In a year marked by climate disasters, federal funding cuts, and growing fear in immigrant communities, RCCF grantee partners organized, adapted, and continued building power for families, providers, and early educators.
In 2025, child care organizers faced mounting challenges. Families, providers, and early educators faced growing instability. Climate disasters disrupted homes and child care programs. Immigrant communities experienced increasing attacks. Safety-net supports eroded, creating new challenges for families already navigating an unaffordable child care system.
In response, RCCF grantee partners built networks of trust, mobilized mutual aid, defended public investments, and created opportunities for parents, providers, and early educators to organize together.
That is the core mission of the Raising Child Care Fund. Launched by the Early Childhood Funders Collaborative (ECFC) in 2019, RCCF is grounded in the belief that those most affected by the child care crisis, parents, providers, and early educators, should lead the movement for change. Today, 16 foundations support this work across 19 states and Washington, DC.
Download the 2025 RCCF Impact Report >>
By the Numbers
- 617,000+ people reached
- 25,000+ people mobilized to take action
- 80+ full-time organizers building power for child care justice
- 100% of grantee partners lead or help lead their state’s organizing and advocacy strategy
- 19 states and the District of Columbia comprise the RCCF network, with one-third of grantee partners located in the South
Five Lessons from 2025
- Multi-year investment allows grassroots organizations to build lasting power.
- Grassroots organizations sustain communities during times of crisis.
- Organizing is trust-based work that requires long-term staffing and leadership development.
- Sustained grassroots organizing creates the conditions for policy change.
- When funders work together, ambitious ideas become achievable.
Stories of Impact
Strengthening Communities During Crisis
When floods devastated communities in West Virginia and a tornado struck St. Louis, grantee partners connected families with emergency assistance, coordinated recovery efforts, and raised $750,000 to support Missouri’s early childhood ecosystem. In Oregon, more than 2,000 residents joined the Protect Portland initiative to help defend immigrant families’ access to Head Start.
Building the Base of the Movement
From 550 providers rallying in Ohio to 40,000 doors knocked in Maine, grantee partners expanded the child care movement through coalition building, new local chapters, and partnerships with fathers, chambers of commerce, immigrant organizations, and rural communities.
Growing Leaders and Investing in Staff
Leadership development translated into policy wins, including support for a $40 million child care campaign in North Carolina and the largest child care action in Louisiana’s history. Mothering Justice now supports Mamavists in 10 states as part of a national network of more than 50,000 members.
Influencing Policy Implementation
Grantee partners helped secure an $18 minimum wage for early educators in New Mexico, translated licensing regulations into Spanish in Pennsylvania, and advanced bipartisan child care licensing reforms in Minnesota.
Finding New Ways to Fund Child Care
Grantee partners defended Multnomah County’s Preschool for All program, helped secure $25 million in teacher retention grants in Pennsylvania, and expanded child care access for 17,000 single mothers in Mississippi, demonstrating that meaningful public investment remains possible even in challenging fiscal environments.
Growing Grassroots Investment
Through the State Grassroots Growth Project, RCCF is helping state-based funders better understand grassroots organizing and expand investment in states that have historically received limited child care funding.
Long-term investment makes this work possible.
RCCF is not the sole funder of any grantee partner, but partners consistently report that RCCF’s flexible, long-term support is critical to sustaining their organizing and advocacy efforts.
As momentum grows, so does the opportunity for philanthropy to invest alongside communities building lasting change.
Join the Raising Child Care Fund in supporting grassroots organizing that strengthens families, providers, and early educators and advances a more equitable child care system.