The Virginia Department of Education has launched a new online portal to help families access quality and safety information for more than 3,000 publicly-funded early childhood care sites across Virginia.
The portal is based off of Virginia Quality Birth to Five (VQB5), a statewide quality measurement and improvement system that provides information about child care, family child care, Head Start, and preschool. VQB5, created by state law in 2020, includes all public and private programs that use public funds to serve children from birth to age five.
“We know the importance of early learning and school readiness in setting up our children for success, and with the VQB5 portal, families will be able to make informed decisions when exploring and choosing an early childhood program for their children,” said Superintendent of Public Instruction Lisa Coons.
“With nearly 30,000 classroom observations made over the last year alone, the quality of the information available to Virginia parents is greater than in any other state in the nation,” she said. “We are proud to equip parents with the information they need to help make the best early childhood decisions for their children.”
The VQB5 portal includes information on all publicly-funded sites and any non-publicly-funded sites who opt in. With the portal, families can:
- Easily find out whether a site has chosen a quality curriculum and access links to health and safety inspections.
- View sites’ quality rating and performance information.
- Review up-to-date data and information.
- Easily search for a site or program by program name, address, city, or zip code.
The portal includes data from more than 28,000 classroom observations of teacher-child interactions completed in schools, child care centers, and family daycare home settings in 2023-2024.
“VQB5 is a win for families, young children, and early childhood educators. Through this one-stop portal, Virginia families can now learn more about health, safety, and learning for more than 3,000 early childhood programs, making it easier for parents to find options that best meet their needs and put their children on track for success. At the same time, this VQB5 truly shows that early childhood educators, whether in a school, child care, or home-based early childhood setting, are educators, not baby-sitters, who are working hard every day to improve how they care for and educate our youngest learners,” said Jenna Conway, deputy superintendent at the Virginia Department of Education.
The Virginia Department of Education explained that the VQB5 portal will be updated annually and shared publicly each fall.
