Child Care

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Business Resources for New Mexico’s Child Care Providers

WESST recognizes the critical need for more child care and is actively working to build the supply of quality child care in New Mexico. WESST offers its established expertise in consulting, training, incubation, and lending to help individuals start and grow sustainable child care businesses. WESST offers the following initiatives as part of its focus on supporting the Child care industry:

CRECER

CRECER stands for Capacity Resources for Enhancing Care, Excellence, and Resilience and means “to grow” in Spanish. The CRECER initiative provides and leverages robust business development resources to increase the supply of high-quality licensed child care in New Mexico. All resources from CRECER New Mexico are offered free of charge with funding from the New Mexico Early Childhood Education and Care Department (NMECECD). CRECER is a collaboration between of WESST, Growing Up New Mexico (GUNM), and Civitas Strategies supported by New Mexico’s Early Childhood Education and Care Department (ECECD).

WESST and our partners are focused on the following priorities:

  • Increasing the supply of quality child care for ages 0-5. Expanding the availability of high-quality early child care is essential in New Mexico to support parental workforce participation and provide crucial early learning experiences during children's most formative years.
  • Increase quality in the FOCUS system. Enhancing the FOCUS quality rating and improvement system is necessary to ensure consistent standards, guide providers towards best practices, and help families identify truly high-quality early childhood education settings.
  • Increase use of the child care subsidy. Boosting utilization of the state's child care assistance program is vital to make quality care affordable and accessible for eligible low-to-moderate income working families, thereby reducing financial barriers to early education and parental employment.

THE Accelerator

THE Accelerator (Training Home Educators) is a state-wide, bilingual program for providers and prospective providers who want to grow and improve their family/home-based child care business. The six-month, intensive training helps increase the supply of quality child care for families and improves economic opportunities for caregivers.

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2024 Impact

  • 76 child care providers graduated from THE Accelerator
  • 90% report their confidence managing their business is higher
  • 86% reported their caregiving is better
  • 51% increased their revenue (31% now receive child care subsidies)
Play Video

Karla Pineda, THE Accelerator Participant, owner of Creciendo Juntos Child Development Homecare

I came to WESST in 2021 because I wanted to learn more about improving my child care business. I’m from Mexico where I studied psychology, but when I moved to the U.S. I couldn’t continue my career. I felt my vocation was to work with children, but not to be an entrepreneur or have a business. I was drawn to THE Accelerator because it was helpful to benefit from the collective knowledge being exchanged. I struggled with the financial aspects of my business, and WESST helped me organize my accounts and think about how to invest money. With WESST’s support, I formed something new and I feel fulfilled. I am a teacher, a director, and now also an entrepreneur.

For questions or more information, please contact Marcela Mendoza at mmendoza@wesst.org.