Shared Services for Chidcare Providers
What if every childcare provider had an administrative team?
Solving Missouri’s childcare crisis requires paying attention to the needs of childcare businesses.
On top of providing education and care, owners and directors must manage enrollment, staffing, tuition, payroll, cash flow, licensing, technology, marketing, regulatory compliance, facility maintenance, and more – with little, if any, administrative support.
What if they didn’t have to do it all alone?
What if every early childhood educator had an administrative team behind them?
Enter the Missouri ECE Shared Services Planning Project – a statewide, grassroots effort to strengthen the financial and business administration side of early childhood education (ECE) through shared “back office” support.
The purpose is to help childcare providers save scarce time and money so they can sustain and grow their businesses. Back-office support also frees up providers to focus on offering the very best early childhood education and care possible. Examples from across the country show that such an approach can stabilize and grow the childcare sector.
New Growth is a community development corporation working in its rural west central Missouri region, and with partners across the state, to address childcare challenges. With support from Missouri’s Upward Momentum Fund, New Growth will assist childcare providers and stakeholders in designing a Shared Services Alliance that works for them.
A Shared Services Alliance is a structure that allows multiple childcare providers to access time- and cost-saving support that is difficult for individual providers to find and afford on their own.
Back-office shared business services that the project will explore include:
- Financial management
- Enrollment support
- Staffing support
- Human resources management
- Food program management
- Bulk purchasing
- Technology
- Fundraising
- Legal services
- Marketing
Read New Growth’s 2024 report to learn more about shared services: Solving Missouri’s Childcare Puzzle.
How to Get Involved
Most important is learning from childcare providers and stakeholders about what is of most interest and most needed. The project’s Design Team leadership includes providers and organizations that work with providers.
Add your thoughts and follow the process by signing up at this Interest Form.
The Missouri ECE Shared Services Planning Project will also take stock of existing business support programs to ensure that any shared services effort complements rather than duplicates.
The planning project will result in a blueprint for shared services action in Missouri. It runs from September, 2026, through August, 2027.