Background: Families and providers have been frustrated by their inability to know where families are on the waitlist for Child Care Scholarships, or easily access a place that indicates this information.

• Recommendation: Create parent-facing portals, or add to the childcare availability portal, to enhance transparency by showing real-time scholarship availability and subsidy eligibility; transparent public dashboard for waitlist data and processing times.

Background: TWC’s transition from a Child Care Services platform, TWIST, to TX3C in January 2025 has been challenging. This system tracks attendance: it sends payments to childcare providers and holds the entire data system for the Child Care Services across the state. The transition has had many challenges of the past year. And while it is improving, there are still many inaccuracies including errors in attendance and payments.

• Recommendation: Conduct a full audit of the technological upgrade of the CCS platform TX3C (KinderConnect).

Background: The 28 Local Workforce Development Boards who provide Child Care Services and Texas Rising Star support to their local regions through funding by Texas Workforce Commission, contract with an outside entity, LWDB Contractors, to deliver those services. These LWDB Contractors vary across the State, adding another layer of interpretation to rules and standards which leads to a lack of consistency between these contractors with little oversight from TWC.

• Recommendation: Develop a system to ensure coordination among LWDB Contractors so that programs are delivered uniformly statewide.

Background: The 28 Local Workforce Development Boards (LWDBs) were established three decades ago, based on the geographic boundaries, population, and community needs of that time. Since then, Texas has experienced significant population growth and demographic shifts. As a result, the LWDBs now differ widely in the number of childcare providers, families served, and employers seeking childcare supports for their workforce.

• Recommendation: Conduct a comprehensive review of the current LWDB structure to ensure a balanced and strategic distribution of resources that reflects today’s population patterns, community needs, and economic realities.

Background: Recent feedback on a survey from 1200 providers indicated that 40% did not know how to appeal an assessment result they disagree with (called the Reconsideration process in TRS (TWC) and an Administrative Review CCR (HHSC)–another 24% said they were only slightly familiar with the process Even using the same language would help.

• Recommendation: Making sure that TRS program leaders know this process exists and how to engage in it would improve transparency, partnership and quality, potentially impacting the TRS rating and reimbursement level for a childcare program.

Background: A recent survey of over 1200 providers indicated that background checks are a big barrier to being able to provide staffing for classrooms. According to respondents, the issue was mainly due to the time they had to wait to get a response, and also frustration in the inability of companies, organizations, or other associate groups of providers to allow one teacher to sub-in at a program that is not their home program. Additionally, a teacher may have a cleared background check in the system used by public schools, yet they have to get an additional background check through the approved system for HHSC, which costs both time and money.

• Recommendation: Centralize and simplify the Background Check process across state agencies; allow reciprocity between school districts and child care programs.

Background: The Administrative Review is the process day care operates use when they need to challenge a citation or ruling from Child Care Regulations. This process is cumbersome, time consuming, and with limited information regarding the process nor the Day Care operators’ rights throughout the process.

• Recommendation: Require mandatory training for all CCR staff on the Administrative Review process and professional development focused on the Texas Rising Star (TRS) quality rating system. In addition, create a streamlined system, with clear instructions and supports, to help childcare operators understand and effectively navigate the Administrative Review process.

Modernize HHSC Texas Child Care website to improve the process for providers to promptly correct inaccurate information on their public-facing records, enhancing transparency and fairness, building on the current high accuracy rate.

Background: Child care providers report that Texas Rising Star (TRS) Mentors are accessible and responsive resources for technical assistance, including timely responses to questions by phone or email. In contrast, providers indicate that Child Care Regulation representatives at the Texas Health and Human Services Commission (HHSC) are less consistently available for informal guidance and that interactions are primarily focused on compliance and deficiency citations. Providers note a difference in approach between technical assistance–oriented support and regulatory enforcement, which may limit opportunities for proactive clarification and continuous quality improvement. Increased access to non-punitive guidance could support compliance, improve program quality, and enhance child safety.

• Recommendation: Implement risk-based inspection models that balance regulatory oversight with targeted technical assistance to support compliance and continuous quality improvement.