Support Programs for Home-Based Child Care: A Global Study

Spring Impact’s new report, generously supported by Echidna Giving, profiles 11 support programs for home-based child care providers.

This report presents a conceptual model to share insights and recommendations for funders, policymakers, and other early childhood care and education stakeholders.

There is a high proportion of young children around the world in home-based child care (“HBCC”), particularly children under the age of three. The potential for HBCC to allow for greater women’s workforce participation, contribute to the economic empowerment of providers in the care sector, and promote effective child development has been largely ignored. A number of programs has emerged to support home-based providers, yet there is minimal documentation of key implementation successes and challenges.

Through a literature review, interviews, and detailed profiles of 11 support programs for HBCC, we have collected insights to help address this gap. Our report offers a conceptual model of support programs for HBCC and insights in each of the following areas:

- - The goals of the support programs
  - Common features
  - How these support programs are financed
  - How quality is defined and supported
  - Common challenges

11 Featured Programs

Our Recommendations

In order to realize the success of these support programs, scale their impact further, and strengthen the sector’s resilience to further crises, we make the following five major recommendations to funders, policymakers, and the early childhood care and education sector:

Donors and policymakers should increase financing for systems of support, and governments should provide more funding to HBCC providers

Policymakers should look to embed support programs for HBCC into the public sector to increase scale and sustainability

The early childhood care and education sector should establish a global learning community of existing support programs for HBCC

The early childhood care and education sector should convene a panel of experts to develop guidance that can address standards, competencies, and tools to define and measure quality for HBCC across a range of diverse settings

Further research should be undertaken to answer outstanding questions not resolved in this report

In all of these activities, we recommend keeping the voice and leadership of HBCC providers at the forefront, to continue implementing successful programs and policies that can meet the needs of both providers and families.

We hope that this report is seen as an initial step towards understanding and scaling the impact of these and similar support programs, and we invite you to join the conversation on how to bring quality child care to even more families worldwide.

Support Programs for Home-Based Child Care: A Global Study

11 Featured Programs

Our Recommendations

Donors and policymakers should increase financing for systems of support, and governments should provide more funding to HBCC providers

Policymakers should look to embed support programs for HBCC into the public sector to increase scale and sustainability

The early childhood care and education sector should establish a global learning community of existing support programs for HBCC

The early childhood care and education sector should convene a panel of experts to develop guidance that can address standards, competencies, and tools to define and measure quality for HBCC across a range of diverse settings

Further research should be undertaken to answer outstanding questions not resolved in this report

Executive Summary

Download the full report

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