Perspective | Supporting and expanding the early care and education workforce in western North Carolina
Early Care and Education (ECE) is a lifeline for families and young children across western North Carolina (WNC), providing enriching experiences for young learners, allowing parents to work, and keeping local businesses running. But the pervasive trends of dwindling licensed child care professionals and programs have high stakes for working families and the economy.
In North Carolina, a survey commissioned by the Chamber of Commerce last year finds child care availability challenges result in an estimated $5.65 billion annual loss to the economy. In response, local WNC leaders are developing promising solutions that can strengthen and expand the ECE workforce.
“Parents have to have quality, safe care in order to be able to be working and helping the local economy,” said Linda Carter, director of children’s services for regional nonprofit WNCSource, one of 16 ECE organizations participating in a grantee cohort launched in 2022 by Dogwood Health Trust. To date, Dogwood has invested more than $23 million into ECE as a strategic priority, with $12.6 million devoted specifically to developing solutions that strengthen the region’s “workforce behind the workforce;” expand access to quality child care programs; and improve working conditions within the industry.
For decades, WNCSource has served families in Henderson, Polk, Transylvania, and Rutherford counties through Early Head Start, Head Start, and NC Pre-K, caring for roughly 500 children per day as young as 6 weeks of age to 5-years old while enabling the parents and adults in those children’s lives to maintain steady employment. Providing such stability is a heavy lift, especially as child care professionals nationwide exit the profession.
According to a community assessment of WNCSource’s four-county service area, in June 2023, 119 licensed child care providers in the four counties were in operation with capacity to serve roughly 5,400 children. By March 2025, that number dropped to 83.
“Think about how losing 36 providers impacts local businesses and our economy — if parents don’t have care for their kids, they can’t go to work,” Carter remarked. “Thanks to Dogwood Health Trust, we’re bringing in new partners, finding new ways to build the pipeline of educators and incentivizing them to stay.”
Hiring for good
Growing staff numbers through their project funded by Dogwood was a vital priority for WNCSource, but so was an analysis of what it takes for professionals to do their best work. “We needed to make this a more attractive field for new people to join,” said Margit Nelson, procurement and operations manager at WNCSource, who noted that pay raises for WNCSource child care educators were one result of the analysis. A second focus was on wraparound support, providing educators with an extra set of hands so that they could focus on the quality of their work.
“We hired wraparound staff in classrooms from 2:30 until 5:30 each evening to ensure educators have dedicated planning time for lesson plans, daily reflections, and meetings with their teams,” said Nelson. “ECE teachers need and deserve the same professional considerations they would get in the public school system. That’s rare in this field. It’s been a huge commitment from WNCSource, and it really has made a huge impact.”
Since March of 2023, WNCSource has hired 23 wraparound staff, 15 of whom are still in these positions. Eight of these current employees have shifted into full-time roles. Recruiting more substitute staff was another win, providing educators with greater flexibility when unexpected personal or health needs arise, while also introducing newcomers to the profession.
WNCSource also deepened the bench through a financially incentivized employee referral program, with 20 out of 42 staff-referred candidates hired to date. For those not immediately qualified, a paid training program prepares them to transition into a teaching role upon completion of requirements. Assistance for tuition and supplies is available as well as support from teaching mentors and trainee coaches.
Prioritizing the recruitment of candidates from Head Start families was another WNCSource strategy, bringing in people already familiar with the Head Start model. Thirty parents are currently on the WNCSource payroll, Carter said. “That’s pretty unusual to have a program that not only is serving families but providing the opportunity for employment and a way out of poverty.”
Building the pipeline
To expand the next generation of child care professionals even further, WNCSource created a new, dedicated staff position with its support from Dogwood. It focuses on identifying strong prospects for the early care and childcare profession, recruiting talented and passionate individuals from all walks of life and at various stages of schooling. Education is another key strategy for recruitment. Through both high school and higher education, WNCSource continues not only to fill, but to build, the pipeline in collaboration with Henderson County Public Schools and Blue Ridge Community College.
One emerging initiative in Henderson County could bring a college course (EDU 119) to some high school classrooms. This course covers foundations of the education profession, diverse educational settings for young children, professional best practices, and how to plan developmentally appropriate programs. High school seniors will also have access to paid internships with WNCSource to put their learning into practice.
Growing collaborations with Blue Ridge Community College, Appalachian State University, and Western Carolina University are elevating the skills of existing staff and bringing apprenticeship programs and summer internships to life at WNCSource. “We help them achieve education and professional growth through either an early childhood certificate, a two-year degree, or a four-year degree,” Carter continued.
“There are a lot of different pipelines for building the workforce that would never have happened had we not had the dedicated focused attention, the staff time, the opportunity for building partnerships, and the collaborative work that has helped create these partnerships,” she said.
Looking ahead
Like many in the ECE field, Carter and her team are closely monitoring policy and funding developments on the federal level that could impact the success and sustainability of Head Start.
“Head Start is a wonderful influencer on early childhood education, making sure child care professionals earn a livable wage, and helping folks out of poverty. While we are doing this important work, we’re also educating decision-makers about the essential role Head Start plays in supporting kids, families, and employers here and in communities across America,” she said.
At the end of the day, the WNCSource team hopes that their discoveries in partnership with Dogwood will stabilize and revitalize the child care ecosystem in WNC and beyond. Since joining Dogwood’s ECE cohort in 2022, WNCSource’s dramatic strides in recruitment and retention have resulted in the hire of 161 new staff, with WNCSource classroom staff vacancies dropping from 44% to 11%, creating more capacity to support children and working families.
“What we’ve learned through this is that early childhood educators need to be treated as professionals, and they need to be compensated as professionals,” Carter emphasized. “It’s a different workforce today. We have to think outside the box about what we as employers can offer to help staff want to stay in this field. To be an employer of choice, you must always be working to be the best you can be.”
This article first appeared on EdNC and is republished here under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.
