Outline of New Hampshire New Hampshire State Profile

  • Licensing: New Hampshire child care regulations do not require providers to engage child care health consultants (CCHCs). In the case of a licensing violation, providers are mandated to seek consultation, though not specifically with a CCHC.
  • Funding: Healthy Child Care New Hampshire (HCCNH) directly funds 1 FTE of CCHC services. Braided funding from the Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems Project, Immunization, and Lead Poisoning Prevention Programs contribute the funds that support the CCHC services.  
  • Auspices: HCCNH is coordinated from within the Maternal and Child Health Section, Bureau of Community Health Services, Division of Public  Health Services.
  • CCHC Role: CCHCS provide onsite consultation services, as well as group health and safety trainings to child care providers.   
  • CCHC Training: HCCNH provides a four-day CCHC training in partnership with the Healthy Child Care New England Regional Collaborative. These trainings are open to Head Start health managers.

History and Development

In 1995, when HCCNH received its Healthy Child Care America grant, it combined those funds with monies from the Child Development Bureau to develop a pilot CCHC project. With strategic planning support from John Snow, Inc., HCCNH decided to focus the pilot project on raising awareness of the CCHCs’ role among child care providers and health professionals as a a step toward building public demand for quality child care health consultation services.
HCCNH has continued to provide technical support, in-kind contributions, and some limited, direct funds to community agencies including community health centers, the New Hampshire Child Care Resource and Referral Network, and other child care-oriented entities. These constituencies, in turn, provide health and safety information, materials, and trainings to child care providers. They also educate providers about the role of CCHCs.
As the state’s ECCS Project evolved, HCCNH became seamlessly integrated into that initiative. The coordinators of the ECCS and HCCNH initiatives work closely to align their goals. ECCS supports HCCNH objectives in its implementation plan. In addition, ECCS activities statewide emphasize the availability of CCHC services as best practice in improving child care quality.
In 2006, HCCNH launched a new model for CCHC services, for the first time directly funding CCHC services to providers through a contract with a community-based organization.

Challenges and Lessons Learned

  • Funding: Funding child care health consultation services remains New Hampshire’s major challenge. As child care providers and families gain awareness of CCHC services and benefits, their informed advocacy can help stimulate community investment in funding such services.

Ingredients for Success

  • Multiple Partnerships: Building inter-departmental partnerships, state public-private partnerships, and multi-state partnerships has led to in-kind and direct cash contributions to HCCNH activities.
  • New England Collaborative: The inclusive and generous efforts of the six New England states, as part of the Healthy Child Care New England Regional Collaborative, resulted in several quality initiatives that a single state could not have launched on its own. These initiatives include the development of a National Training Institute-based training curriculum and the concurrent implementation of the four-day CCHC training series in each state. The Regional Collaborative also led to each state’s Title V Director contributing funds for CCHC activities. And, the states worked together to recommend uniform language for a CCHC-related Maternal and Child Health Bureau block grant performance measure to be adopted across the region.
  • Bi-state Collaboration: Bi-state collaboration between New Hampshire and Vermont is continuous and ongoing. The two states combine resources to sponsor workshops and networking meetings on their shared border.

Moving Forward

  • Expansion Funds: To offer CCHC services free of charge on a wider basis, HCCNH will seek expansion funds from the Division of Public Health and other New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services programs.
  • Quality Rating: HCCNH will work with state partners to include health and safety parameters in the state’s new voluntary quality rating program.
Fostering Sustainability: To build funding sustainability, the project plans to engage the community, including local businesses. HCCNH will also explore new ways to inform parents about consultation services and how they contribute to child care quality.

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Information as of August 2007