Early Care Spaces FAQs

Early Care Spaces refers to the informal spaces in Oakland—such as family resource centers, community spaces, libraries and more—where children receive care. Many under-resourced communities face significant barriers to access when it comes to developmentally appropriate and enriching early learning experiences. The Early Care Spaces grant program aims to fund community-driven solutions and local initiatives within these spaces, explicitly focusing on integrating literacy and language development into early childhood programming. By doing so, the program seeks to create stronger, more enriching opportunities that support the developmental needs of young children. 

Although activities may vary based on a child’s developmental stage, we fund efforts that support children’s early literacy and language development in the following areas: 

• Listening & Speaking: Building children’s oral vocabulary skills and understanding of how words are used. This area emphasizes creating experiences that expand children’s background knowledge, enabling them to better engage with and understand the world around them. This could include programs that teach families and providers the importance of “serve” and “return” for young children and informal playgroups where children participate in activities that connect themes throughout the day. 
• Foundational Literacy Skills: Building a foundational understanding of the alphabet, how sounds make up words and an initial awareness of print. This could manifest as rhyming and singing activities that encourage children to play with sounds in words. It could also include activities that direct children’s attention to objects, shapes and words in their environment. 
• Reading: Instilling a love of storytelling, book engagement and other literacy-related activities in young children. Read-alouds and oral storytelling, in particular, can expose children to richer vocabulary and more complex sentence structures than everyday conversation. These kinds of shared reading experiences have been shown to significantly and positively impact the oral language skills and print knowledge of young learners. 
• Writing: Supporting children’s experimentation as they begin representing their ideas with symbols, pictures, letters and words. Activities that encourage children to draw or scribble strengthen fine motor skills and build an early connection between writing and communication.

Across all these areas, it is essential to encourage children’s language expression by validating and affirming their language and communication use. This is especially important for multilingual or multi-dialectical children. Children should be supported in bringing all of their linguistic knowledge to their literacy development. 

These early literacy experiences build a strong foundation that helps children better transition to more structured literacy learning in elementary school. 

Informal care refers to childcare provided by family members, friends or neighbors that are not part of an official childcare system. Commonly known as Family, Friend and Neighbor care, they may operate without, or may be exempt from, formal licensing requirements. They may receive payment privately, access public financial support or provide unpaid care. 

Traditional education systems that do not qualify for this opportunity include private and publicly funded childcare programs like Head Start, Early Head Start, California State Preschool and Transitional Kindergarten. Center-based care includes nonprofit and private childcare centers. 

The term flatlands refers to Oakland neighborhoods experiencing disinvestment and displacement. The term flatlands often excludes the Oakland hills. 

Early Care Spaces does not fund work focused primarily on book access. It will fund efforts that incorporate book distribution along with programming that enhances children’s vocabulary and fosters positive relationships to storytelling, written text and comprehension. It will also fund efforts that build parents’ knowledge on how to engage with books at home to support their child’s development.  

Wraparound and social services play an important role in holistically serving families with young children. While we don’t fund these services on their own, we can support literacy and language development initiatives that incorporate elements of wraparound or social services. 

Please note that books and wraparound services cannot account for more than 25% of the project’s total budget. 

Some organizations that support young children and their families offer programming that, while valuable, may not have a clear focus on fostering early language and literacy skills. Early Care Spaces supports work that is explicitly focused on sustaining, building or strengthening these practices, helping organizations develop targeted approaches to supporting children’s literacy development.  

We recognize the value of formal career advancement pathways, such as formal degrees and credentials. We also understand that not all providers choose to follow this route.

We support programs that enhance the knowledge and skills of childcare providers in ways that will meaningfully impact early literacy development for children. This can include initiatives that provide trainings, workshops, collaborative learning opportunities or other professional development options for providers. Although these programs may not result in formal credentials, they can strengthen quality practices and outcomes for children.

By supporting a range of learning and advancement opportunities, we aim to empower providers to grow in their practice and careers in ways that are aligned with their goals, contexts and the needs of the children and families they serve.

Foundation staff cannot review applications to provide feedback or recommendations before submission. However, we can answer questions and discuss alignment during our scheduled office hours—sign up on the Early Care Spaces program page. You can also contact Education Program Staff anytime with your questions. 

Project support refers to funding for specific programs, initiatives or projects within an organization. This type of support is best suited for organizations that are not explicitly literacy focused. Some examples of work that fits well with project support include:

• Programs that focus solely on early childhood literacy but are integrated within organizations offering a variety of early childhood education services. 
• Community-based programs that incorporate literacy and language support into their broader programming.

General operating support can provide flexible, unrestricted funding to help sustain the overall mission of an organization, rather than focusing on a single project or program. It supports the organization’s day-to-day operations and ongoing activities, with decisions left to the organization’s discretion. To be eligible for this type of support, there must be a robust alignment between the organization’s mission and the Early Care Spaces’ focus areas and priorities. 

The grant period starts January 1, 2026. Grantees can choose a 12-month or 24-month period. If selecting a 24-month period, the award amount will be divided over two years.