Introduction:

This polling analysis summarizes the findings from more than three dozen polls and focus group projects conducted over the past five years by a wide variety of survey research organizations on child care, early care and education and early learning issues. The purpose of this polling review is to pinpoint public attitudes towards these issues. For purposes of comparison and to track public attitudes over time an additional two-dozen polls and focus groups conducted on child care issues between 1988 and 1992 were also studied for this report.

The report found a rich database of survey research and information. State-based polls commissioned mainly by child advocacy groups in California, Colorado, Florida, Massachusetts, Michigan, Missouri, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Washington State were reviewed. Generally, there were few differences between the results among the states.

In addition, this study reviewed a number of foundation-sponsored polls. Polling funded by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, the Henry J. Kaiser Foundation, W.K. Kellogg Foundation, the C.S. Mott Foundation, the Pew Charitable Trusts, and the Rose Community Trust were helpful.

Numerous national organizations have done polling on child care, including the AFL-CIO, the American Association for University Women, Child Care Action Campaign, the Children's Defense Fund, Fight Crime: Invest in Kids, the I Am Your Child Foundation, Lifetime Television, the National Partnership for Women and Families, and Zero To Three.

Most prominent national polling organizations have conducted child care polls, including EDK Associates, the Gallup Organization, the Harris Organization, Peter Hart, KRC Research, Celinda Lake, Market Strategies, Opinion Research Corporation International, Penn and Schoen, the Terrence Group, and Yankelovich.

Finally, many major news organizations have done survey research on child care issues, including ABC News, Associated Press Cable News Network, CBS, Fox News, the Los Angeles Times, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post.

Child Care - General Support High, But Not a Priority:

For more than a decade a series of polls have consistently found two things regarding child care:

• As a stand alone issue, support for providing more resources, especially government resources, for child care is high (ABC News, 1988, Lake, Snell, Perry, 1998; CBS News, 2001) and is bipartisan; but
  
• Over time, when listed against other national priorities, child care barely registers above 2-3 percent as a top issue for most Americans (NBC News, 1993; The New York Times, 2001). Consistently, now and a decade ago, other domestic policy issues like education reform, health care and Social Security were the top tier issues in the minds of most Americans.

And, even when matched against other pressing family issues, child care is not a top-level issue of concern (Market Strategies, 2000). For example, other family issues such as: increasing K-12 funding, juvenile crime, child health and family leave, are a higher public priority than child care in terms of expanded government assistance to meet these problems.

A Tale of Two Views:

There are two competing, and virtually equal, public attitudes toward child care. First, a view held by 38-42 percent of the population is that child care is a function best left to parents and the family. Focus group research on this view finds that "values" are an important consideration with this plurality. This group believes that government, or any other non-family organization, has no role in providing child care assistance. This plurality believes that it is a parental responsibility for families to provide child care support to their children. As one analysis put it for this group "discussion of child care almost immediately turns to the value of parents (especially mothers) staying at home with pre-school-aged children rather than working" (Peter Hart, 2001). While recognizing that workforce demands require many parents to utilize child care (about two-thirds of all mothers with preschool children are now in the workforce as opposed to one-third of mothers twenty five years ago), values often trump these concerns in their minds.

A slightly larger plurality of 44-48 percent of Americans supports government and non-government child care assistance for working families. They cite child care as a primary workforce support for parents. Further, they see the links that quality child care has to early learning and school readiness (see below). "The fact that these Americans want parents to take responsibility for their children does not preclude support for child care," said one analyst (EDK Associates, 1999).

There are also possible racial and ethnic differences:

-African-Americans overwhelmingly support child care assistance in numerous polls;

- Hispanics appear to support child care assistance in Florida polls but not in California focus groups;

- In California focus groups, Asians appear to be leery of child care assistance outside of the family.

These differences in support can also be traced to "values." Some Hispanics and Asians are wary of child care assistance because they see parents as the sole and primary caregiver in their families.

As the polling summary below suggests, in a whole host of stand-alone circumstances, child care and child care assistance is supported by a large majority of the American people. But, the hard held "values" of a substantial plurality of Americans makes the public dialogue concerning quality, accessible, affordable child care difficult to initiate.

Ties to Education:

A social marketer conducting work for a prominent state-based child advocacy organization said after reviewing the polling data cited in this report "there is no large constituency for child care, but there is a constituency for education." Numerous polls and focus groups conducted in the past several years pinpoint links to early education as a key way in which large portions of the population can view child care more favorably.

Furthermore, the focus group work on these issues (Market Strategies, 2000) has discovered that the public has become aware of the various studies regarding early brain development and the links to early learning. While the public cannot detail the exact findings of reports like the Carnegie Corporation's "Starting Point's" research, they accept the report's findings. This means that the public, as opposed to polling a decade ago, believes that learning begins much earlier than previously understood. Therefore, many people now understand the importance of an early educational setting within child care.

The polling suggests that when child care is posed as a key component of school readiness that the issue gains additional public support. So, using terms like early care and education, early learning, pre-K, preschool and prekindergarten instead of the term "child care" can be an effective way in which the public can begin to broaden their view of this vital service. In these same studies, pollsters also caution that child care should be seen as complementing, not supplanting traditional K-12 education. Because, when forced to choose between funding for child care and K-12 traditional public education K-12 funding is overwhelmingly supported.

Also, focus groups (Market Strategies, 2000) suggest that the public has a generalized view that early learning in child care settings should not just encompass "the ABCs and reading and writing" skills. The public thinks that school readiness also includes the development of social skills that will enable every child to be ready to learn as they enter school.

Relationship to The Workforce:

In reviewing polling data from a decade ago (CBS News, 1992) and the most recent opinion survey results (W.K. Kellogg, 1999) the positive relationship between child care and workforce development remains one of the top reasons why the issue has resonance with some portions of the population. The data reveals support on two levels.

First, there is widespread generic support for government assistance in child care that is focused on low-income (Eagleton Institute, 2000; Pew, 1998) and welfare-to-work families (Associated Press, 1997; Los Angeles Times, 1999). Indeed, child care is seen as a necessary component of welfare reform by a majority of Americans (CNN, 1997; KRC Research, 1999). And, polling shows that the public, seeing what they perceive as the success of welfare reform that includes a strong child care component, believes that these same government benefits should be extended to low-income and working poor families with earnings only slightly above former welfare recipients (W.K. Kellogg, 1999).

Second, focus groups (W.K. Kellogg, 1999) and polls (Child Care Action, 1998) have consistently shown that the public understands the need to primarily target child care resources at welfare-to-work families and low-income populations. But, the public believes that these same benefits should also eventually be extended to working, middle-class families as well.

The public also sees a tie to worker productivity if employers or government provide good child care arrangements for employees (Harris, 1998).

Parents/Parent Education:

Especially in focus groups (Peter Hart, 2001), those supporting extended child care assistance to working families also believe that many young parents do not have the proper training to be responsible parents. Young parents say the same thing in polls. First-time parents say they are "stressed and worn out" and "afraid of doing something wrong" (Zero to Three, 1997).

Therefore, the public supports efforts to provide parent education classes and training through child care centers, faith-based organizations and public schools. The public is also frustrated that parents often do not know where to turn when seeking these services. People believe "one easy way to reach parents in need, without creating a massive new bureaucracy, would be to work thought the existing early-childhood infrastructure to communicate how to care for children, create a positive emotional environment and teach children properly," said a pollster (Peter Hart, 2001).

And, when talking about expanded child care assistance, supporters consistently say that the "role of parents" has to be taken into consideration in designing any new system. What they mean is that child care should be seen as assisting the role of parents, not supplanting the primary role of parents in raising their children.

Also, in order to encourage parents to stay-at-home to raise their children, Americans support additional tax breaks for stay at home parents (Yankelovich, 2001). Finally, a majority also supports strengthening the family and medical leave law to permit six months of paid parental leave (Yankelovich, 2001).

Messengers:

A number of polls and surveys (Market Strategies, 2000) have attempted to pinpoint groups of spokespersons and messengers that the public believes are credible when talking about child care issues. Therefore, among the most effective child care messengers, in a general sense, are:

• Parents and providers
• Teachers, especially kindergarten teachers
• Researches and academics that are experts in child care issues
• Family doctors
• Nurses
• Faith-based organizations
• Law enforcement officials
  

Some studies revealed business leaders as effective spokespersons - especially when talking to public officials who generally respect their opinion.

The Role of Government:

Polling and focus groups (KRC Research, 1999) show that a near majority of Americans support an expanded role for government in providing additional child care supports. But, there is no public support for child care programs run by the government. "The learning experiences of very young children are none of the state's business and should be left to families," said 40 percent of respondents in one survey (Civitas, 2000). Or as one expert said, "parents, not government, raise children." (EDK Associates, 1999).

Rather, the public envisions that the government should assist those with child care challenges. This means that the public supports the current range of formal, informal and neighborhood child care and expects government to help the current system in place. In some localities (but not all) the public also supports a role for public schools in providing child care if a local initiative is part of a school readiness program.

Also, the public has a lot of faith in programs that are described as community and neighborhood controlled and administered (Washington Post, 2000). Similarly, the public has little faith in child care programs that are seen as state-run and operated. The Head Start program, which has a wide support and is federally-run, is a good example. It is perceived as controlled by the communities. Therefore, Head Start has wide acceptance.

"Voter confidence in the ability of elected representatives and government to deal with the problems facing families is approaching an all-time low watermark... voters believe government solutions to strengthening the family should be closely identified with the community targeted for service," says pollster Vince Breglio.

Quality Care:

Over the past decade, a number of surveys note that people support quality child care (Opinion Research Corporation International, 2000; NBC News, 1988). The public knows that high quality care can offer significant educational benefits. In addition, the public knows that parents struggle to find child care that is satisfactory (Parents Magazine, 1997). They know that most child care in this country is not adequate (Penn and Schoen, 1999). Therefore, the public supports child care standards and professional development programs that ensure quality care and provide child care teachers with the tools to obtain better training.

However, in focus groups Americans have a hard time explaining what "quality" care is (Peter Hart, 2001). Their vision of a quality care setting is blurred. Often, the public only cites "safety" as a concern when talking about child care quality. The best they can usually articulate is a well-trained provider and small class sizes. Other important elements like curriculum and provider interaction with children are less clear to the public as components of a quality setting.

Conversely, "bad" child care, in the public mind, generally results when quality is compromised. Here, the public sees unsafe conditions and children that are neglected.

When talking about child care quality, parents also mention two other priorities in the same conversation - access and affordability. They see all areas as interconnected.

Ages 0-3 and 4-5:

The public understands that the ages 0-3 are the most important age group for developing a child's capacity to learn (Market Strategies, 2000). But focus groups (Peter Hart, 2002; EDK Associates, 1999) have also pointed out that there appears to be a dichotomy between public support for public assistance for child care targeted to ages 0-3 and child care focused on children ages 4-5.

In the first category, the public expects that parents will have the primary care giving role. For children ages 4-5, the public is much more comfortable providing government assistance to parents so that they can place their children in child care.

Child Care Financing:

Various polls and focus groups have tested what methods of child care financing and assistance the public would support. Generally, the public supports increased revenues for child care from:

• So-called "sin taxes" like tobacco or alcohol
• Portions of funds raised by state lottery systems, and
• Higher taxes

The public also supports tax credits paid to working parents who have children in child care (Yankelovich, 1998) and additional credits to employers who make child care available to their employees (Gallup, 1998). The public's view of "vouchers" is mixed. Some view vouchers positively while others see vouchers in the context of the larger education reform debate and oppose the concept.

Implications for Effective Communications on Child Care:

The polling and focus group work cited above, give a general road map for ways in which to describe child care, make a case for more resources and point out challenges like child-care quality issues.

In describing child care, it is important not to leave the parent out of the equation. Terms like "assisting the parent(s)" and "strengthening working families" are effective. Also, talking about the value and role of parent education in the context of effective child rearing can be important.

There is no doubt that links to early education and ties to workforce development are the two most critical elements in an effective communications campaign on child-care issues. So, drawing the connection (if appropriate) between child-care and school readiness is important. Similarly, child-care should be positioned as helping "working parents." For low-income families, the ties to effective welfare reform should be stressed. But, there must also be "something in it" for middle-class families also, even if the benefits are longer term.

Finally, it is also important to broaden the spokesperson circle. Early education professionals, family doctors and nurses, faith-based organizations and even law enforcement personnel should be approached to be supporters of child-care and spokespersons for better care.