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$700,000 for baby scholarships

Dustin Dwyer

We think of scholarships as a way to help more students go to college. But there’s a new scholarship program in Michigan that has nothing to do with college. It offers scholarships to babies.

If you have a baby and you want to have a job, or you need to have a job, you have to find childcare. And childcare costs money—thousands of dollars a year.

If your income is below the federal government’s poverty line—about $24,000 a year for a family of four—the federal government will help you pay for childcare. But if you’re at, say, $28,000 a year, you’re ineligible.

Last week, Judy Samuelson, head of the state's Early Childhood Investment Corporation , announced a new program that would help families who just miss out on getting childcare assistance. It’s called Early Start, and it will be administered through a public charity called the Women’s Caring Program (WCP).

The state is contributing $700,000 to the program.

Listen to the full story on State of Opportunity.

Dustin Dwyer reports enterprise and long-form stories from Michigan Public’s West Michigan bureau. He was a fellow in the class of 2018 at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard. He’s been with Michigan Public since 2004, when he started as an intern in the newsroom.