what changes might need to be made would be available by the start of the next legislative session? I think that a lot of

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: them will, especially really getting clear on what is the role of the agencies, the school districts, the programs, I think is one of the things that we've needed to get clearer on. We know that certain so think that's a piece of it that will be really helpful. I think looking at, again, some of the places where there are some routes that are related to administration, I think it will get us to what is the data that we currently have and what we really need. And I think that there is information that can help us on the funding side of it. But GFO is tasked with doing that at the same time. So I think we need to have that conversation about but again, we're happy to work closely with them. On their finance, there's funding study that they early care and learning funding study they just put out. I read at least three drafts of that thing and provided input for that. And relative to funding across settings what did I say?

[Christy (Christie) Swenson, Director, Capstone Head Start; Chair, Vermont Head Start Association]: I can say one more thing over here

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Oh, Okay. So we have done a cost of care model with and again, this came out. Again, it's in the pre K committee report of what were the next steps. And one of the next steps was trying to figure out how do we come up with a cost model for community based programs. And it let's see. I want to oh, there it is. Okay. It identified that the analysis that we did that we commissioned with First Children Finance, the National Office, its estimate was that the current model doesn't cover between $800 and $1,300 of pre K costs per child in a typical zero to five program for the ten hours. Because there a lot of because there are that, a little bit of that is the teacher salary, but a lot of that is the time that you need for administration in terms of working with multiple school districts, as well as some of the developmental assessments that you need to be doing, some of those pieces that you really do need to have staff that have dedicated time to do that work. It's all designed to ideally be like TS Gold system should be designed to have you what you're doing both provides data to the state that's useful, but it also provides useful information to you as a teacher to be able to guide and look at what that child needs. It's not designed to just be like you're filling up paperwork for paperwork's sake. It's ideally designed to do both things at once, But it takes time no matter what. And so that's what that analysis showed. So again, just something to consider as you're

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: So over a period

[Representative Doug Bishop]: of time, 800 to

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: 13 That would be for a school year.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: For a school year.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Yeah. So if the current amount is about $4,000 it's saying that it's at least probably 20% short of what's needed. And again, it does depend on the size of the program, how many pre K kids you have enrolled in your program, what economies of scale you can get.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Yeah, in this committee, we won't be determining what's the appropriate amount. We're just hopefully going to say that it should be the same forever. And I think there is validity to thinking about this and not in terms of weighted pupils because of the complexity of a private and public system. That adds complexity because if we were across all ways and means, they would say, it's not that the school system anymore, it's that there's more taxing capacity. And so I think that one of the things that we could do to simplify one little piece of this is the finding. And I think that categorical aid seems to be gaining some let's just say. We would not be determining how much that is. I would think that that would be added to the scope of work for the consultants who are chosen to do this work.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: If I can add to that, to that discussion, think your perspective is that the current structure also doesn't erase this flat statewide tuition rate. Ideally, children that are eligible for early childhood special education are wrapped around. There still is some debates there. But the additional funding that might go to a school district for a child who is coming from a family with limited financial resources or English language learners, that's not included in the statewide tuition formula for pre kindergarten right now. So just mentioning that. And the other thing, I guess, I would say I know that you guys are at time, it's where we started. And maybe a point of disagreement here is around three year olds. And again, for the pre K committee report I mean, also I co chaired that committee throughout. I aimed to follow the rules, I promise. And the committee consistently came back to being deeply concerned about the idea that three year olds would not have access to three year about eliminating three year olds from the pre kindergarten committee. To the point, we were like, well, what about the thought exercise of it? And it was like, no, we don't even want to think about it. It was honestly where a lot of the committee members were.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Like a

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: thought exercise. Let's just think about it. What if it was just four year olds? Let's go down that exercise. And people weren't even really willing to go down that road because they were really concerned about three year olds. Again, there's places in the state that have had access for three year olds for close to forty years now. It's baked into the system that they have. And they were really concerned about that. In the final committee vote at the end, the committee I think it was there were three people who abstained no, that was perilous. I think there were three members that abstained from voting at that moment. One was absent, and two abstained. One of the people who abstained everybody else voted, please keep three year olds in from that committee. And one of the people who abstained abstained because they thought that the statement didn't go far enough because they felt that pre K was an entitlement for three year olds. And this one and that the language that we were voting on had to talk about a pre K benefit for three year olds. And again, in the report, there is feedback from school districts, too, about their reaction to that and to other people as well. And so just offering that's the feedback. It's not just my personal opinion. That really is the feedback that we got through that, through a pretty engaged process, not just the committee members who were all designated by the legislature. It was the feedback that we heard from schools and the feedback that we heard from community members as well. Do you have a question?

[Representative Zon Eastes]: I have a question.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Okay. So I am recalling some of the recommendations of that report, as well as what we heard in terms of sort of the, I'm trying to remember what this, the policy recommendations from Building Bright Futures through their data gathering process as well. And so I don't want to put words in your mouth. But what I think that I hear you say is because everybody has recommended increasing hours for four year olds. So if the only way that we could increase hours for four year olds was to move three year olds to CCAP full time. I'm hearing you say, Don't do that.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Are hearing it. It at ten hours and

[Chair Theresa Wood]: keep three year olds having the same access as four year olds.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Yes, there's not room to expand hours for Yes, do not expand access for four year olds at the expense of three year olds partially because of the early childhood special education considerations. But also, again, not every child is going to have access to child care financial assistance because if you have they don't all have most of them many Vermont families qualify from income perspective, but not all of them have a service need. If you have a parent that's working if you have a parent at home, then you're not eligible to have care financial assistance. So you could be home again with the baby and the toddler, and it would be amazing to get it would be really good for you and for your child to have a preschool experience. Those families, if they have a caretaker at home, they would not have access to pre kindergarten. And there was some research done it's older now, it's pre pandemic, 2019 that said they just wouldn't send their kid if they had to pay for it separately. Part of that concern is you will not catch every child through child care financial assistance, and especially for those kids that might need extra support, that might need additional supports. And then I think, again, this is the place where, again, I understand that our education colleagues will have even more to say on this. But I don't know that the trade off between two years at ten hours and one year at full time is as clear. I don't know that one year at full I don't think the academic research is clear that one year of full time pre K is better than two years of part time pre K. I think there's some research that shows, nope, the two years is actually a higher priority than the extended hours for four year olds. And I think that's also part of it, too, is I don't think the academic research necessarily backs that up. But again, I am a public administrator, I am not an educator.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Go ahead, Rep. So Steady.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: It's my understanding, have a brand new school, they got lots of room. But like Milton, we don't have enough room. We're outsourcing to the few places that there are in Milton that are accredited daycares that can pick some preschool kids. So what happens to the kids that there's no room for? Right. No, I agree with

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: you that that is I would rather focus our efforts on supporting communities to build that up. And what does that mean? Does that mean you need to work on figure out how to incent, how to have more child care programs in the Milton area that are universal pre kindergarten eligible? So whether or not that means and maybe that's by having a more equalized amount for pre K across settings. We do actually have a lot of support, CDD and AOE has some supports as well, but to support people in advancing in their credentials, to support them in getting that educator license, to support that program and increasing to the required four and five stars. So again, that's the different. And there's been some communities that have done that. I think Addison County is actually probably a good example of a place where they created a regional universal pre kindergarten coordinator across several school districts who really figured out what are the assets that we have in this community for early childhood education, and how are we leveraging all of those to make sure that we're creating a positive pre kindergarten experience. And so I wonder about how do we incent that behavior as

[Chair Theresa Wood]: a tool. I have a question for you. So one of the things that became evident to us in discussing Act 76 is, and then looking at the law around Act 166 on pre K, is that there's nobody responsible for it. The only thing that Act 166 does is says the state will pay ten hours a week if you can find it. And so one of the things on the table is, because it is paid out of the education fund, is making school districts responsible for providing or arranging for the provision. And so I have a question for you. Right now, it is sort of jointly administered. And if we were actually giving school districts the responsibility in whatever form school districts state in the future, would it make logical sense then to say AOE has responsibility?

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: I don't want to respond to that question off the top of my head.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: I just want you to think about that, if you can I think about

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: think right now, the system is designed to build on the strengths of both of our organizations right now? And one of those things is that, really basically, that CDV knows a lot about working with community based programs, and AOE knows a lot about working with schools. And so together, if it's a mixed delivery system, the policy and the guidance decisions need to be made by partners that have expertise in both settings, whether or not there's a place where you're saying, oh, they're the lead. They're the second. I don't know. But I think the other piece to know is, I think, the administration's perspective, we know that children and families are served by both agencies all over the place. We're constantly working together. Whether or not that is within Department of Children and Families, within Department of Mental Health, within a Department of Health, we're all working together with Agency of Education regularly. So there's a part of it that's like, I think we can work together. We already do. I think the other piece of it is that I wanted to respond to your question earlier around the funding flows. So I would offer that families blend public education funding and child care financial assistance All the time, all the time. Their school age children are eligible for childcare financial assistance. So they could be using childcare financial assistance for their summer camps. They could be using childcare financial assistance for their after school program. It depends on the organization of that after school program. But it's happening all the time, where there's a public education dollar that's paying for part of the day and a child care financial assistance dollar that's paying for another part of the day for school agers all the time. Prepaid kids are just at that transition point. The shorter part of the day right now is the public education part of it, and the longer part of the day is the child care financial assistance part of it. But it's the same thing. I'm just saying it happens all the time. And we do see that blending the public. We do see the blending certainly in the private settings. But we also are seeing that blending in the public settings. So yeah.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: We've four patients' testimony happening, and I just want to

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: I got another updated one that says 03:15.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: We checked, Lauren. Thank you.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Sorry. Okay. So I was just saying that we see that again, families are blending it all the time. Settings are blending it all the time for school agers. Prepaid kids are also right just at that intersection of that. And it looks a little different because of this mixed delivery system. So I'm just saying, there's nothing inherently wrong with that, I guess. It's my point. It happens. And we are seeing that public schools there's plenty of public schools that draw down childcare financial systems for after school. And there's some that draw down childcare financial assistance to be able to provide after school to their pre kid kids.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: So do you have any sense or do you have any data on the number of school districts tapping into child care financial assistance, either directly, so money going to the school district or indirectly with contracts with private providers operating in the school district?

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: So in terms of directly, I had the team did pull the information for me on the programs that are drawing down childcare financial assistance on their center based child care license, which is their pre K license. And that was 19 sites. They could be in one school district. It's across multiple school districts, but it could be more than one site in a school district. So that is what we so it's not widespread, though I also know that there's communities that are thinking And hard about expanding I do not have the number

[Chair Theresa Wood]: or I could get that. Kids are involved.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: We could totally get that.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Okay, that would be helpful. I'm just

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: I don't know about the pre K programs in I'm trying to think if there's something in our data set. I could ask the program our data people about how to get at private programs that are using the public school setting. I'll have to see if they have a way to they probably have to do address mapping.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Part of this is about trying to have a more complete picture for our colleagues about what's actually happening.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Yeah. Personally, I think that's why sometimes the school age is kind of a good example of being like, it happens all the time, happens every day. But there's dollars flowing from there's childcare dollars flowing

[Chair Theresa Wood]: to That seems to have been an issue for the older kids.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: It just seems to be an issue for

[Chair Theresa Wood]: the younger kids. So, representative Bishop, and then, we have to move on to our next witness.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: I guess I'm I'm curious what we may know or could learn about any school setting that's drawing down CCAFBP. What does that look like in their budget? Mean, are they Good

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: question. I but that's I say good question, but I'm

[Representative Doug Bishop]: like Yeah.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Mean, you're in

[Representative Doug Bishop]: the school budget, how much of it is accounted for, what they anticipate getting through CACFIB.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Yeah. Got it.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: It would be pretty challenging if you necessarily know when you're budgeting the finances of the families Going down the CSA at that date.

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: Well, people school districts have a good idea of their population. They've been doing it a while in terms of knowing their families. But I think yeah. It is I mean, all budgets are just your best guess. So that's not my professional thing.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: Not a cheat, either. Our budgets are perfect. Yeah.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: All right. Thank you so much. Appreciate it. And if you could let us know about whatever you might be able to tell us about schools accessing CCDAP, that would be great. Thank you.

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: Thanks, Jan.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: And I think Nicole is on. Hi, Nicole. Nice to see you.

[Nicole Miller, Executive Director, Vermont After School]: Good afternoon.

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: No.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: If 123456. Could you wait? Yeah. Okay. I'll close it. People are needing to take personal breaks for a moment, but we're still trudging on here because we have a timeframe that we need to deal with. I appreciate your patience.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Of course.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Uh-huh. Oh, and Christy is just joining us. Hello. Hi. Nice to see you. So as you have picked up on, we're talking about pre K and any potential policy changes for the state in pre K and really are interested in how that may or may not impact after school programs. So it'd be helpful to hear from you what you can tell us about three and four year olds in after school.

[Nicole Miller, Executive Director, Vermont After School]: Absolutely. I really appreciate it. Good afternoon again. My name is Nicole Miller. And for the record, I'm the executive director of Vermont After School. We're a nonprofit organization that works to strengthen after school and summer programs, empower youth, and expand access so that any child or youth in Vermont who wants to attend a program can do so. I structured my testimony today to give a little bit of a refresher because after school is a complicated system, as is pre K, as is most everything that you all are dealing with in your committee. And then I have some recommendations or some things that I'm thinking about at the end. So hopefully that sounds okay as far as a plan. So just as a bit of a precursor, when we're using the term after school or out of school time programming, what we're really talking about is programming that happens after school, over the summer, during school breaks, before school, on the weekends, sometimes even. And it's really any time that children and youth are outside of home or school. Currently, we're also referring primarily to children and youth who are kindergarten through grade 12 in the current system. And again, that's because there's been a different process for preschool students, and that has been a different process. So the universal after school conversations haven't at this point really thought about pre K in that sense. But obviously, as I've been talking with providers, those are some of the things that I've been thinking about. So I think, you know, Janet was just talking about a mixed delivery model that's evident in the after school space as well. So flexibility and mixed delivery are really key design elements of the current after school system, recognizing that every community in Vermont has a unique mix of resources, partners, strengths and opportunities, and that families seek out and value those different types of opportunities from various partners, including parks and rec and libraries and nonprofits and schools, and childcare centers and family childcare programs, and their work in home neighborhoods in order to meet their needs. So when we think about funding for the after school space, because this is going to relate then to my recommendations around preschool

[Representative Doug Bishop]: or

[Nicole Miller, Executive Director, Vermont After School]: around kindergarten, excuse me, we're really thinking about the big four funding streams. And that feels really exciting as a state that we can talk about for funding streams for after school. So I just want to name and celebrate that. But we're really talking about two federal programs. One is the twenty first Century Community Learning Centers funding that comes through US DOE currently to the Agency of Education. And then, as you all know well, the Child Care Development Block Grant funding that goes through the Child Development Division. You will also know very well about Act 76, your hallmark program, bill and legislation that you all have worked on, as well as Act 78, which are the state after school and summer funds, which are administered by the Agency of Education. In addition to that, after school programs are using a wide range of other funding. So local funds, both originating from school budgets and not municipalities, program participants and family fees, private grants and donations, and other federal fundings like Medicaid, title funds. Basically, any dollar that after school and summer programs can find that meets their needs is what they're employing, quite frankly. And there's a big overlap between those program types and funding sources. So a licensed after school program could also be a 21c funded program. A nonprofit that runs a licensed after school program could also have I'm sorry. 21C is twenty first Century Community Learning Center funding. So that's that federal funding stream. I apologize. That's a shorthand because it's such a long name.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Well, they're not the education committee, so sometimes we don't know all of these things.

[Nicole Miller, Executive Director, Vermont After School]: I appreciate you naming that and asking the question. So essentially, it's just a complex space, especially because we're thinking about K-twelve in the current system. As you all know, licensed dollars are really available and flexible for elementary aged children. But for middle and high school, that's a little bit harder because they don't fall into those age ranges. And that's where we see a lot of other different funding sources coming into those spaces.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: So you just said, Nicole, pay through 12. I did. Can you elaborate a little bit more on what do you see across the state in terms of after school for pre K age kids? So three and four year olds.

[Nicole Miller, Executive Director, Vermont After School]: I think my concern is that the system right now is not set up for that. And not that it shouldn't be done that way. I'm just naming that it's a tension point there. So for example, within the 21 C funding, so it's that education funding that's coming from the Department of Education, It is permissible and allowable to use those funds to serve preschool or pre kindergarten age children. There is one site in Vermont out of 94 that is using those funding sources to serve pre K. I also think a lot about the structure and the differences between even in licensing. The licensing regulations are different for school age children versus those who are under the age of five and wanting to make sure that after school programs that are currently running would be able to adapt to those processes, I think that there would be some work needed in order to do that. So those are things that I'm thinking about. I also think about the capacity. After school space is has a hard time finding staffing because it's part time hours for the majority of the year and wanting to think about, you know, would there be professionals available to fill those additional staffing needs, knowing that they would instead of being full time at, like, their local childcare center, you know, there would be some some changes in in how their work looks as far as, you know, the typical hours for any after school would be, you know, to 02:30 to 5PM. So those are things that I think about. I still think a little bit about facilities and whether or not the facilities are set up again for school age children or for those that are in pre kindergarten or under the age of five. Those are really the main points that I think about. Again, I just I want to show that these are really intricate systems. If you make one change to pre kindergarten education, it's going to have an impact on the after school space, vice versa. And just knowing what some of those implications are is really my role is to just share what some of those are.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Thank you. Thank you. Any other questions for Nicole? I think what you're I think that what I'm what I'm taking away from what you're saying, Nicole, is just like we heard from the previous witness. These systems are sort of interconnected. And while you have a lot of after school programs serving pre K kids right now, that doesn't mean that there won't be a future where that's the case. And to think about how anything we might do now might impact that in the future. Absolutely. Great. Any other questions for Nicole? Thank you for waiting. We were a little late because Janet had us enthralled with so many questions.

[Nicole Miller, Executive Director, Vermont After School]: Understood. All

[Chair Theresa Wood]: right. Thank you so much, Nicole.

[Nicole Miller, Executive Director, Vermont After School]: Thank so much, you all. Appreciate it.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: You're welcome to stay on. Christie, welcome.

[Christy (Christie) Swenson, Director, Capstone Head Start; Chair, Vermont Head Start Association]: I'm Christie Swenson. I am the director of Capstone Head Start, which serves Lamoille, Washington and Orange Counties. And I'm also the chair of the Vermont Head Start Association.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: So, Christy, I see you have some information on our And what we're also really interested in is maybe a brief overview of how Head Start interplays with pre K and then also maybe to a little bit lesser extent the CCFAP. And we have some decision points ahead of us. And so how would a potential change to three year olds being CCFAP only and Head Start, how would that impact programs? Or how would increasing hours of pre K public funding impact four year olds or, I guess, potentially three and four year olds? And so if you could just maybe describe a little bit the interplay between Head Start and the public school funding and system, that would be great.

[Christy (Christie) Swenson, Director, Capstone Head Start; Chair, Vermont Head Start Association]: So I think I'll start out with providing a little bit of context for what Head Start is. So we are a program that our mission is to serve those young children who are the most at risk of being behind when they enter kindergarten. And so that means that we prioritize children based on whether they're likely to be behind at kindergarten. Those, like as an example, our waitlist is not based on how long a child has been sitting on the waitlist, but rather we have a point system and those the most that need jump the line to go to the front of of the wait list and get in first. So that really is our mission and what drives all of our work. We operate on a five year grant cycle and preceding each of those five year cycles, we do an in-depth community needs assessment. And based on that assessment, we take our service area, the number of dollars the Office of Head Start will give us and determine how we can best address those community needs with those dollars that will be made available. And so what is very different about Head Start programming is that the core of what we do is early childhood education at a very high quality level, but it is only one of many things that we do. So we also are providing, making sure that children have all their medical, mental nutrition, mental health needs met. We also are making sure that children are in stabilized families, and we work to stabilize those families because what we know about children in this age group is that they cannot attend and learn if they don't have a safe home environment and a belly with food in it. That is much of sort of, I'll say that's our philosophy and the way that we operate and the way we're mandated to operate. As far as how we interplay with UPK, I believe that all seven Head Start programs in Vermont participate in UPK. So we are intertwined in that way. The other way that we're intertwined is that a lot of folks don't understand that Head Start isn't federally funded to provide all the services we're mandated to provide. The expectation is that those early those basic early child education services are provided by a a mix of CC, FAC, and state funding, And then we're layering on the high quality for early childhood, which means we have a coach on staff to make sure that teachers are doing a great job. We have research based curriculum that must be followed to fidelity. All of those things cost money. But in addition to that, we have all of those wraparounds for the child. So we have a registered dietitian consultant. We have multiple mental health consultants. We have nursing consultants. We have dental consultants so that we're looking at all of the health needs of the child. And then we also do a whole lot of work with families in as far as providing parent training, identifying goals, whether that's that they want to maybe they want to go to college, maybe they want to have more stable housing. We help them work toward those goals in an intensive way. We have one staff person to every 35 children enrolled that is solely working on family services.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: And that seems to be, I mean, that's a key difference between pre K by itself and Head Start is that you work with a whole family. Also, as I understand it, having visited your capstone site at least, also provide education to parents and GEDs and teaching and all of that. So I think the wraparound nature for the whole family is something that is unique to

[Representative Brenda Steady]: which

[Chair Theresa Wood]: is very resource intensive, I'm sure.

[Christy (Christie) Swenson, Director, Capstone Head Start; Chair, Vermont Head Start Association]: And so what that means is that we are dependent on those UPK funds for our current model of how we operate, all of us are. I'd say there are two things that would be big impacts for us were what we're doing with UPK to change. One is if we no longer are getting that additional funding for three year olds and the majority of four year olds are going to the public school system, then that necessarily means that we would need to reduce the number of slots we can provide because we're mandated to provide all of those services. So it's not like we can't reduce quality because we have less income. We have to reduce the number of children we can serve, which is not something we want to do. The other thing that I'll say for four year olds is that the majority of the four year olds my program serves, that's the program I could speak to, would be fine to move into the public schools. But there's a subset of 10 or 15% that really need those family services and really need those intensive child supports in order for them to be successful. They're ready to move into the school system yet. And I would worry about that subset population getting their needs met.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Do you think it's important for I don't think that we're it seems pretty clear that what we want to maintain is a mixed delivery system that allows private public being best practice. So how do we support that? And I think that I'd be interested to know from your perspective and Head Start, we've uncovered some equity issues in terms of access. And you mentioned a waiting list a little bit ago. I'm just wondering, did you say that you maintain a waiting list? So do you know if those children access any other supports while they're waiting? So do you

[Christy (Christie) Swenson, Director, Capstone Head Start; Chair, Vermont Head Start Association]: know if they're accessing CCFAP or if they're accessing some form of maybe public pre K? Sometimes we know and sometimes we don't know. So we do work with them to try and find them some supports while they're waiting, particularly if they're really looking for a center based program. Sometimes we can put them in home based and then we can be providing all of those wraparound supports while they wait to get to the front of the wait list. And our family services workers are well aware of what other opportunities are in our community to help them with that piece. I wonder if I could speak a little bit to the whole system.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Yeah, it looks like we have one more question. Oh,

[Representative Brenda Steady]: yeah, my question relates to the whole system as well. Maybe you'll talk about it, but about just how new restrictions in HR1 are impacting you or will impact you if they haven't

[Christy (Christie) Swenson, Director, Capstone Head Start; Chair, Vermont Head Start Association]: already. So I guess that's a big unknown for us. It feels like it's a big unknown for a lot of folks because particularly the Medicaid piece, I've been asking folks at Department of Health to try and figure out what we think those long term impacts have been, and I've not been able to get answers yet. What I keep hearing is we don't know yet either.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: I

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: just want to be

[Representative Brenda Steady]: ready and prepared as because that's our job, of course, here in Esme. So it's hard to not know, of course, from every angle.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: And we know there were threats early on to us that luckily didn't come

[Christy (Christie) Swenson, Director, Capstone Head Start; Chair, Vermont Head Start Association]: to fruition. And we're not feeling that right now. There is some behind the scenes dismantling of some of our systems, we are not seeing It's not where we were a year ago when they wanted to just eliminate head start. There's no discussion like that anymore. That's good. So yes, please speak As to far as sort of the whole Vermont ECE system, I really wanna speak to how well it's working right now. I really feel like folks are making use of it. I feel like our outcomes are great. I think we always wanna be thinking about continuous improvement, but I think we wanna be very cautious as we're doing that right now because what we have now is working well. So being very mindful about unintended consequences, I think it would be wonderful to expand services for four year olds, but it can't come at the expense of what three year olds and families with three year olds are receiving. So I think we need to be mindful of that. And also, I think we have to make sure that we still have that mixed delivery model because we need a range of service providers because we have families and children with a range of needs. And so we need to be able to meet the needs of kids and families. And I wanted to just say one thing about small business owners who are in this field, which you guys have probably heard this 50 times already, but I'll feel remiss if I don't mention it. Even. That for these small business owners who are who are running these centers, they're very dependent on the funds that they bring in for three and four year olds because they lose money on their infant toddler. I mean, they're they're private businesses, but they're doing infant toddler classrooms as a service to the community because they lose money on those. And so we need to be very mindful as we're playing around with funding for three and four year olds that we are not unintentionally causing problems for those small business owners and ending up unintentionally reducing overall slots when we've done so much work to expand the number of slots that we have available.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: I think one of the things that I think this committee has probably had particular concern about is the differential in the rate of education payment for pre K from private pre K versus public school system. And that's one piece of the equity system that we'd like to address. Are your teachers licensed teachers? And I don't know if Head Start's required to have licensed teachers. Are they licensed in the classroom? Or do you just have sort of overall supervision by licensed teachers? No, they're required to have their bachelor's degree.

[Christy (Christie) Swenson, Director, Capstone Head Start; Chair, Vermont Head Start Association]: And the majority of them do also have their ed license. Not all Head Start teachers do. What

[Chair Theresa Wood]: kind of transition period, if that were to be a requirement, do you think would be reasonable? Transition to? To being licensed. Oh,

[Christy (Christie) Swenson, Director, Capstone Head Start; Chair, Vermont Head Start Association]: I can only speak to my program. I don't think it would be a big lift for us. I can't say for other programs what their specific staffing situation is.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Since you already have a requirement for bachelor's, that's probably not the situation for all private providers. Correct. Yeah. Other questions for this witness? Thank you so much for taking time away from what, as I know, is a very busy place with all those little ones running around. Thank Thank you, Christy. Appreciate it. It's nice to see you again. Okay. What we've heard and hopefully, Laurie, can you tell me if we have been successful in AOE doing this? Okay. Tomorrow we are going to start with some very, very draft language, hopefully. I haven't seen anything yet. But we will have Katie and Beth St. James here in the morning. We're gonna start the day though with Representative Burrows. Oh, okay. All right. Well, stay tuned. Guess I'll say then. It's a fluid agenda, that's for sure. So what are your just reactions and thoughts, not only to today's testimony, but what we have heard from near, what we heard from Building Bright Futures, what we heard from JFO. We haven't heard from the education side of things yet, and we'll get them in here. Not sure when, but.

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: I had no idea it was

[Chair Theresa Wood]: that much of a,

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: know, Bollygard or whatever. Threads, all these, wow. Kind of a hard thought to untangle it.

[Representative Doug Bishop]: I agree, the intertwinedness of how everything has kind of organically evolved.

[Representative Zon Eastes]: Yeah. Yeah, listening, especially today, but trying to think about everything, strikes me that, where my brain is that I'm really intrigued by notion of these two agencies and a nonprofit working together for this. The practice of doing that is not simple and just making sure that that's well in place in order to go forward. It seems like we're gonna get so much more information soon ish, that to make a substantive change or a pretty significant change might be tricky given the changes that are coming in Act 73 and also in the report that's coming. It just seems to me there's we need to I would feel really comfortable about setting up a system that can really grow and deal with all this. And then we can provide good oversight as we go forward. But to make changes right now, just because it seems like the thing to do, I can't think of one that would accept sit down and figure out how to get the access across the entire state, really solve that problem somehow.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: It makes sense.

[Representative Zon Eastes]: Put that as a task, maybe not that specific goals, but that's the first task. And then start arranging if we need to down the road, but that's where I am right now anyway. I

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: think just based on what we've heard so far, I think we can make progress towards the funding, equalizing the funding. So that would be a big step forward, I think. I have big concerns about the three year olds and four year olds. I think, I've shared this before, given that we have just stabilized and this is not a surprise, I've worked for CBD, but just we've stabilized this whole system just such a short time ago, and we're just kind of getting going on stabilizing capacity, increasing credentials because we have a lot more incentives out there for professionals. We're getting more people interested into the field. We're getting more family childcare programs that want to start businesses. So I just really, really worry that disrupting that right now, especially given that we have this information that's coming based on the PDG grant and the consultants that are going be working on this, I just feel like it would be really premature for us to do that piece of it. But I'm really encouraged that we might be able to make some progress on the funding, equalizing the funding. So childcare programs are receiving the same amount of funding at schools.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Yeah, I like I

[Representative Doug Bishop]: would say I've probably been fairly transparent on my thoughts as we've gone along with my questions. And then just really probably second what Rep. Garofano has said. To a degree, what comes to mind for me is sort of the with some questions left open, I'll take sort of two analogies or borrow from the medical field. One is Hippocratic Oaths first, do no harm. We have a system that's working quite well. And then the second, I think, as representative Eastes was saying as well, we're getting more information and we can act more surgically, I think, in making some changes and fixes once we have that information.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: I think it seems pretty clear from all the witnesses we've heard from so far. I don't anticipate AOE being any different given the pre KA implementation committee report. Although that was just I remember if Secretary Sanders was She was just barely here. Yeah, just coming in when that came in. Even if we are not able to expand four year olds, that it would be better to leave three and four year olds as part of the mix for pre K. That seems to be pretty consistent from what we're hearing from all of the witnesses. And think we are also hearing that equity and access should be one of the first things that we try to tackle. And I agree with Ray that I think we can make progress on the equity of the payment. And I think we can simplify that, or at least propose a simplification for that. Which a help. Which would be a big help, think. And on the governance, we heard from DCF that they think it's important to maintain dual governance, and we'll hear what we hear from AOE. We'll ask that same question when we talk to AOE. I think it's interesting that I don't know how many of you in your school meetings, when you've gone to school meetings, I continually hear about pre K as an unfunded mandate, which really surprises me. And I also continue to hear about it in my school districts. And this is, I will say from upper level teachers, high school teachers about the perception it's not education. It's mainstream. Yes. And it's not necessarily something we can change here, but I think it's something that sort of the system needs to work on. And I do view AOE as being sort of a responsible entity for helping to change that dynamic. The bill that might come to us also will help with that. The professionalization. Yes. We're not going to talk about that one right now. They're talking about even within the school system where they have licensed teachers. The concept that it's an unfunded mandate and when it's not, is just an interesting dynamic. And I don't really, it's not really something for us to deal with, but I think it is something that the education system as a whole needs to, I guess, underscore the importance of early education and the benefits of that it pays off. And I would look to that system, that system is clearly producing results. Kids are arriving at kindergarten ready to learn, very high percentage. They're motivated. And then we don't maintain that over time. Beat this first. Okay, well, we're just in discussion. Yeah,

[Representative Doug Bishop]: I would say in my time working at the Greater Burlington YMCA, I came to bristle whenever I heard the term daycare. Because at a minimum, it's early childcare. And I think early childhood education is appropriate more often than not, even if we're not talking about a licensed teacher in a classroom. Are, the the stars program and other things that we do to ensure high quality really push Vermont ahead of many other states to ensure that there is benefit other than just someone's minding my kid while I'm working. So I think even here in this committee, keeping in mind that it's early childcare or early childhood education is what we are getting in Vermont. And we're fortunate for that, because it is yielding great results. And I'll just add on a data point with, and I think the conversation has moved in this direction of what we've been hearing from the witnesses, of three and four year olds. I think I would have to imagine we're getting a 91% literacy rate, meeting literacy for four year olds in part because we've got three year olds in the program.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Yeah, think that's a good point. Yeah, I think that's an excellent point. Guess we're not in the education committee, but think that maybe and I realize that education at different ages is different, but it seems as though some cross fertilization of methods that are successful with young children, as the assessment results definitely change by the time you get to fourth grade and then again by eighth. So yeah, Brenda. I was on

[Representative Brenda Steady]: the school board back then. That's how old I am. And I did have a parent approach me, and it was really odd at a local store, screams at me, You better vote for that,

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: I need daycare. And I'm thinking, I might

[Representative Brenda Steady]: be voting on it to give you daycare. And he was out of it, he gave me daycare, and it was like, it wouldn't be for daycare, but whatever, I was polite to him. And then has anybody ever done a study of the dropout rates have increased since this all started in 'eighty seven, Well, 'eighty five, we started. 'eighty four, I was on the committee to get kindergarten into the system. So that was 'eighty four. So 'eighty seven for the preschool. Has anybody done a study? The dropout rates are really high right now if it has anything to do with kids getting sick of school. By the time they get to the

[Deputy Commissioner Jenna McLaughlin (DCF, Child Development Division)]: high school level, it's like, hey, I've been here

[Representative Brenda Steady]: for something three years old, I'm done. And the dropout rates are a lot higher and we're losing kids right and left. Has anybody ever done a study about that? That's a

[Chair Theresa Wood]: question you can ask Secretary Saunders when she's there.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Thank you. That's a good question because, yeah, the BlackRock groups are huge. Well, one of

[Chair Theresa Wood]: the things that you notice on the Head Start data elements is the rate of high school graduation is one of the things that they actually measure for students. That means they followed them for a long period of time, which is probably more than any other system, I would say, terms of that kind of information.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Well, they've been around for a while too.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: It's been around for a while.

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: I must say that nothing I've heard yet has steered me away from my own gut saying, I mean, are really different at that age. Their maturity, all those things they need. They do better in different settings. And the idea, the importance of the diversity of the system, the mixed delivery system. Some things aren't right for some kids and vice versa, and having those options I think is really important at this age and phase. I did get concerned, oh,

[Representative Doug Bishop]: no, please.

[Representative Brenda Steady]: Concerned after listening to the representative from MedStar. It would probably affect them with their funding and everything if this went through, they would take away from kids instead of helping them in that area. So, there's a lot to think of in terms of child. So,

[Chair Theresa Wood]: tomorrow we'll be seeing some draft language, language that we based on our conversation here today will pretty much tear apart, I'm pretty sure. And I think it is good for us to be thinking about how we can increase equity in making pre K accessible to all who we end up recommending should have it? And what kind of timeframe that that would require? And I think that what we will end up with out of here will be some fairly simple language, I think. And it'll wind its way through. It'll go from here to education where they're gonna add a bunch of other stuff to this bill and then ways and means and appropriations. So I think that while we heard a lot today about the intertwinedness of all of this and the complexities of it, I think that there are elements that on the surface can be relatively simple that we can, one, confirm or reaffirm, I guess. And two, some couple of places where we can make some movement toward doing our best to ensure equity to access this service and simplifying payment. I think that we can figure out ways to do most of those things. And probably also make some recommendations around qualifications of people who are in the classroom. Because one of the things that we have to keep in mind that if we are going to provide additional payment on the private side of things, then I think we do have to answer the question about licensed teacher in the classroom, but allowing lead time for that to occur.

[Representative Zon Eastes]: To clarify, just a question, when you talk about increasing or improving access, I'm understanding you to mean geographically.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: I am, I am, yeah. Just to be

[Representative Zon Eastes]: really clear because you don't want anybody to think where it's available, it's available, right? In a lot of places, yeah. And pretty good access in some places.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: In some places as we saw, but then we also saw in some places where there's nothing, where there's 11% of the kids I

[Representative Doug Bishop]: would just share, I'm a little concerned on how it would play out with respect to requiring a licensed teacher in all settings in classroom, not just monitoring the program, if you will, whether the realities of the workforce can meet that and would we inadvertently be doing harm to our mixed delivery system?

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Yeah. I don't have those concerns myself. I mean, I think with ample lead time, we have a lot of people, as we heard from the witness, that we have opportunities and payment for people if they want to. And a lot of the center based programs have already moved in this direction. And you can't double the payment they're going to receive and not have that expectation from I my agree with that. Yeah. And I don't think it's fair to not the same to not have the same payment because that does influence what you're able to provide in the classroom. We can't pretend that it doesn't.

[Representative Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: As far as access goes, I just wanted to reiterate something we heard from testimony earlier from DCF, from the deputy commissioner, is that one thing that we can really leverage is kind of thinking about targeting the areas where we need to increase access and helping bolster the mixed delivery system in having centers or smaller programs become UPK qualified. So we're not just relying on the schools, that we're building really good partnerships in those areas, but having a targeted approach and understanding where the need is and having the responsible agencies working with those communities to figure out how can we leverage the incentives that are because we have all these incentives with stars and credentials and all that to help those areas develop better partnerships so there's more access for pre K in the private setting when there's no space in a school.

[Chair Theresa Wood]: Yeah. And I know, for instance, we're going to be getting a bill from the Senate that talks about enabling access in New Hampshire, particularly in the Northeast Kingdom, where it's the only place where they have access in instances. Okay. So we've had some good testimony today. They all seem to be building on one another. I mean, I haven't heard anything that is distinctly different from any of our witnesses that we've heard either previously or today. People seem to be on the same line, almost as if they got together and said, let's talk about this. No, I'm just kidding. But they do talk. So I think that we will, like I said, get some draft language tomorrow. Begin poke holes at it, make changes. We still have to hear from AOE. And I think that hopefully we can get AOE in here so that we can have something voted at committee by Thursday. I still would like to stick to that time frame if we can do our part. Anything else? Okay. Thank you very much. And if you're interested in going down to appropriations, two of our colleagues are down there explaining H938. Oh. Okay.