Senate Bill 21-236 designated the, then Office of Early Childhood, now Colorado Department of Early Childhood to create the Early Care and Education Recruitment and Retention Grant and Scholarship Program to award grants to licensed early child care programs and nonprofit entities or institutions of higher education that administer scholarship programs to improve teacher recruitment and retention. Grants may be used to cover: tuition, fees, and materials for early childhood courses that lead to a degree or credential; costs for an educator to earn a coaching or mentorship certification; paid release time or substitute costs for an educator to pursue training; costs for providers, institutions, and early childhood councils to create a grow-your-own program; financial incentives for current or potential educators to pursue training; and payments for apprenticeships for work-based learning opportunities. Senate Bill 22-213 provided additional information to extend the timeline of several Recruitment and Retention Grant and Scholarship Programs.
T.E.A.C.H. (Teacher Education And Compensation Helps) Early Childhood® is a comprehensive national strategy helping address the need for a well-qualified, fairly compensated and stable workforce. T.E.A.C.H. is unlike any other scholarship opportunity. The ECE workforce is largely female, receives poverty-level wages and lacks the employment benefits afforded to most professions. Early educators need and may be required to attain college credits and degrees. However, early educators are challenged in their pursuit of higher education by the obstacles of money, time, location, dependent care needs, lack of incentives and systemic barriers. The T.E.A.C.H. Early Childhood® model allows states to address the issues of under-education, poor compensation and high turnover in the ECE workforce.
