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IRVING HARRIS FOUNDATION
191 North Wacker Drive, Suite 1500
Chicago, Illinois 60606
PHYLLIS GLINK
Executive Director

DIRECT 312-621-0564
FAX
312-621-9179

November 23, 2010

ACF Reports Clearance Officer
Administration for Children and Families
Office of Administration/Office of Information Services
370 L’Enfant Promenade, SW
Washington, DC 20447
Re: Comment by the Irving Harris Foundation on the Draft for Public Comment

Dear ACF Reports Officer,
On behalf of the Irving Harris Foundation, I am submitting some comments on the CCDBG State Plan
Draft. We are delighted that the Office of Child Care at the U.S. Department of Health and Human
Services has taken such a comprehensive approach to understanding how states plan and work on
developing an integrated child care and development system that promotes evidence-based
practices that support all areas of child development, promote school success and support families.
As a fifteen year veteran of Illinois’ Child Care Advisory Committee, I am aware of how challenging it
is to create a high quality system that meets the complex needs of families yet focuses on ensuring
our children, from birth, are receiving the quality care they need to be successful in school and in life.
I applaud the State Plan’s emphasis on pushing states to consider how their child care system
supports and encourages continuous quality improvement since we know that young children,
starting at birth, must have high quality early learning experiences. This is particularly true for babies
and toddlers who have the least access to high quality care environments at a time when research
indicates that those supports are essential for developing the social, emotional, behavioral, cognitive
and physical development skills necessary for children to enter school ready to learn. I hope that the
State Plan guide will give equal weight to the needs of this important population.
It is important that the State Plan encourages states to focus on developing the key components of a
high quality, evidence-based child care system: health and safety requirements, early learning
guidelines, developmentally-appropriate child assessments used to improve quality, quality
improvement systems for programs, professional development and workforce initiatives. It is our
hope that the State Plan will encourage states to consider how these important elements of their
child care system relate to each other and integrate into the larger early learning, education and
health systems developing in states.

Thank you for advancing this new and improved State Plan guide and for considering this letter in
your review.
Sincerely,

Phyllis Glink
Executive Director
pglink@whi.com
312-621-0564