Advocates can play a critical role in shaping services that help parents make a smooth transition from welfare to work. Here are some suggestions for how you can help:

• Make sure families are linked with needed, safe, affordable, high quality child care.
• Establish programs that address the obstacles facing families moving to work, such as domestic violence, substance abuse, or lack of job skills.
• Apply for welfare-to-work grants to help families in the transition to self-sufficiency.
• Help link families with transportation so they can find and keep jobs.
• Encourage agencies that serve families to stay open at night and on weekends.
• Invite policy makers to your center to meet the children and to see a high quality program in action.
• Encourage policy makers to visit a variety of child care facilities to observe for themselves the differences in high vs. low quality, safe vs. unsafe, and accessible vs. unaccessible programs and the potential impacts on our nation's children.
• Educate state policy makers about the importance of using federal funds to expand child care subsidies.
• Involve health care providers and educators in explaining the full range of services children need while their parents work.
• Monitor carefully the laws and policies established by the state. If they are ineffective, identify the families who are being hurt, publicize their plight, and encourage law makers to remedy the problems.
• Don't forget to highlight successful programs and have parents provide personal testimonies.
• Remember to give credit to policy makers who are making a difference. Consider sending personal thank you notes, contributing an article to your local media, or hosting an awards breakfast in their honor.
• Never give up! All good things come about as a result of good ideas and perseverance.

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