News

June 10, 2026

Trying Together, Educators Advocate in Harrisburg for Early Childhood Education Investments in State Budget

Trying Together traveled with 40 early childhood education teachers and administrators as well as caregivers of young children to Harrisburg on Tuesday, June 9 to meet with policymakers and advocate for investments in the early care and education workforce in the 2026-27 budget.

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The teachers, administrators, and parents represented five counties – Allegheny, Westmoreland, Fayette, Washington, and Beaver – and were members of Trying Together’s advocacy fellowship program. They met with their state representatives and senators to tell their early childhood education stories.

“Early care and education is a critical issue for families and economic development in every community – rural, suburban, and urban alike,” said Emily Neff, Trying Together’s director of public policy. “The fact that nearly 40 early childhood educators from five counties traveled to Harrisburg and back in a single day demonstrates the urgency of this issue.”

Neff said the group met with policymakers from both parties and both chambers – a total of 19 state representatives and 10 senators – to advocate for increased investments in child care, pre-k, and early intervention in the state budget.

“There is no way around it: continued public investment in early care and education is essential,” Neff said.

Meetings with Policymakers

The group discussed with policymakers the importance of including proposed investments in the early care and education workforce in the 2026-27 state budget, including:

A $10 million increase for the Child Care Staff Recruitment and Retention Program
A $2 million increase for the Head Start Supplemental Assistance Program
A $7.5 million increase for Pre-K Counts

Participants in the day of advocacy said it was a positive experience. Anna Dolter, a Pittsburgh Public Schools pre-k teacher, said the trip was her first time to Harrisburg. She met with state Reps. Dan Frankel (D-23rd) and Lindsay Powell (D-21st) and state Sen. Jay Costa (D-43rd).

“My message to them was the importance of early education and keeping it accessible and equitable to all families in our city and state,” she said. “It was good to meet with representatives, so we can take information back to our colleagues in terms of what we can do to advocate to get early education in the budget.”

Wes Garis, the senior director of professional and child development at Braddock’s Heritage Community Initiatives, said his job involves supporting educators and providing classroom support.

“I’ve tried to bolster recruitment and retention, but we need to have teachers long enough to grow them and keep them in the field,” he said.

He said although some of the policymakers he met with on Tuesday were already on board with proposed investments, he thought it was important to provide them with context.

“It was good that we did it as a group,” he said. “We had our stories bounce off each other – it shows the connection and makes the stories and data come to life.”

Dayna Jones, the owner and CEO of Highland Park’s Simply Kidz Zone Early Learning Center, said that the trip to Harrisburg was a great opportunity to advocate for investments to the field.

“I wanted to advocate that we struggle with financially supporting our staff to be able to embrace high-quality child care,” she said. “We want to pay staff what they deserve and allow parents to be able to afford child care and be able to work. We want to send a message that (early childhood educators) are essential. I don’t think child care is taken seriously enough.”

The group met with state Reps. Dan Frankel (D-23rd), Lindsay Powell (D-21st), Eric Nelson (R-57th), Daniel Deasy (D-27th), Arvind Venkat (D-30th), Timothy J. O’Neal (R-48th), Joshua Kail (R-15th), Jim Rigby (R-71st), Jessica Benham (D-36th), Aerion Abney (D-19th), Andrew Kuzma (R-39th), Emily Kinkead (D-20th), Bud Cook (R-49th), Natalie Mihalek (R-40th), Eric Davanzo (R-58th), and Anita Kulik (D-50th), La’Tasha Mayes (D-24th), Mandy Steele (D-33rd), and John Inglis III (D-38th), and state Sens. Jay Costa (D-43rd), Kim Ward (R-39th), Joe Pittman (R-41st), Camera Bartolotta (R-46th), Wayne Fontana (D-42nd), Elder Vogel (R-47th), Patrick Stefano (R-32nd), Lindsey Williams (D-38th), Wayne Langerholc (R-35th), and Devlin Robinson (R-37th).

News

February 14, 2022

Request for Applications: 2022-23 PA Head Start Supplemental Assistance Program

The Office of Child Development and Early Learning (OCDEL) will use a competitive Head Start Supplemental Assistance Program (HSSAP) Request for Application (RFA) process for fiscal year 2022-23.

The intent of HSSAP is to increase the number of low-income, Head Start-eligible children receiving high quality pre-kindergarten services in Pennsylvania. Governor Wolf’s proposed 2022-23 state budget expands HSSAP by $10 million. With this expansion funding, the state will be able to increase the number of children served in high-quality pre-kindergarten.

About

HSSAP funding is awarded competitively on a five-year grant cycle. Fiscal year 2022-23 begins a new five-year cycle. All current HSSAP grantees, as well as any new, eligible applicants must apply during this competitive RFA process.

This RFA is intended to support providers in preparing to serve and enroll children by September 2022. The RFA is being released February 2022 to give providers time to conduct outreach to families; recruit, hire and train staff; and plan for implementing the program, pending grant approval. Applicants may submit funding proposals aligned with the program models outlined in the Head Start Program Performance Standards 1302 Part B.

The ceiling or limit on the potential number of slots that may be awarded to any applicant will depend upon a county’s unmet need percentages and the amount of funding available. Funding is contingent upon approval by the Pennsylvania General Assembly.

HSSAP grants are funded via state dollars and, therefore, carryover funds are not permitted. All grant dollars identified in this FY 2021-22 application must be encumbered or spent by June 30, 2022.

Eligibility

Eligible entities include:

Head Start grantees; and
Early Head Start grantees.
Successful applicants MUST demonstrate:
Current federal funding for Head Start or Early Head Start as a grantee or delegate; and
No uncorrected deficiencies from the most current federal Monitoring Review.

Applicants must also have the following in place to complete an application:

REQUIRED Letter of Intent (information below);
Vendor number (SAP #);
Administrative unit number (AUN);
Master provider index number (MPI); and
Federal ID number or tax ID number.

How to Apply

All information relevant to the application process is available in the HSSAP Application Guidance. HSSAP applicants must submit a Letter of Intent (LOI) using the template posted online. The LOI represents the applicant’s intent to apply for HSSAP funding and includes preliminary information about requested funding, program model, provider type, and area to be served. Information submitted in the LOI may be modified in the final eGrants application.

Eligible applicants who apply for HSSAP funding must provide assurance that they operate in full compliance with the federal Head Start Performance Standards as reported on their Integrated Monitoring Report. They also must assure they will provide updates to OCDEL and the Head Start Collaboration Office director when changes in their compliance occur. Failure to report changes may jeopardize current or future grant funding.

Programs interested in applying must submit a fully completed LOI by 3 p.m. on February 25, 2022 to RA-PAPreKCounts@pa.gov. Programs that do not submit the LOI will not be able to access or submit a funding application in the eGrants system. Late submissions will not be accepted. Agencies submitting a fully complete LOI by the due date will be notified when the HSSAP application is open in eGrants.

More Information

A pre-application webinar will be held virtually on February 23, 2022 from 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. To register for the webinar, visit the HSSAP Virtual Bidders Conference registration page. The recording will be posted at HSSAP How to Apply shortly after to assist interested applicants in the completion of the application. The Bidder’s Conference will include information on the application process and program requirements and participation is highly encouraged.

In addition to the Bidder’s Conference, applicants are encouraged to view the asynchronous Grant Writing 101 course found in the Professional Development (PD) Registry. This course provides general tips on how to approach grant writing. A PD Registry login is required to access this course.

For questions, contact PDE by sending an email to RA-PAPreKCounts@pa.gov.