Client Story

The Indiana Uplands Region in Southwest Indiana has a child care shortage problem. The Community Foundation of Bloomington and Monroe County (CFBMC) through their Regional Opportunity Initiatives (ROI) wanted to replicate their collective impact work for early learning in Monroe County to five other counties in the Indiana Uplands region. These counties identified access to high quality childcare, especially-infant care, as a priority for both better quality of life for its residents and for the attraction and retention of their workforce necessary to support regional employers.

TCG was hired by CFBMC to help form an early learning coalition, analyze their child care needs, develop a strategic plan to improve child care quality and affordability in their county and the Uplands region, and implement the plan. TCG supported the five counties in doing the following:

• Invited key stakeholders to join the coalition by identifying key stakeholders that should be invited
• Participated in stakeholder feedback processes (surveys and interviews) with key individuals and groups of stakeholders
• Research trends and best practices from other cities and communities across the country were shared and discussed
• Developed strategic plans for each of the communities as part of the project
• Supported the engagement of employers and business leaders in each community