Services for Providers

All services provided by the Child Care Inclusion Challenge Project (CCICP) are free of charge and confidential. CCICP provides services to providers, including:

• Ongoing technical assistance and support;
• Support in maintaining a positive match between providers and families;
• Information on other community resources that may be helpful to both providers and families;
• Opportunity to work one-on-one with a Child Development Specialist and to undergo an individualized needs assessments;
• Opportunity to receive training on the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), definitions of inclusion, family and provider experiences with inclusion, and other related topics.

Child Development Specialists

If a child is already in child care but the family would like the provider to receive some additional support, Child Development Specialists from the Children's Council and Wu Yee Children's Services are available through the Inclusion Project to work with providers.

Child Development Specialists all have masters degrees in child development or a related area, and are available to make site visits to child care centers, family child care homes, and license-exempt providers' homes. They work with both the family and the child care provider to gain information about what services the child is currently receiving, what the child's strengths are, and in what areas it would be helpful to assist the child.

Child Development Specialists are available to make informal assessments of the child in the child care setting and to provide feedback to the provider about how the environment and curriculum could be modified to create a fully inclusive child care setting. They are also available to support communication between the parent and the provider.

Training

The Child Care Inclusion Challenge Project (CCICP) provides trainings to staff at a variety of child care centers on topics specific to the population of children they serve. We also encourage providers to request training they would like to receive.

In addition, the project aims to ensure that family child care providers have an opportunity to receive group trainings. CCICP offers a one-unit community college class on caring for children with special needs, and we collaborate with SF CARES to offer trainings to interested family- and center-based child care providers throughout the year on topics such as

• the Americans with Disabilities Act,
• the changed world view of parents with children with special needs and available resources for their children,
• managing challenging behaviors, and
• inclusive child care curricula (adapting activities).

Training sessions are translated into Spanish and Cantonese.

Other Supportive Services

Through Support for Families of Children with Disabilities (SFCD), Inclusion Project providers are given opportunities to:

• attend trainings
• obtain information and resources