Colorado Early Childhood Standards

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	Agency	Description
View Standards	Caring for our Children: American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), American Public Health Association (APHA) and National Resource Center for Health and Safety in Child Care (NRC)	Guidelines on health and safety needs of children from birth to 12 years in family and group day care homes and child care centers. Includes licensing, child-to-staff ratio, emergency procedures, prevention and control of injury and infectious diseases, special needs, and more.
View Standards	Colorado Department of Human Services (licensing)	The Colorado Department of Human Services ("the Department"), Division of Child Care, issues rules and regulations for licensing all child care facilities in Colorado, unless the facility is legally exempt from licensing. Exemptions are defined in 26-6-103 C.R.S. and 26-6-103.5 C.R.S. and in the General Rules for Child Care Facilities. Otherwise a license must be obtained before care begins.
View Standards	Colorado Quality Standards (Colorado Department of Education "Building Blocks")	The Colorado Quality Standards for Early Childhood Care and Education Services reflects the values of parents, educators, administrators and policy makers across the state of Colorado who are working for the best possible education and care for young children.ÿIt recognizes the crucial importance of partnerships between early childhood programs and families, supports a quality learning environment for the total child, and encourages the effective and efficient use of public and private resources to meet children's needs.
View Standards	Head Start	Head Start and Early Head Start (throughout this description, the term "Head Start" will be used to include both Head Start and Early Head Start programs) are comprehensive child development and family focused programs which serve children from birth to age 5, pregnant women, children with disabilities, and their families.ÿProject Head Start, created in 1965, was designed to help break the cycle of poverty by providing preschool children of low-income families with a comprehensive program to meet their emotional, social, intellectual, health, nutritional, and psychological needs.
View Standards	National Association of Family Child Care Accreditation (NAFCC)	NAFCC is dedicated to advocating for the family child care profession by collaborating with other local, state, and national organizations who contribute to the family child care field to increase awareness about and improve the quality of family child care.
View Standards	National Early Childhood Program Accreditation (NECPA)	The National Early Childhood Program Accreditation (NECPA) is a national, voluntary accreditation system for early childhood centers, schools and school-age child care programs.ÿIt was initially conceived by the National Child Care Association as a part of the organization's ongoing efforts to encourage the availability of high quality, affordable child care and early education programs for America's families.
View Standards	Qualistar	Qualistar is the result of an innovative merger in 2004 of two of Colorado's non-profit leaders in early childhood education - Educare Colorado and Colorado Office of Resource and Referral Agencies (CORRA)
View Standards	The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), Copyright © NAEYC	The National Association for the Education of Young Children's (NAEYC) primary purpose is to act on behalf of the needs and interest of young children by providing developmental and educational resources to adults who work with children from birth through age eight. This goal translates into sponsoring activities that are designed to improve the professional practice of early childhood educators and to educate the American public about the importance of good quality early childhood programs.