School Readiness Tax Credits Offer Louisiana Businesses an Opportunity to Invest in our Future

In 2007, Louisiana's Legislature approved a unique package of tax credits to support Quality Start, Louisiana's quality rating system for child care. In addition to tax credits for parents, child care teachers, and center owners, there are special credits for businesses that support child care.

One key credit allows businesses to make a contribution to the Child Care Resource and Referral (CCR&R) agency in their region and get a 100%, dollar for dollar, refundable tax credit up to $5,000 on their Louisiana income taxes. Agenda for Children's Child Care Resources program serves as the CCR&R for the New Orleans, Northshore and Houma regions. For more information about the credit, please visit the Quality Start web site and the Louisiana Department of Revenue's web site. If your business would like to learn more, please call us at (504) 586-8509.

January-March Positive Steps Training Calendars

Positive Steps, Agenda for Children's training program for child care providers, offers a wide variety of workshops designed to meet the needs of today's early childhood educators. This quarter, we're offering classes on Understanding Inclusion, Child Growth and Development, Making Toys and Games for Infants and Toddlers, and much more! As always, we offer special sessions designed especially for directors, new child care providers and family child care providers. Visit the Positive Steps page to learn more or click on the links below to access your region's catalog:

• Greater New Orleans (trainings in Jefferson, Orleans, Plaquemines and St. Bernard parishes)
• Northshore (trainings in Livingston, St. Helena, St. Tammany, Tangipahoa and Washington parishes)
• River Parishes (trainings in Ascension, Assumption, St. Charles, St. James, St. John, Lafourche and Terrebonne parishes)

Join Our Team: Agenda for Children Seeks Program Director for Learning Readiness Collaborative

The Project Director will guide the work of the Learning Readiness Workgroup Collaborative, which aims to identify and promote best practices within the early childhood sector in New Orleans.  The Project Director will research best practices for ensuring school readiness and seamless transitions from preschool to kindergarten classrooms, analyze the local early childhood sector, and produce a series of reports and policy recommendations based on his/her findings. Read the full job description for more information and instructions on how to apply.

2011 KIDS COUNT Data Book Reveals the Impact of the Recession on Louisiana's Children

The 2011 KIDS COUNT Data Book examines how children and families are faring in the wake of the recession. It ties together research findings on family economic success in 2010 and the critical role of investing in early childhood programs to allow the next generation to succeed. For the first time, the Data Book includes state-level data on children affected by foreclosure and children with at least one unemployed parent.

The Data Book, which is published by the Annie E. Casey Foundation, ranks each state based on ten key indicators of child well-being. Louisiana ranked 49th among states in overall child well-being. Since 2000, Louisiana has seen improvements in the child death rate, the teen birth rate, teens not in school and not high school graduates, and children living in poverty. Louisiana saw data worsen for several indicators, including low birthweight babies, infant mortality rate, the teen death rate, and children in single-parent families. Data for two other indicators were not directly comparable to 2000 data. More information is available in the national press release, the Louisiana fact sheet, and the Louisiana press release.

We also invite you to visit the online KIDS COUNT Data Center (http://datacenter.kidscount.org), which provides easy, online access to the latest child well-being data on hundreds of indicators by state, county, city, and school district. Visit the new mobile site being launched in conjunction with this year’s Data Book from your smartphone, such as the Droid, BlackBerry, or iPhone. For additional information or to request a Data Book, please contact Teresa Falgoust at (504) 586-8509.

Agenda for Children Releases 2010 KIDS COUNT Data Book on Louisiana's Children

The 2010 KIDS COUNT Data Book on Louisiana's Children, which was produced by Agenda for Children with the generous support of the Annie E. Casey Foundation, features profiles of child well-being in each of Louisiana's 64 parishes. Each parish profile includes data on demographics, maternal and child health, education, family economics, child welfare and juvenile justice.

Readers can use the Data Book's parish profiles to see how well their parish's children are doing on a host of different indicators, ranging from low birthweight babies to high school graduation rates. Download the report or contact Teresa Falgoust at (504) 586-8509 to order a hard copy of the book.