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The following letter was sent to the Minister of Education offering assistance on implementing full-day learning for a stronger system of early learning and child care.

July 13, 2009

Honourable Kathleen Wynne
Minister of Education
Mowat Block, 22nd Floor
900 Bay Street
Toronto, ON, M7A 1L2

Dear Minister Wynne,

The Ontario Coalition for Better Child Care is Ontario’s advocacy group for high quality, affordable, not-for-profit early learning and child care.

We actively participated in the Early Learning Advisors consultation on full day learning. We worked with members across the Province and held a major forum in conjunction with partner organizations that was attended by over 300 participants.

With a mandate to provide more affordable options for parents for quality, not-for-profit early learning and child care program, we are very excited about the report “With Our Best Future in Mind”. We look forward to working with you, your staff, and other Ministries to fully implement the report.

Change can be difficult, but we are committed to working to find solutions so that parents, children have greater access to affordable programs and our early learning and child care sector remains viable and becomes stronger.

One of the most common questions from early learning and child care providers was the status of child care centres in schools. As you know, many are purpose-built centres for children from infants to four years old. We were very pleased to see the Early Learning Advisors report said it was “essential” to protect the space currently used by Parent and Family Literacy Centres, Child Care Centres or other family programs. We want to preserve the stability of all existing programs in order to create the Best Start Child and Family Centres.

As you consider implementation committees, we would encourage you to think broadly about the various constituencies that are affected by such wide ranging change.

Throughout the summer, we are providing information bulletins to our members and canvassing them for questions, comments and concerns. We look forward to participating in the implementation process to ensure those questions and concerns are part of the consideration as we build a stronger system of early learning and child care in Ontario.

Sincerely,

Andrea Calver
Coordinator