This program provides funding to enhance the quality, affordability, and supply of child care available to Virginia's families. Child care programs are child-centered, family-focused services that support the family goals of economic self-sufficiency and child development by providing substitute parental care, protection, guidance, and early childhood education.Toward this end, policies and service strategies are designed to meet the following goals:

• To provide low-income families with the financial resources to find and afford quality child care for their children
• To ensure that the family child care program contributes to the broader objective of self-sufficiency
• To provide child care to parents trying to achieve independence from public assistance
• To promote parental choice in the selection of child care
• To empower working parents to make their own decisions on the child care that best suits their family's needs
• To provide consumer education to help parents make informed choices about child care
• To ensure that subsidy dollars are provided to the neediest families
• To enhance the quality and increase the supply of child care for all families
• To improve the coordination among child care programs and early childhood development programs.