Birth to Five Illinois Working to Improve Access to Early Childhood Education

January 27, 2026

Original coverage in WQAD by Nora Reichardt and Haley Bickelhaupt.

The group offers a toolkit to help educate businesses and offer resources to reduce the strain that child care places on working parents.

An Illinois nonprofit is reimagining early childhood education in the Quad Cities and across the state.

In 2019, Gov. J.B. Pritzker established an early childhood funding commission, charged with studying and making recommendations to provide more equitable access to education. In 2021, the state helped launch Birth to Five Illinois. The group hopes to "ensure all families in Illinois regardless of race, ethnicity, home language, ability, and social circumstance have the services needed to prepare their children for school," according to their website.

Rock Island is Region 49 for the group's efforts. In our region, an "action council" of community leaders and a "family council" of parents with children younger than eight years old provide their feedback on what's working for their kids in the community.

"We have three main goals that we're working on," Regional Council Manager Emily Cummings said. "We want to optimize the workforce. We want those early childhood educators to be as prepared as they can't handle all the things that life and childhood throws at them. We also want to try to enhance collaboration and care. How can we get into our communities and make a bigger difference for children and families? Our third one is we want to enhance mental and behavioral health."

According to Birth to Five Illinois, one in five Illinois parents has had to take time off work due to issues with child care. That's where the group's Child Care Toolkit comes in. They're hoping to work with businesses to ease the burden placed on working parents.

"The toolkit is really designated towards businesses so that they can understand and provide resources to the community and resources to their employees," Cummings said.

You can review Birth to Five Illinois' reports on Rock Island here.