2024 CCDF Final Rule: How CITI Offers Support for the Future of Child Care
The 2024 Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) Final Rule represents another step forward in improving access, affordability, and stability within Child Care. This comprehensive update to federal policy focuses on three critical goals: improving payment processes for child care providers, simplifying and accelerating enrollment for families, and increasing child care options for families. Together, these updates aim to ensure that children and families have greater access to the high-quality, affordable child care they need to thrive.
At its core, the CCDF mission is about building a stable and equitable child care ecosystem that works for families, providers, and state agencies alike. Achieving this mission requires a focus on creating systems that not only meet current demands but are flexible and scalable enough to adapt to evolving needs and regulations.
A Shared Commitment to Child Care Stability and Quality
At CITI, we recognize that early childhood is a critical period for long-term emotional, physical, and intellectual development. Access to high-quality, affordable child care not only supports working parents, but lays the foundation for future success. For families in need, reliable child care can make a profound difference in stability and opportunity.
Understanding the importance of these formative years, CITI remains steadfast in its commitment to the mission of the 2024 CCDF Final Rule. With focus extending beyond technology, we stay closely connected to the evolving landscape of Child Care programs and the broader Health and Human Services (HHS) industry. By staying tuned into federal, state, and local initiatives, CITI ensures that our solutions align with the real challenges faced by families, providers, and agencies.
Introducing CITI’s Child Care Solution: Arise
CITI’s early development management system, Arise, is designed to help state and local agencies meet the regulations laid out in the CCDF Final Rule efficiently and effectively. Arise is a comprehensive child care case management system engineered to facilitate and augment Child Care subsidy programs. By leveraging the vast domain experience of active child care case managers and providers, Arise is built to deliver meaningful, lasting impacts for the children, families, and providers who need it most.
Arise was developed with a deep understanding of the child care space—from the challenges caseworkers face to the needs of providers and families. This intuitive platform offers robust functionality to streamline processes, automate administrative tasks, and ensure families can access support quickly and efficiently. Arise empowers agencies to do more for their communities while reducing administrative burdens.
Meeting the Goals of the 2024 CCDF Final Rule
The 2024 CCDF Final Rule sets clear expectations for improving the way child care programs operate. CITI’s Arise platform is uniquely positioned to help agencies achieve these goals:
Simplifying Enrollment for Families: The CCDF Final Rule emphasizes the need for faster, easier enrollment processes to ensure families receive the support they need without delay. Arise streamlines these processes with automated workflows, dynamic process management, and user-friendly interfaces, guiding caseworkers and families through enrollment efficiently. By reducing manual steps, agencies can minimize processing times and get families connected to care faster.
Improving Payment Timeliness for Providers: Providers often face delays in receiving payments, which can create financial strain and limit the availability of child care services. Arise addresses this challenge by automating payment workflows, ensuring that payments are accurate and timely. This not only supports providers, but actually helps retain providers and high-quality child care services for families.
Increasing Access to Information: Transparency and accessibility are key pillars of the 2024 CCDF Final Rule. Arise improves communication and information-sharing across all stakeholders—families, caseworkers, and providers. With mobile-enabled access, real-time notifications, and personalized reporting, Arise ensures that critical information is always available when and where it is needed.
Driving Impact Through Innovation
CITI’s Arise platform reflects a deep commitment to innovation and the mission of the 2024 CCDF Final Rule. By providing state and local agencies with a powerful tool to simplify processes, improve payment systems, and enhance access to information, Arise supports the long-term success of Child Care programs across the country.
As regulations evolve, CITI remains at the forefront of technology solutions designed to meet these new challenges. We understand that achieving the goals of the CCDF requires tools that are adaptable, intuitive, and built to deliver measurable results. Arise provides agencies with the capabilities they need to modernize service delivery, improve operational efficiency, and ensure families have access to the care they need to thrive. Additionally, CITI’s solutions are scalable and we are prepared to enhance our technology as policies continue to change.
Looking Ahead: Partnering for Success
The 2024 CCDF Final Rule marks another step forward in ensuring stability and equity for child care programs nationwide. By aligning with these goals, CITI is proud to play a role in helping agencies navigate new regulations, achieve operational efficiency, and deliver better outcomes for families, children, and providers.
With Arise, agencies gain a partner committed to the future of Child Care—a partner who understands the challenges, priorities, and opportunities in this complex, evolving landscape. Together, we can build stronger, more resilient child care systems that create lasting impacts for generations to come.