>> Illinois's youngest residents as well as their parents and caregivers have a new arm of the state government to turn to for resources.

The Illinois Department of Early Childhood officially opened at the beginning of this month after a 2024 law that created it.

Now all of the state's early childhood programs are under one roof.

And while building a brand new state agency is one thing planning for federal funding, uncertainty and regulatory rollbacks is a challenge all on its own.

Joining us to talk about it is Teresa Ramos, the first ever secretary of the Illinois Department of Early Childhood.

Thanks for joining us.

Welcome to Chicago tonight.

Thanks for having So less than actually 30 days on the job so let's talk about your work because your department combines the early childhood functions that were formerly under the Department of Child and Family Services.

Dcfs it just Illinois Department of Human Services and is be the Illinois State Board of Education as well as on the governor's hit the office that was in his office Early Childhood education.

What do you all think it was necessary to pull all of these together under one department?

Yeah.

It was a huge decades long endeavor.

Really?

We have some of the best advocates and partners across the state who said.

>> We need one place.

One person, one agency in charge of programs that have been in 3 agencies.

When you have programs and 3 agencies, all serving families with young children, you have to navigate that complexity.

That complexity is borne by providers and families.

And we said to make it simpler and better and fairer for families across the state, we need one place to go.

A one-stop shop to navigate those service services and those earliest years of life, folks like, you know, about the importance of early education, early learning for childhood development.

Do you think this new departments, its formation is also a reflection of everybody else sort of going?

Oh, yeah, this is important.

We should invest.

I governor has long been a a.

>> A champion for early childhood education and care.

Not only because in those first 5 years of life, 90% of all of our brain development happens.

It is where you get.

>> The biggest return on investment as a family to have supports to set your child and family up for success.

Long term.

But it's also true at the state level.

When we invest early, we see that pay dividends in preschool and k 12 and post-secondary and kind of all life outcomes.

And so the goal here really is to how do we make sure we can drive equity and efficiency in those services for families across the rich diversity of the state?

What are some of those programs than that now fall under your right.

So those are programs like preschool on preschool.

For We have Child Care Assistance Program which provides financial assistance for families from lower incomes.

We have early intervention programs which support families with children 0 to 3 who might need speech, therapists or developmental therapists.

The whole kind of kit and caboodle of those services and home visiting that supports families as they are caring for their children from his earliest prenatal, through the age of 5.

So for parents and what does this mean if they are, for example, looking for early intervention services or any other sort of services for that matter for the kiddo?

Well, first, we're 30 days.

And and what what we mark of our success is if you're a parent and you who were connected in those services.

>> 30 days ago or 60 days ago, nothing changed, right?

You services seamlessly.

You're still a relationship with the provider with the family, with the the research that you were before.

If your new family or an aspiring provider.

Now there's one place to go to get your questions answered it get connected to the right person.

Information previously.

As you mentioned, they were at 3 agencies, DHS, the state Board of Education, DCFS, you had to navigate.

What who do I talk to finding this?

How can know know if I haven't getting quality care if this is license, what are my options now?

It's cry.

And then for child care how does this make life easier for them?

I imagine can apply to one agency for state grant funding rather than >> 3.

What?

a day on the green light to.

There's a lot of work to do.

We talked about this transition really has in phases the work to pass the legislation and get ready to transition what he's now hundreds of people, thousands of process and about 100 technologies over to the agencies as part of that transition for providers.

They were prying for funding at the Department of Human Services and also at the state Board of Education to different platforms kind of the same questions.

Now we have one platform for managing those grants and at the Department of Early Childhood, there's still work to do on designing more seamless and simplified system for providers.

Right now there are 12 funding streams that come into Illinois that serve providers that they can apply for.

Some are competitive.

Some arts summer vouchers, some R r, you know, different ways of coming in.

We still have work to do with our partners in the General Assembly to say, hey, how can we simplified ease this burden over time on the funding side?

How much would you say of your budget comes from these already existing programs and how much new is being appropriated for?

>> organization sake, but also a new programming that you're starting.

I think we're really lucky and Illinois that we have had a.

>> Governor, JB Pritzker in office since he came into office.

He has added about a billion dollars just under a billion dollars to early childhood education and care services across programs at these 3 agencies and the agency itself allows us to really say where that where the dollars going.

How do we drive equity and efficiency over times that we more families can be served across the state.

So after recent federal rule change states are no longer required to cap copayments for child care.

>> a lot.

And and that allows states to switch from enrollment based funding to attendance based funding.

What does it mean for families in Illinois?

I we get, you questions about what the implications are for federal changes all the time.

In fact, a year ago we stood up a committee as part of our early Learning Council to say how do we connect directly to providers and families understand?

>> What any of this uncertainty means for them?

Well, we know now is those changes will make it less affordable and harder to be a child care provider in Illinois.

And we continue to work with our partners providers, families, our sister agencies to understand what we can do to drive more support to providers.

What might that look like?

It's going to harder and what you all might be able to do to support them.

I think it makes the New Department more important than ever before.

A lot of the navigation and time applying to different funding streams submitting the same data going to 12 different people to get a question answered.

Now we're starting to ease that there's one place to go.

We have watch to taking a customer service program that was at the Department of Human Services and made for the whole agency.

So if you have a question, we will navigate you to the right answer means planning and thinking about how do we start to reform our funding system.

So it simplifies the administrative burden right now.

Those told fundings formulas that are coming in we're navigating means compliance monitoring means application.

It means a lot of heavy paperwork and administration.

We can simplify that.

Making it easier for providers head start funding has been uncertain during the Trump administration.

What is the status of that right now?

Head start is a unique program nationally.

It goes directly from the feds to local providers in Illinois, like a Carole Robertson start sale in the Quad cities.

>> So the state doesn't have the same role in supporting it.

Feds directly give money to providers.

We that said we work.

>> Closely with all of those providers to say what is a certainty mean, how coming start to think and plan and prepare for, you know, why any eventuality in the future?

And of course, head start viewers at home for low-income provides that early early education.

You know, 30 seconds left.

Secretary, what goals do you hope it will accomplish in the coming year out so many goals?

I mean, our North star is we want to be on a path to make Illinois the best the fam and in the country.

There is a family with young children.

We've said we want to simplify the process for providers to be come a licensed provider and stay a provider in Illinois.

We want to make it easier for families to get services and those earliest years of their child's life and their 6 weeks old to 3 years old.

We know we need to modernize and evaluate our operational infrastructure to make all that happen.

And so that's what we see over the