December 3, 2025 Trying Together Surpasses Fundraising Goals for Give Big Pittsburgh Thanks to the generous support of donors, Trying Together exceeded its fundraising goal for Give Big Pittsburgh, a 24-hour online fundraising effort held on GivingTuesday that was hosted by Pittsburgh Magazine and presented by GBU Life. The organization’s goal for the day was $5,000, but ultimately raised $7,180. Learn More The donation form will remain open until the end of the year, but individuals who want to make a year-end donation can do so on Trying Together’s website. Cara Ciminillo, Trying Together’s executive director, said that donations made on GivingTuesday will help to further the organization’s mission of ensuring that every child has quality early care and education. “Thank you to those who donated through Give Big Pittsburgh on GivingTuesday,” she said. “Every gift, whether big or small, fuels this work. And every dollar moves our community closer to the care system children deserve. I’m incredibly fortunate to lead an organization filled with people who show up every day for children, families, and early educators across Southwestern Pennsylvania. We believe in a future where every child has access to affordable, high-quality care and education – and where the educators who make that possible are valued, supported, and fairly compensated.” Double Your Donation Donors can double their donation if their employer has a matching gift program. Once an individual makes a donation, they will be prompted to check for matching gift opportunities. They will be prompted to enter their employer’s name and the Double the Donation database will identify whether the employer has a matching gift program and determine if the donor was eligible. If eligible, the donor is guided through the process of submitting a matching gift request to their employer. How Donations Help Individuals who donate to Trying Together are helping to support a number of initiatives, including: Community-Based High School Child Development (CDA) Program Buzzword literacy initiative Rapid Response Team Developmentally Appropriate Parenting (DAP) Resources series Homewood Early Learning Hub & Family Center Diaper & Formula Banks Institute for Early Childhood Career Pathways Pediatric First Aid/CPR Facilitation and Instruction Home-Based Child Care Business Cohort To learn of other giving opportunities, visit Trying Together’s Give Now page.
November 20, 2025 PA Governor’s Advisory Commission on Women Hosts Discussion on Child Care Crisis The Pennsylvania Governor’s Advisory Commission on Women hosted a virtual discussion earlier this week between business and government leaders and child care advocates about the state’s child care crisis. Learn More The discussion – which took place on Monday – focused on the ongoing child care crisis, which has forced many parents to leave the workforce due to the lack of access to affordable child care. “Ensuring affordable, high-quality child care depends on bold, ongoing investment in the educators who power our commonwealth,” said Cara Ciminillo, Trying Together’s executive director. “Early educators are the workforce behind every thriving community. By continuing to invest in them, Pennsylvania can strengthen its economy, support families, and build a child care system that positions our state for long-term prosperity.” The topics focused on during the discussion – which included Trying Together and various other organizations – will inform the commission’s future recommendations to the Shapiro Administration. Gov. Josh Shapiro recently signed the state budget, which secured the following investments in child care: $25 million for a new Child Care Staff Retention and Recruitment Program, providing about $450 per employee annually to licensed Child Care Works providers A $7.5 million increase in Pre-K Counts rates, enabling providers to raise wages and stabilize the early educator workforce Continued support for the Employer Child Care Contribution Tax Credit, which encourages businesses to help employees cover child care costs, and the Child and Dependent Care Enhancement Tax Credit for working families A $10 million increase for Early Intervention to provide coaching support and services to families and children with developmental delays and disabilities “Child care and the early learning professionals who make this work possible play an important role in supporting child development and fueling our economy,” said Shante Brown, deputy secretary of the Office of Child Development and Early Learning (OCDEL). “Our child care workforce makes it possible for parents to go to work knowing their children are learning and growing in an enriching, caring environment.”
November 10, 2025 Trying Together Exec Director to Participate in Discussion on How Child Care Shapes PA Economy Trying Together Executive Director Cara Ciminillo will take part in an upcoming virtual discussion on how child care shapes Pennsylvania’s economy. Learn More The state Governor’s Advisory Commission on Women will host a virtual discussion on Monday, November 17 on child care’s role in Pennsylvania’s economy. The event will be a candid conversation featuring participants from business and economic development, state government, and child care advocacy. It will explore the workforce, policy, and cultural shifts needed to strengthen child care in Pennsylvania. The state is currently facing a child care crisis that affects every sector of its economy. Due to a shortage of 3,000 child care positions affecting care for more than 25,000 children, families are being forced to choose between cutting work hours or leaving the workforce entirely. Since nearly 70% of children have working parents and 95% of child care workers are women, the issue is deeply intertwined with women’s economic opportunity. The virtual discussion will focus on identifying the problem and shaping solutions that help families, employers, and the economy. Panelists include Ciminillo; Shante Brown, the deputy secretary of the state’s Office of Child Development and Early Learning (OCDEL); Alex Halper, senior vice president of government affairs for the PA Chamber of Business and Industry; and Kevin Schreiber, president and CEO of the York County Economic Alliance. Tracy Lawless – government affairs counselor for K&L Gates and chairwoman of the Women in the Workforce Subcommittee of the Governor’s Advisory Committee on Women – will be the moderator. Those interested in attending can RSVP online.
November 3, 2025 From Cradle to Career: How Child Care Shapes Pennsylvania’s Economy The state Governor’s Advisory Commission on Women will host a virtual discussion on Monday, November 17 on how child care helps to shape Pennsylvania’s economy. Learn More The event will be a candid conversation featuring participants from business and economic development, state government, and child care advocacy. It will explore the workforce, policy, and cultural shifts needed to strengthen child care in Pennsylvania. Panelists include Trying Together Executive Director Cara Ciminillo and Shante Brown, the deputy secretary of the state’s Office of Child Development and Early Learning (OCDEL), among others. The discussion will run from 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. Those interested can RSVP online.
October 28, 2025 Trying Together Exec Director Touts Importance of Early Childhood Education at Business Solves Conference Trying Together’s executive director discussed the importance of early childhood education during the U.S. Chamber of Commerce Foundation’s Business Solves conference on October 28. Learn More Cara Ciminillo, Trying Together’s executive director, joined Mark Bezilla, vice president and manager of corporate volunteerism at PNC Bank, and Brittany Scott, senior manager of policy and childhood education at the chamber, to discuss Trying Together’s partnership with the bank. During the partnership spotlight – titled Creating Systems-Level Change for Children – both Ciminillo and Bezilla discussed why early childhood education is critical to the workforce. “We see child care as a structure just as a bridge is to a city,” Ciminillo said. “In Pennsylvania, more than 75 chambers of commerce have endorsed child care as a top priority.” Ciminillo cited a study in Washington County that found that a shortage of more than 1,500 child care slots resulted in $5 million in lost productivity for the county’s workforce. She added that early childhood education is an “infrastructure for the economy” because it allows parents to remain in the workforce. Ciminillo and Bezillo discussed how Trying Together and PNC Bank have partnered on various initiatives, from financial management courses to helping to build early childhood education kits at Trying Together’s office. She also talked about the areas in which Trying Together works in the early childhood education field. “Our work spans two areas – direct support to the caregiving community and the developmental needs of children and family through professional development, coaching, behavioral health consultation, and child care navigation tools, and advocacy and system change by partnering with philanthropy, government and the business community to help bring about long-term policy solutions,” she said. “Child care is the workforce behind the workforce. It’s what helps us have a thriving economy.” To listen to the entire discussion, watch the 2025 Business Solves Conference Day 1.
October 15, 2025 Trying Together Exec Director to Take Part in Webinar on Child Care Crisis and Jobs Trying Together’s executive director will take part in an upcoming National Fund for Workforce Solutions webinar on job quality and the child care crisis. Learn More Cara Ciminillo, Trying Together’s executive director, will take part in a panel during the webinar, which will run from 2 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. on Thursday, November 6. The webinar will discuss how child care is prohibitively expensive for many parents of young children in the United States, often costing nearly as much as their rent or mortgage payments. This makes child care a workforce issue as companies struggle to keep parents who are otherwise in their prime working years on payroll. Meanwhile, for structural reasons it can be hard to ensure quality jobs for early childhood educators as companies in that industry face high costs and tight margins. The panel discussion will focus on how individuals are navigating the tangled challenges of child care and the workforce. Ciminillo will join Bonny Yeager, senior manager of industry solutions at Partner4Work, on the first panel. Then, attendees will hear from employers who are innovating in the child care space, including offering subsidized care for their employees, and organizing across municipalities and states to solve this challenging problem. Panelists include representatives from Boston Children’s HOspital, the University of Vermont’s Health Network, and the Massachusetts Business Coalition for Early Childhood Education. Those interested in attending can register online.
June 17, 2025 Trying Together Exec Director Featured on Women and Girls Foundation Podcast Trying Together’s executive director recently discussed the organization’s mission and the need for an increase in early childhood education workers’ wages on the Women and Girls Foundation podcast. Learn More The podcast, led by host Camila Rivera-Tinsley, frequently features guests who are “working toward a more equitable future” and tackles such topics as gender, racial, and environmental justice. In a recent episode, Tinsley discussed issues surrounding early child care – from parents seeking child care for their children so they can work to those employed in the field in need of higher wages – with Cara Ciminillo, Trying Together’s executive director. On the podcast, Ciminillo talks about how she got involved in early childhood education, April’s Month of the Young Child, the origin of Trying Together’s name, and the organization’s advocacy efforts during the state budget season. Ciminillo talked about how early childhood education is an overwhelmingly women-led field. “Probably about 96 percent of all early learning experiences and child care experiences are led by and provided by women,” she said. “It is a women-led field and has a high number of women of color who lead the work in this industry. They are brain builders.” Ciminillo said the success of many of the state’s industries is tied to whether communities provide adequate child care options. She added that the state’s early childhood education teacher shortage is caused by the industry’s low wages. “If you want to solve (the problems of) an industry’s workforce, you have to solve for the child care workforce,” she said. “It’s very much a challenge in terms of our collective economic mobility if we don’t solve the economics of child care and the wages they make.” To learn more, watch Ciminillo and Rivera-Tinsley discuss early childhood education on the Women and Girls Foundation podcast.
June 4, 2025 Trying Together Exec Director Discusses Your Career, Our Future on Yinz Are Good Podcast Trying Together’s executive director discussed the Your Career, Our Future campaign alongside the Early Excellence Project on Yinz are Good’s latest podcast. Learn More Cara Ciminillo, Trying Together’s executive director, joined Dr. DaVonna Shannon, director of research and impact for the Early Excellence Project, to discuss the initiative with Yinz are Good host Tressa Glover. The Early Excellence Project champions Black and Brown child care providers by fostering equality, equity, and accessibility in early childhood education. Ciminillo and Shannon discussed how the Your Career, Our Future campaign has collected stories from early educators and families in the Pittsburgh region with the intention that their shared experiences will inspire more people to answer the call to become early educators. Making Educators the Centerpiece The campaign centers around 15 educators and parents, who relay their positive experiences with the early childhood education field. Ciminillo cited several stories from the campaign. One educator entered the the profession at a young age and rose from being a classroom aide to an executive director. Another was a stay-at-home father who become a classroom educator due to his interest in understanding how his child was developing. “We’re always trying to center the educator,” Ciminillo said. “They are exemplars of people coming into the field. We ask how we can help others to see themselves in these stories to draw other people to the field. You need to help people see what opportunities exist, so making provider stories the centerpiece is important.” A Need for Investment Ciminillo and Shannon said the campaign aims to combat an ongoing early educator shortage that has resulted in repercussions for businesses, the economy, and local communities. “One of the pain points that we’ve heard frequently – it predated COVID and was exacerbated after COVID – is that child care programs are struggling with staffing,” Ciminillo said. “We are a field where wages are suppressed and the reason why is that families can’t pay more. Child care is expensive and it’s a regulated system; it’s based on a child-to-staff ratio. The public system has not invested enough to alleviate that problem.” Ciminillo said that this lack of investment in early childhood education has resulted in low wages for teachers and, in turn, teachers leaving the profession as well as challenges in recruiting and retaining them. “What happens is that providers subsidize (a lack of funding) with their own wages,” she said. “As a result, you’re not getting as much interest in going into the field as other fields that are higher income-generating.” Ciminillo noted that many early childhood educators were making just over $9 per hour prior to COVID-19, but are now earning an average $15. However, she said wages will need to continue to rise due to the profession’s often challenging nature. She said the job’s primary focus is “brain building.” Shannon added that part of the Your Career, Our Future campaign involves letting families know that early childhood education is not “babysitting.” “Children are developing in these early childhood programs, which are very high-quality,” she said. “The message to employers is: If you don’t know how to invest in early childhood education, you will lose staff. People won’t be able to work if they can’t afford child care.” To listen to the entire interview, “Episode 168: Trying Together & Early Excellence Project’s Your Career, Our Future Campaign,” visit the Yinz are Good podcast’s website.
April 16, 2025 Trying Together Honors Early Childhood Educators at Annual Celebration Dinner Nearly 800 early childhood educators and advocates joined Trying Together on April 10 for its Annual Celebration of Early Childhood Educators Dinner at Acrisure Stadium. The Westinghouse Academy marching band greeted attendees as they arrived at the event, which included a dinner, photo booth, raffle prizes, and networking. The formal presentation featured a video from Governor Josh Shapiro, who spoke about the importance of early childhood education in Pennsylvania and proposed investments for recruitment and retention. Honorees Trying Together Executive Director Cara Ciminillo paid tribute to the dinner’s two honorees – Riverview Children’s Center Executive Director Betty Lisowski and Dr. Aisha White, program director for the Positive Racial Identity Development in Early Education (P.R.I.D.E.) at the University of Pittsburgh’s Office of Child Development. “With more than 40 years’ experience, Betty has been the catalyst for sustained, high-quality early care and education and expansion at Riverview Children’s Center,” Ciminillo said of Lisowski. “Betty has positively impacted thousands of children, families, and colleagues through the high-quality care and education Riverview provides while also being a working mother of three.” Lisowski’s co-workers at Riverview paid homage to her work at the center in a video. Lisowski cited author and speaker Jim Collins’ quote that “great vision without great people is irrelevant” in describing those with whom she has worked in early childhood education. “I am truly blessed to have spent my entire 43-year career in this field,” she said. “It has been a journey I wouldn’t trade for anything. I’ve loved the work, but more importantly I’ve loved and cherished the people I’ve had the privilege to work with.” Ciminillo noted Dr. White’s work in helping children find pride in their racial identity as well as her decades-long engagement in the arts, social activism and work involving racial awareness. During a speech following her own tribute video, White noted that many children in America are struggling, citing Black infant mortality rates that are nearly two times higher than the national average for all races or ethnicities and the fact that 11 million U.S. children live in poverty and 400,000 in foster care. “While things are not good for children across the board, there’s an extra burden on children of color – and especially Black children – and that’s the burden of racism,” she said. “With respect to race, what we can do is pretty simple: Support children’s positive racial identity development in as many ways as we can, as often as we can, and as effectively as we can.” Ciminillo also recognized two regional educators – Lesely Crawford, executive director of the ABK Learning and Development Center, and Eva Wood, executive director of Ligonier Valley Learning Center in Latrobe – who were recent honorees at the PennAEYC Voice for Children Awards. Valuing Educators During a toast to all of the early childhood educators in attendance, Ciminillo said that a society that values its children must also value those who care for them. “Tonight, we gather during the Month of the Young Child not just to celebrate, but to honor you,” she said. “Your work is essential. It always has been. But more and more, the world is beginning to understand what you’ve long known – that care is not just an individual act of kindness, it is a public good.”
March 24, 2025 Trying Together Board of Directors Treasurer Raises $2.7K for PwC National Pi Day Fundraiser Price Waterhouse Cooper’s (PwC) Pittsburgh’s office recently held “Pi-a-Partner Day,” a National Pi Day-themed event to raise awareness for local nonprofits and provide donation opportunities. Dan Waltman, Principal for Wealth Management Tax Services at PwC, has been involved with Trying Together for four years and serves as treasurer for the board of directors. He chose to raise money to benefit Trying Together. “Having young twin boys with full-time working parents was what drew me to get involved with Trying Together,” Waltman said. “The positive impacts that child care providers have had on my children is undeniable.” Waltman offered an incentive to potential donors: if he reached his original goal of $2,500, he would be pied in the face. He surpassed that goal by raising $2,780. “Dan’s fundraiser on behalf of Trying Together is one of the more creative efforts I’ve seen – and I applaud his success!” said Cara Ciminillo. “On behalf of Trying Together, I thank him for his commitment to supporting the work of early childhood.” Those interested in donating to Waltman’s fundraising effort can still do so on PwC’s fundraising page. National Pi Day National Pi Day, which was celebrated March 14, is an annual celebration of the mathematical constant π. The day is celebrated on that particular day because 3, 1, and 4 are the first three significant features of pi, and March is the third month (the 1 and 4 are represented by the 14th day).
