Advocacy

Children’s Friend takes a leadership role in educating policymakers and the public about the needs of Rhode Island children and their families.

2025 Budget and Legislative Priorities

Children’s Friend is calling for investments in First Connections, Early Intervention, Head Start, and the Child Care Assistance program.

View our 2025 Priorities Sheet

Children’s Friend provides an array of early education and early child care options for families including Early Head Start, Head Start, Child Care, and Pre-K. We have served over 1,469 children so far in 2024 at one of our 13 licensed early childhood centers. We have a waitlist for these programs, primarily due to our inability to hire enough staff. We urge the state to invest in child care reimbursement rates and strategies to invest in our early education workforce.

At Children’s Friend, we serve 925 families in our First Connections, Healthy Families America and Nurse Family Partnership home visiting programs. The state has changed the funding model, so these programs are primarily paid for by fee-for-service Medicaid, making it extremely difficult for us to cover the costs of these lifesaving programs. Rhode Island must be creative – as other states have been – in funding home visiting programs to ensure their ongoing sustainability.

  • (H5164 Carson / S231 Valverde) Support the establishment of an IDEA Task Force bill
  • (H6073 Giraldo / S677 Valverde) Invest state funding to draw down federal funds for home visiting and re-visit Medicaid strategy to support proven, multi-year, consistent, relationship-based programs
  • Children’s Friend supports the creation of an IDEA Task Force (H5164) to develop a financing and staffing plan for a coherent system of educational and developmental services for babies and young children with developmental delays and disabilities. 
  • (S247 Valverde) Maternal and child health service for children with special healthcare needs – Early Intervention program for developmentally disabled infants.

Children’s Friend supports increasing cash assistance benefits annually and aligning them with the federal poverty limit, ensuring no child lives in deep poverty. Additionally, measures should be taken to protect vulnerable children from losing their benefits if their parent loses eligibility due to immigration status.

2025 Testimony

Presient & CEO of Children’s Friend testified at the Senate Finance Committee on 03.27.25 regarding the RI DOH 2026 Budget

How You Can Help

Join a meeting

The RIght from the Start campaign hosts meetings throughout the year to share more about what’s happening in the legislature on our priority issues.

Open campaign meeting schedule
Share your story

The most effective tools we have are real stories of how Children’s Friend makes a difference for the children and families we serve. If you’d like to share your story, please email us at info@cfsri.org.

Donavan's Story

Thriving In Early Head Start: Donovan’s Story

You might remember a very cute young boy stealing the show at RI Strolling Thunder 2023 by spontaneously grabbing a toy microphone and joining Governor McKee and other leaders to offer his “remarks.”

Read Donovan’s story

Head Start

https://player.pbs.org/viralplayer/3079396613

First Connections

Children’s Friend: Needed Now More Than Ever

Marc’s Story

The Dads Job Training Program at Children’s Friend
Many, many thanks to Capitol Conduit, who donated this amazing video.

Contact your legislators

Your legislators need to hear from you about what they can do to help children. 

find your legsilator
Amplify our message

Follow along on social media to see the latest on our advocacy efforts. Share, like, and comment to help build momentum.

2024 Testimony

Children’s Friend President and CEO David Caprio, First Connections Nurse Alyssa Carvalho, and Early Intervention Clinical Supervisor Alicia Moran testified at the Senate Finance Committee meeting on 4.11.24 to share why First Connections and Early Intervention programs are so important.

Yeisha Pereira, lead Head Start teacher at Children’s Friend, testified at the Senate Finance Committee meeting on 4.23.24 on the importance of the Child Care for Early Educators program.

Tiana Ochoa, VP of Programs/Director of Head Start at Children’s Friend testified on 5.09.24 on the need for the Child Care is Essential Act, H7124.