Childcare Program Manager

About the role

The Department of Education and Early Learning (DEEL) is charged with transforming the lives of Seattle’s children, youth, and families by eliminating opportunity gaps and preparing students for kindergarten, improving academic achievement, and ensuring students graduate prepared for college and a career. DEEL strives to embed the City’s Race and Social Justice Initiative into its education objectives and seeks staff that value the importance of working together as a government and community to eliminate racial disparities and achieve racial equity. Core values of equity, results, stewardship, transparency, and collaboration guide the work, support operations, and hold the department accountable. The Child Care Program Manager will manage ongoing program implementation of the Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP) and the department’s other childcare investments and initiatives, and directly supervise and evaluate the performance of four Early Education Specialists and one Senior Early Education Specialist.

Responsibilities

• Setting goals for the work unit
• Reviewing and updating program policies and procedures
• Developing systems, processes, and workflows to achieve maximum productivity and ensure efficiency
• Resolving customer requests, such as exceptions to policy and program complaints
• Ensuring the Operations Unit provides high-quality customer service
• Creating standard procedures for data management within the Child Information and Provider database and acting as the subject matter expert for the team
• Serving as the lead for the Emergency Child Care Initiative, should it be needed by the City
• Acting as a subject matter expert for the division on childcare business operations and licensing regulations
• Developing and implementing quality assurance processes and protocols, in particular through data visualization (e.g., Power BI or Tableau)
• Assisting with the evaluation of childcare programs
• Developing and monitoring childcare investment contracts with community-based partners
• Making recommendations on continuous improvement plans to ensure the effectiveness and efficiency of the City’s investment in early learning
• Working jointly with City managers and staff, funders, community-based agencies, public health and professional development partners, and stakeholders to coordinate and participate in continuous analysis of program outcomes, program quality, and child outcomes
• Facilitating funding processes for community grants and managing contracts for childcare investments
• Creating standard procedures for data management and acting as a subject matter expert on the data system in partnership with IT
• Acting as the primary liaison with Seattle Public Schools (SPS) community partnerships to monitor the success and opportunities for improvement in childcare settings within schools, including supporting childcare provider partnerships with SPS

Qualifications

You will be most successful if you have demonstrated experience managing childcare, early childhood, and/or education focused programs. A commitment to listening, creating space for diverse perspectives, and the achievement of educational equity must be at the center of your professional practice. The ability to communicate at all levels tactfully and effectively will also contribute to your success. Specifically, you’ll be prepared to take on this role with a combination of the following:

Experience

• Continuous quality improvement and change management processes
• Working with marginalized communities
• Supervising individuals in direct service to the community
• Writing and monitoring contracts, grants, or other standards within a program
• Creating and implementing policy

Knowledge

• Childcare WACs, Early Achievers QRIS, or other regulations
• Childcare licensing and how a childcare business is run
• Government processes
• Effective professional development practices, with experience in supporting a high-functioning and professional team
• Race and social justice, especially in early learning, childcare, and/or Seattle communities

Abilities

• Demonstrate excellent strategic planning skills and self-managing work and priorities
• Promote employee learning and development
• Act as an escalation point for elevated, complex, or out of the ordinary issues