Child Care Is Economic Infrastructure — Families Show Us Why

This post is part of the Forward With Families series.

Forward With Families is a multi-year strategy led by Ascend at the Aspen Institute to amplify ideas and initiatives that make life affordable, economic mobility possible, and security attainable for every family in America. This strategy drives policy and systems leaders at every level to act on proven and promising solutions to ensure resources go farthest for the children and families who need them most.

Across the country, parents are doing constant math to balance work schedules, child care availability, transportation, and costs, often all at once. For many families, the challenge isn’t a lack of effort or ambition. It’s navigating systems that weren’t designed to work together.

When child care is unreliable, unaffordable, or disconnected from education and workforce pathways, families are forced into impossible tradeoffs: between earning a paycheck and caring for their children, between completing school and staying afloat. Parents feel this strain most acutely, but its ripple effects reach entire communities and local economies.

When systems recognize and address these challenges, families tell a different story.

What Responsiveness Looks Like in Practice

Aligning policy and systems for expanded child care access

• In November 2025, New Mexico became the first state to offer no-cost universal child care regardless of income, an unprecedented policy achievement under Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham’s leadership. 
  
  That achievement was enabled by years of coordinated coalition-building across advocates, agencies, and Tribal communities, which first drove a fundamental governance shift: the creation of the Early Childhood Education and Care Department, led by Secretary Elizabeth Groginsky. With a dedicated early childhood agency in place, the state was able to align policy, funding, and implementation, reducing costs for families and expanding access to high-quality care statewide. 
  
  
• In Georgia, student parents are finding new pathways forward through the CAPS Student Parent 2Gen Pilot, led by Jill Taylor at the Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning (DECAL) and Cayanna Good at the Technical College System of Georgia. Nearly one in five college students nationwide is a parent, yet securing high-quality child care remains a primary barrier to enrollment and completion, especially for women, single parents, and low-income families.
  
  By simplifying access to child care subsidies and aligning benefits access and family-centered coaching with education and workforce goals, the pilot helps parents stay enrolled, complete credentials, and support their families simultaneously. Early implementation has underscored the importance of flexible, regional approaches and dedicated on-campus CAPS staff, reflecting the decentralized nature of campuses and enabling more responsive, in-person support across systems.
  

Lifting up the importance of the earliest years

• Under the leadership of Teresa Granillo, AVANCE’s Parent-Child Education Program (PCEP) treats child care as part of a whole-family, two-generation approach. Offered in Texas and California, parents and children learn together, reinforcing parents’ roles as their children’s first and most important teachers while strengthening long-term educational outcomes.
  
  From its earliest days, PCEP has been shaped by the families it serves: nearly half of current PCEP staff are program alumni, including long-serving leaders who began as parents in the program. That lived experience informs program design, governance, and evaluation, ensuring the model remains grounded in real family needs while supporting economic mobility through long-term career pathways.
  
  Since COVID, AVANCE has also refined a virtual PCEP model that expands access for families facing transportation, distance, or scheduling barriers while maintaining strong outcomes. Multiple rigorous studies, including a recent randomized controlled trial, demonstrate PCEP’s lasting, statistically significant impact on parenting confidence, family well-being, and children’s language and literacy development.
  

Why This Matters Now

Alignment changes everything.

Across states and communities, interacting systems are intentionally aligning to expand access to child care, restoring time, stability, and choice for families.

These models show that child care works best when it is treated as essential infrastructure that supports family well-being, educational progress, and economic mobility simultaneously.

Moving Forward With Families

Families can’t afford to wait for fragmented systems to catch up. What’s already working across states and communities points to a clear path forward: align policy, practice, and investment around how families actually live.

Forward With Families elevates these proven and promising approaches and helps move them from practice to policy — so families don’t have to navigate disconnected systems alone.

How are you moving families forward? We invite you to share your work to help map the momentum and spark new opportunities for connection, collaboration, and support. Tell us how you’ll take action here.