CARSON CITY, Nev. – The Office of Early Learning and Development within the Nevada Department of Education has been awarded nearly $600,000 through a federal preschool development birth through age five grant.

The one-year grant will help Nevada develop plans to collaborate and coordinate its existing early childhood care and education programs within a statewide mixed-delivery system to prepare low-income and disadvantaged infants, toddlers, and young children to enter kindergarten. The funding will allow Nevada to conduct a comprehensive statewide birth through age five needs assessment, followed by in-depth strategic planning, while both enhancing parental choice and knowledge of programs and improving transitions between early childhood and school systems.

“This grant will allow us to better align, coordinate, and advocate for greatly improved practices and services for Nevada’s vulnerable and underserved children and families,” said Steve Canavero, Ph.D., Superintendent of Public Instruction. “After completion of the needs assessment and strategic planning process, we will maximize parental choice and knowledge by developing an integrated data system and consumer website that will both gather data from providers, partners, and programs and organize and deliver data online in order to expand parental choice and knowledge of existing programs. We will develop a communication plan and tools to better inform communities about the status, availability, and access to high-quality early childhood services and supports.”

The grant will allow the Department of Education to share best practices by greatly improving the alignment of birth through age five learning and development standards, program quality standards, and professional workforce standards. It will allow the department to explore financing options to greatly improve and sustain funding to support the infrastructure necessary for high-quality early childhood providers, practices, and services such as increased educational requirements and wages reflective of the skills and abilities necessary to implement higher standards.