Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: Good morning. Welcome to House Services. Today is Thursday, April 23. We are picking up Child the Care Early Education I'll try this for

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: a third time.

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: S206, and that's relating to licensure of early childhood educators by the Office of Professional Regulation. We have a whole host of lovely witnesses this morning, and we're going to start with Shannon Edmunds Folsom, who is a childcare manager at the JPQ Resort. Welcome, Shannon. It's in two hours. I don't think we can hear you.

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: Am I coming through now?

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: You are, but really faint. Very faint, okay.

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: That's Is that better?

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: Better, yeah.

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: Okay.

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: So, Tom, you have the floor if you wanna start with your testimony. Thank you for being here.

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: Absolutely, thank you for having me. And for the record, yes, my name is Shannon Edmunds Folsom and I am the childcare manager for JPEG Resort. So what that means in licensing terms is that I'm the program director of our licensed center based childcare and preschool program. And we also offer non recurring services. That's how we take care of our guests. Our program, JPEG Childcare exists in a unique space in so far that we are a private for profit business operated by JPEG Resort, but we also benefit from CCFAP funding and UPK Act 166 funding, which comes from DCF and the public school system respectively. We can access Act 166 because I also hold an AOE teaching license for a birth through pre K. So this means that I split my time between the administrative pieces of running the department and I'm also still spending time in the classroom with children. So I do support S206, I testified my support for the bill at the Senate Committee for Health and Wellness back in January, and I actually testified again at the House Committee on Government Operations and Military Affairs just yesterday. So here are my reasons for supporting S206, I'm just gonna walk through. It provides a clear pathway to attract and retain new members to the ECE field as a hiring manager in this particular field, that's very important to me. And if new recruits are presented with a clear career path with respect and fair pay, the whole field benefits from attracting qualified and energetic candidates and the families we serve benefit from getting high quality care. S206 provides further accountability for ECE professionals, which generates trust and security for the families that we serve. So to open this up a little bit, there's not currently a lot of transparency or common public knowledge around qualifications for early childhood educators. Licensing regulations differentiating a teacher associate from a teacher assistant to an aid, to a substitute, that's all easy enough for me to understand, but that's literally my job. I have to understand that. If I'm explaining those licensing qualifications for staff credentialing, it's lengthy, it's convoluted. So if we offer a clear license structure of ECE one, two or three, that streamlines that conversation and also the general public has an accepted understanding of a license as permission to practice, right? So whether it's medical or commercial, etcetera. So having trust and transparency with families can only serve to benefit everyone, whether you're a for profit center like mine or a nonprofit or a family care provider, because families that trust the system enroll their children. And when we fill our slots, we make money, that's good business. So in addition to this, there's also not currently a consistent way to track a candidate's work performance if they move around from center to center. So violations on a center's license to operate are on public record. But when we're hiring staff, we're very reliant on the fingerprint background check and personally calling references and word-of-mouth. So if there is a teacher with a problematic history or a questionable work performance, there's no clear cut immediate way to identify that. And that can result in potentially poor performing teachers just bouncing from program to program with potentially little accountability. So as a hiring manager, somebody again, who's trying to attract quality candidates to the field, that's never really a good feeling. S206 provides a clearer structure for employers to advocate for or incentivize better compensation. So since our center operates through JPEG Resort, I am not fully in control of compensation for my staff, But with the passage of S206, it gives me clearer grounds to advocate on their behalf for fair wages for the valuable work that they do. When, if we had a licensing structure like S206 suggests, again, hiring managers have a clearer sense of qualifications and also professional commitment to the field when recruiting staff. If someone came in through the door and said, Oh yeah, I'm already a level two. I'm like, Great, that's fantastic. Let's talk. And if somebody comes into the door, which is this is more frequently what happens. I love kids, I have my own kids. I've kind of pedaled around here and there. It becomes this mishmash of, okay, well, what have you done? And where does that fit into the bigger picture of qualification regulations? And what can I offer you based on what you can do? Right? But that's not necessarily immediately a qualified teacher that can be in charge of a whole classroom right off the bat, right? They would have to probably work up to that. So a clever piece of S206 as far as I understand is that there's still a transition time built in to last over several years to allow existing providers to gain licensure and also providing inroads for new recruitment directly into this newer system. And there is room for and the need for current providers to offer their knowledge and experience to bridge the best parts of our current practices to this new path moving forward. So in general, just to speak a little bit to the not so small elephant in the room, the resistance that I've encountered to S206 when I talk to people in my field is honestly just rooted in a fear of change, right? And there is also very valid frustration from established educators and family home providers who are extremely valuable in our field. We should never forget the family home providers. They may feel locked out of a new licensure system if they've decided that they don't wanna return to college. But that being said, there are so many opportunities for currently operating programs to be grandfathered in, And so that they have no disruption in their service or their ability to perform business. Then there's also a ton of supports out there for helping guide folks either back to school or through school for the first time. VTAEYC is going to be the best resource for explaining all of those moving pieces. But to put it briefly, our current system, it's fragile, fragmented, and still fighting for the professional recognition we deserve. So discontinuing this search for licensure, because things are working fine the way they are. It's just not an acceptable reason to delay progress or deny a better professional future for early childhood educators that wanna enter this field in the next ten, twenty or thirty years, right? Early childhood educators now have the opportunity and the responsibility to leave this field better than we found it. So finally, S206 provides a unique opportunity to further the conversation about the false divide between care and education, right? And de stigmatize the ECE field as less than the public education system. So as a concrete example, I was present when it was proposed that there might be confusion between licensure for public educators and the proposed licensed structure for ECEs licenses. And a specific argument was made to drop ECE three because it was too closely aligned with current expectations for an agency of education teaching license with a pre K or a pre K special ed endorsement, right? However, hello, I also have my agency of education pre K teaching license. That way I can offer Act 166 UPK through my program and the families I serve can benefit from tuition assistance through act 166. That being said, what if I wanted to use my master's degree in early childhood education to pursue ECE level three as an infant teacher or a toddler teacher, right? Infant and toddler teachers are required to undergo the same amount of education, professional development as their pre K peers. So does their wish to pursue a career as an infant or a toddler teacher degrade that education and experience because they're just taking care of babies, right? 90% of the brain is built before the age of three. So here's another question that I could ask. Did you know that The United States already has federally subsidized nationally available childcare? It's called the public school system. And that would enrage some people because they genuinely worked really hard for their teaching license and their professional respect. So why I ask, is it any different for those hardworking professionals that are incredible infant and toddler teachers? And as somebody who hires in this field, do you know how hard it is to find those people? Spoiler alert, it's hard. It's really, really hard. It takes very special people that love infants and toddlers to pursue that kind of work. So in conclusion, I support S206 because it's an opportunity to take an actionable step towards stabilizing the early childhood education career field. And further, is real systemic change that reflects Vermont's evolving values in prioritizing accessible high quality care and education for children and families. So thank you all for your time and consideration. And I'd like to offer any remaining time I have for answering any questions from the committee.

[Brenda Steady (Member)]: Thank you so much, Shannon. Rep Steady, go ahead. Can you see this raising the cost for the working people that do not qualify for any free subsidies? Can you see the cost going up for these people that work hard and have to get daycare for their children, but they don't qualify for the subsidies?

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: So, there is, I don't have numbers on that. I can see it coming from both sides. But what I do know is that Act 76 has done a ton of work to increase the income eligibility limits to make any kind of subsidized care affordable and accessible and for a huge range of income, right? So we're talking about state assistance for people that are making, you know, decent middle income, middle class income money. The other piece too, is that centers are private businesses, right? So we can create our own policies on what we charge and what we collect. So if the current policy that I have is I encourage families, I say, please apply for subsidy. And if you get flat out denied because you're in this weird income bracket where you make enough money but you never get any help, which is very familiar to me. I understand that completely. Give me the denial letter and then we can have an individual conversation about what you can afford, right? Because then I don't ever wanna be in a position of squeezing blood from a stone. I'm very sensitive to the fact that people work very hard for their money and that this is a very complicated system. And that way there is still a middle ground for those people to find some kind of relief.

[Brenda Steady (Member)]: Does that make I've had her straight care stew bargain, wait and see if he gets subsidies, and then if you don't, I'll try to help you. Yeah, I have heard that, but the daycares first try to get all they can from the subsidies, and then they'll work with the working people.

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: Right, and when absolutely. Yeah.

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: Thank you. I have a couple questions. Yes. So

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: can you talk a little bit about how many staff you have right now and what is your vacancy rate? So I am in a position where I am currently rebuilding my staff. I had some people step away for medical reasons, but if I'm firing on all cylinders, I have myself, I have a supervisor, I have an infant teacher, a toddler teacher, and an assistant. And then I also have a pre K teacher and a pre K assistant as well. So that's looking at a staff of roughly seven people, but that's to operate the department year round. And then I also have additional seasonal staff that I hire when I open my seasonal guest center that's attached to our ski and ride school. And that can be anywhere from three to four more people typically. Currently, when I was looking at the proposed credentialing for S206, I myself would qualify for the ECE level three. I have two staff that would qualify at least, no, sorry, three, three that would qualify for ECE level two and then the remainder would qualify for ECE level one. And then I also do have a couple of call in subs as well. But they would not necessarily, was one of my questions for OPR was how do subs and how do trainees work along with how does seasonal staff work, right? Because I want to make sure that I have enough staff that are in compliance with future potential regulations. Also balanced with the idea that I do also run a seasonal piece of the business, right? So we're not always guaranteed for those people to come back year to year, but I am extremely fortunate to say that pretty much every single person that I have would already fit into this licensure structure at some point.

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: And then the other question I have is you talked a little bit about how like the current system right now is like convoluted. There's no like clear path for people. And having the three levels would really simplify it. And full disclosure, I work for CDD when I'm not here. So can you talk a little so bit about I have just other knowledge. Sure. If you can talk about the current career ladder, and we're going to have CCBN. But from your experience as a provider and a director of a program, how are you experiencing the current career ladder that does have levels and qualifications that are kind of tied to those levels? How is that experience for you and your staff?

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: Okay, that's an excellent question. So the career ladder, it's one of those pieces that because it's optional, like you can do all of the work to have the credentialing, to be hired and work in a center. You don't have to have the career level though, right? It's sort of like a little bit of an icing on the cake. And I believe it's still also incentivized by some small bonuses. Like there's a small bonus structure, I believe. So if you qualify for this career level ladder, you can get this much money. If you do this, then you get that much. So, because it's optional, some people just go, Oh my God, it's more paperwork. And I'm just not in the mood. And I say, Yes, but you could get X, Y, and Z. And they think, Well, I think it's for the level one career level ladder, I believe it's like a $100. And sometimes people honestly just go, I have other ways of getting a $100. Like I just, I'm really tired of submitting things and working through these steps, which is, you know, sometimes a coaching conversation again, as somebody who manages these folks, it's like, look, it's worth it. You just have to dig down and do it. I will literally sit next to you and hold your hand as long as we're in ratio out there. And like we can, we'll pull time aside and we'll do this here together and now. And I do wanna acknowledge that CDD and Northern Lights has come a long way in streamlining how to submit all of this documentation in ways that I have yet to explore. Because I'm still very used to scan everything, put it in a PDF, email it, and then, you know, hope that eventually it gets in. There's now apparently a portal that you can submit all of that documentation yourself. So I'm hoping that that would streamline that process as well. So even with the career levels though, you know, there's a lot of like, you can have this and this and this, or this and this and this plus this, this, this, or this, this, this, this, which on one hand me personally, I view that as a strength because it is flexible and we need flexibility in this field, but I can see the other side of it where some people are looking at it going, I don't understand. Can you please walk me through this? And you do have to have somebody immediately on hand who is really strong at that kind of ability to nitpick those things and say, no, no, no, it's not as scary as it looks, just do it. And I'll help you through it. But when people are faced with it kind of on their own, I think they get a little overwhelmed sometimes.

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: Great, thank you. I'll wrap it up.

[Doug Bishop (Member)]: You. You were just in a moment ago talking about some resistance sometimes to move up within the current structure. There may be bonuses, but they're not particularly it's not a great amount of money. A $100 may not incentivize someone to do that work. Presumably, in the ECE one, two, and three structure, there's more work folks may need to do to get that level. And so naturally, I think there'd be an expectation that compensation would increase as they attain that. How do you think a center can cover the expectation of staff for increased pay?

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: So that is always a really great question and I don't know if I'm immediately the person who is qualified to answer that. What I can tell you in for my particular situation, right? I am hugely blessed and I will never take for granted for the fact that I operate my childcare center out of a 60,000,000 So dollars we have access to other sources of revenue, right? Which hospitality and snow sports. When it comes to other centers that are truly only generating their revenue, either from tuition or grants, that is definitely a piece that I think could be answered better by somebody else or elsewhere. And that's another reason I kind of, you know, hinted a little bit at, for example, the public education system where somehow conveniently, you know, public people are not paying tuition to send their kids to public school. And yet these public teachers are making this kind of income, which is fantastic. They deserve that they earn that. So I guess in as a private citizen, even more so than somebody who works in this field, I would raise a hand and say, well, how do they do that? Can we examine that structure? And is there something that we can learn from that as well? And then again, with subsidy that has helped a lot in bridging those gaps for staff expectations for pay and making those pay expectations realistic. Does that help answer those questions a little bit? I wish I had a better answer.

[Doug Bishop (Member)]: It does, it does. I appreciate it. Thank you.

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Thank you for being here. My apologies. I had another commitment first off when you came in. One of the requirements of the Sunrise Report is talking about the safety of the Vermont public. And one of the things that they identified as a reason for this certification was the safety of children. And I'm just wondering if you feel that this certification process, if you feel like somehow children are unsafe now in your current program.

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: So me personally, I trust my team, and I don't have any concerns about how my program operates, which may sound a little biased, but you know, I can only speak from my direct course, right? Now, however, that being said, have we had issues in the past? Yes, I'll be transparent about that. And this is sort of a, I'm trying to answer very carefully because no one ever wants to come off as throwing stones in glass houses, right? Nobody's perfect. No license track history is perfect and things happen. And so when you're looking at potentially, and I touched on this a bit, like potentially problematic staff or people with questionable work histories, right? You know, for example, there's a licensing regulation that says your voice or the teacher in charge, their voice should never exceed the volume of the noise level of the whole class, which could also be interpreted as you shouldn't just be standing in the middle of the room screaming at the children, right? I think we can all agree that that's probably not ideal. Now speaking for myself personally, have I sometimes gone, woah, hold on buddy. Yeah, because there was imminent danger of what I call the free rights. There's personal safety, other people's safety or the safety of property, right? If a kid's about to crack another kid over the head with a tricycle, that's a, woah, hold on moment. And, but then I always take a moment to stop deescalate and explain and say, I didn't wanna scare you. I didn't raise my voice because I'm angry. I raised my voice because it looked like someone was gonna get hurt, right? And I do that because I have a deep level of knowledge of deescalation with children and teaching them emotional wellness. And I, you know, balancing that with reality, right? Which is group management. Whereas, you know, you may have somebody who is either exhausted or they're burnt out or they're just professionally over it and they are perfectly content to just sit in the corner of a room and yell at a kid, What are you doing? Get down from there! And without any of the follow-up of, hey, you know, what's really going on? Because all behavior is communication. And if kids are literally climbing up the walls, you know, my first question is, well, why? You know, is there something that we could be doing to engage them differently? Is it near lunchtime? Is it near nap time? What's going on? Whereas other people who either are burnt out or they're inexperienced and they're just thrown into the mall because of short staffing. They are not asking these questions. They're just in survival mode, you know. And there are some several, you know, sort of high profile pieces in the news recently about concerns for safety, which I've also been reading. And yeah, it can be really intense and my heart goes out to those directors because it only takes one person and one really bad decision to make the whole thing look really, really bad.

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: And so I guess what I'm trying to get at is, do you think that a certification process so you've identified all these things and you've alluded to the licensing staff at CDD. They've been involved in those situations that you're talking about that recently been in the news. Do you think that a certification process is going to alleviate those things that you've just been talking about?

[Shannon Edmunds Folsom, Childcare Manager, Jay Peak Resort]: Yes, I do. And thank you. To come full circle to answer the question more directly, I do because if you have a license, then at some point you have had a class or an expectation to review a code of ethics, right? And so NACI does offer a code of ethics when dealing with children. And it's something that in my professional development over the years, I've reviewed multiple times. And when I applied and got my teaching license through peer review, I got my teaching license through the peer review program for the agency of education. I had to sign off and prove that I did all of that, that I committed to a code of ethics. So I think that if that is a requirement of the licensure process, then yes, there's always that sort of alarm bell and the ability for us to hold other people accountable and say, Woah, okay, this is a repeated pattern of behavior. And we all signed off on a code of ethics to behave differently. And so we need to have a more serious conversation about accountability. And then if there were unfortunately ever the situation of something so egregious that you lost your license, if a doctor commits abuse, they lose their license. If we drive erratically repeatedly, we lose our license to drive. So I do think that there would be some additional weight behind that accountability piece that would make people either think twice or as elitist as it may sound, it may guide people who are thinking like, oh yeah, sure. I work with kids, whatever, but they're great. I guess it would kind of guide them away.

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Thank you. Thank you.

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: Any other questions?

[Brenda Steady (Member)]: Thank you so much for your testimony. Thank you for having

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: me. Appreciate it if you want to

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: take over. Sure. Thank you very much, Shannon, for being here this morning. Appreciate it. And I see Rachel has joined us and miraculously, we're on time. So these days seems to be a rare occurrence. So thank you for being here, Rachel. And we appreciate your testimony around S206 and the floor is yours.

[Rachel Hunter (Early Childhood Educator, Springfield)]: Thank you so much. And wow, oh, there's my alarm to not be late. Look at that. Thank

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: you so much. You succeeded Rachel, you succeeded. I

[Rachel Hunter (Early Childhood Educator, Springfield)]: can get easily distracted and run off to something else. So thank you again for having me here. I'm really excited to share my experience with S206 and the work that's taken place on that, as well as my personal experiences. So again, thank you to all the representatives for having me. I'm Rachel Hunter. I'm an early childhood educator down in Springfield. And my journey in the early childhood field began in 2001. I opened a family childcare home. Before that, I was actually in the business field. I had two degrees, one in small business management, one in marketing, and I was in the process of buying a successful business here in Vermont. And all that changed for me in 2001. I had, at the time, a two year old daughter who is now wonderful 27 year old, and I really became concerned about the care she was receiving in a regulated state program. And one day, I ended up finding her and four other children in a minivan unattended to in a local shopping plaza in December. And at that point, I realized there was no amount of money I was going to make in the business world that was worth taking a chance that my child was receiving poor care. So everything changed for me, and I decided I needed to figure out what early childhood was about and be part of the solution. So I reached out to my local parent child center, and I completed the paperwork to open my own family child care home. So within three months, I purchased a home and I was a family childcare provider. And this was pretty scary. I'll be honest. I came from the business field. I had never so much as even babysat as a teenager. So here I was with this great piece of paper that said I was certified to care for other people's children. I'd completed two hour orientation and taken CPR and first aid. The only other thing I had to do was take six hours of training a year. So that was a little overwhelming. And coming from a business background, I was surprised at how minimal the requirements were. And the only thing I truly knew was I was filled with desire to keep other people's children safe and not have them experience what I had experienced. So over the next several years, I spent a lot of time attending workshops, taking courses, going to conferences. I earned a child development credential. I went on to earn a bachelor's degree in early childhood education and then my Vermont teaching license with the early childhood endorsement. And I knew that the education I had was going to directly influence the outcomes for the children in my program. And then in 2018, I had an opportunity to join the project around advancing early childhood as a fully recognized profession. And as you can imagine, this was pretty near and dear to my heart because of what I experienced with my own child and thinking about how we could move early childhood forward. I started out as a facilitator holding conversations around the state and then became the outreach coordinator. And one of my goals was to connect with as many Vermont early childhood educators as possible to ask them, do you support this movement? Do you think it's important that we become recognized as a full profession? In that first year, we held 58 conversations, and we made sure that we balanced those that we talked talked to center based programs, we talked to headstarts, public schools, and we talked to family childcare providers. We wanted representation from all the different sectors. And the feedback was shocking. 72% of the folks that we connected with wanted to move forward. They wanted a change. 24% said they only wanted partial change. But I think the piece that was the most glaring to me was only 4% didn't want a change. And that said to me that the folks that were working in the field knew there was already something wrong. So as my role was as the outreach coordinator, we moved forward to build consensus around the workforce. A task force was created of other early childhood educators, and I led the outreach, sharing information across the state, collecting feedback, providing that to our project coordinator as well as a task force. And we made sessions that were equitable and available to everyone that could possibly participate. And as you can imagine, here we were in the middle of the pandemic. What do we do? We can't travel around doing in person sessions anymore. So we became Zoom professionals and shared our information that way. So we employed a lot of different outreach strategies where we specifically targeted different parts of the state. I had maps where I would look at how many times have we been into the Northeast Kingdom, how many times into Lamoille, how many times into Bennington and Windham Counties, and making sure that we were really sharing this information in a lot of different ways. We provided updates across the state with Vermont AEYC newsletters, with partners like Let's Grow Kids and the Vermont Early Childhood Alliance. We shared information in every way you can imagine, whether it was social media, emails, paper flyers, mailings, peer to peer updates, sessions over Zoom, posting in Facebook groups, in any way we can think of to make sure that everybody was included regardless of where they were geographically or the setting in which they worked in. We had daytime and evening sessions. We offer professional development credit. We recorded our sessions, and we posted videos of the full sessions, and we posted synopsis. We offered ongoing sessions called getting up to speed for anyone who might be new to the field or might be new to getting engaged to make sure they understood what we were talking about, and we continued that specific targeted outreach. The other thing that was really unique about the work we did was all of our sessions were consistent. And so there was consistent messaging that we used, and we also had a certain way that we tailored the sessions where we had a conversation with intent, and that allowed every participant to speak and share information. And we always ask them the same questions. What excites you about this and what concerns you? That way we could hear from them directly of what they thought and what they were worried about. And one of the things we really focused on was making sure we had enough of a sample size and making sure that our data was valid. And it was interesting. The larger and larger we'd get with the sample size to make sure that we were encompassing enough folks, our data points didn't change. The workforce continued to wildly support the idea of moving forward as a recognized profession, including the individual accountability of professional licensure. So since 2008, a quick summary is we've had well over 200 sessions for folks to become engaged in. And we've done that, again, through webinars, keynotes, roundtables. We've done introductions at different conferences, things of that nature. And the sessions that we held and the recommendations shaped the information that was submitted to OPR in 2024, and that information was primarily gathered between 2019 and 2022 because we're nearly at a decade of being invested in trying to rebuild this system and ensure that folks are accountable and that children are well cared for. So now we have s two zero six, and it's rooted in the national recommendations coming out of from DC as well as the recommendations from OPR and the voices of Vermont educators. It's really important for us that we listen to the educators themselves and that this was workforce driven and that we made sure to take all of their considerations and thoughts into account as we worked on this project. You know, we know right now that early childhood education is in a tough place. There's high turnover. We continue to have to hire folks that are not necessarily qualified. And I speak to that. When I opened my program, I was not qualified. I really wasn't, and I can look back at mistakes I made and wishing I had the information education I needed right from the start. We also know that our folks spend a lot of money on training and education and then end up leaving the field because it's not supportive in a way that they need. So we continue to have underlying high quality educators who may have no way of showing their qualifications, and we need a system that allows for transparency. That not only the system is built around transparency, but also so families know as those end users what that service is they're receiving. We need a system that attacks attracts and retains educators. We need to really work on retention. We've lost so many great folks over the years. I myself being one of them. I ended up closing my program after seventeen years due to the cost of medical insurance. I couldn't possibly afford buying medical insurance through the marketplace anymore. I still remain in the early childhood field, but I did have to close my program. And accountability is a piece along with now investment from Act 76. I think that will help retain folks and keep our workforce stable. Know, Act 76, as I'm sure you're all aware of, it's really helped to keep programs open, to raise wages, to encourage programs, to expand, and really meet the demand for early childhood education in Vermont. The recommendations for s two zero six include phase in implementation. It's not right out of the starting gate. It is earn while you learn with flexible pathways, things, education pieces that stack on top of each other. And the other thing is is it structures a profession that honors the early the current workforce. That was one of the things that was key to us is we did not wanna take a chance of losing any educators that we already had and making sure that our next generation was prepared to serve the children. And for me, as I was writing this testimony, I really spent a lot of time reflecting. It has been twenty five years since I found my daughter and those four other children unattended to in a car by a Vermont educator. And what ended up happening was due to the lack of no individual accountability, the program closed, but she immediately went to work in a center based program. So twenty five years later, we're still having the same conversation about how do we do what's right for Vermont's children, how do we protect them. And that's why I've had such an integral role in this. You know, my daughter's 27 now and thriving, but that could have looked really different. I feel fortunate and blessed that it turned out the way it did where other families haven't had that. So that is the conclusion of my prepared testimony and I'm happy to answer any questions.

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Thank you very much, Rachel. Appreciate that and appreciate you sharing your personal story and experiences too. And I'm grateful that our childcare system has definitely advanced in those twenty five years, but obviously, we can always do better. So thank you. Questions for Rachel? Yeah. Go ahead, representative Bishop.

[Doug Bishop (Member)]: Let me echo the appreciation for your testimony and also jumping in when you saw a problem. I appreciate that. It's a great way to approach it. You mentioned that Act 76 helped raise wages in the field. I think there would be a natural expectation for folks in the field if they increase their current level of professionalism and credentials. There might be a further expectation, fair expectation of increased pay. How might you envision that the field can afford to increase the wages for for folks working in the field?

[Rachel Hunter (Early Childhood Educator, Springfield)]: I think one of the easiest ways is gonna be through the constant turnover and the loss of funding that is consequence of having to retrain folks and families feeling insecure about the consistent turnover and the loss of revenue dollars from families. So I think there's a piece that would naturally happen as part of that consistency of a system we're building. The other thing is I think we also need to spend some time unwinding our existing funding streams and thinking about where we may have duplicative efforts or where we may be able to shift and move and funnel funds directly so we don't have as much duplication or perhaps it's simplifying the system.

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Represent Garofano. Hi, Rachel. So nice to see you.

[Rachel Hunter (Early Childhood Educator, Springfield)]: Hi, Ray.

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: Question, would you envision if this bill were to pass, would you envision What would happen to the existing professional development system that is now in place and has been established for like the last ten years?

[Rachel Hunter (Early Childhood Educator, Springfield)]: Do you mean the trainings through Northern Lights? Yeah. Oh, I would hope they would stay. Those are so incredibly critical. And I think the nice thing about those trainings is it's a lot of application of what you actually do in practice. The coursework as part of a degree gives you that theory and a background of understanding of how to actually support the children. And then I do think those trainings really supplement that with your day to day supports.

[Brenda Steady (Member)]: Great. Thank you.

[Doug Bishop (Member)]: Yeah.

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Other questions for Rachel? Yeah, go ahead.

[Doug Bishop (Member)]: Was wondering Do

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: you want follow-up? Different

[Doug Bishop (Member)]: topic. With respect to the accountability, I I agree that I think the field could be helped by some personal level accountability rather than just the the center or the the family home providers. Do you or in your study of the field or on your own, do you have thoughts if there is something short of licensure that could be put in place to ensure that there's that personal level of accountability?

[Rachel Hunter (Early Childhood Educator, Springfield)]: I can't imagine what that would be, because we did spend a lot of time looking at other professions. We did spend a lot of time looking at other industries and trying to identify what could be that individual accountability piece. We did look at certificates. We looked at a lot of different pieces and we were not able to find anything that, as I think as I came into this conversation, you were talking about if a nurse engages in medical malpractice, they lose their license. If an attorney does something they shouldn't, they can be disbarred. Trying to find what that accountability piece is without a licensure, we were unsuccessful. We felt like it had to be individualized and they had to show an understanding of expectations, understanding of standards and competencies, and then be held accountable based on their training.

[Doug Bishop (Member)]: Alright. Thank you.

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Yep. Any other questions for Rachel? Thank you so much for being here, Rachel, and thank you for your work to, be part of this movement in recognizing the value and importance of early educators.

[Rachel Hunter (Early Childhood Educator, Springfield)]: Absolutely. Thank you all. I appreciate your time, and I hope you enjoy the rest of your day.

[Theresa Wood (Chair)]: Thank you. Bye. Okay. Next we have Danny Sottel, but I don't think that person is on yet. Not sure if they're gonna be in the building or on Zoom. We're a few minutes early now. So why don't we go offline for the next fifteen minutes or so

[Golrang "Rey" Garofano (Vice Chair)]: and