OUR MISSION:
We enrich the lives of at-risk and underserved children and families in Collier County by providing high-quality, affordable early childhood education.
To do this, we commit to:
- Engage families to assure their children’s future success
- Provide scholarships for children ages birth to 5 years old to ensure access and school readiness
- Emphasize the arts and nature through experiential learning
- Encourage children’s innate ability to develop cognitive, physical and social-emotional skills

Our Vision
We strive to inspire children’s love of lifelong learning.
Ten Things to Know
About Child’s Path

- Child’s Path strives to give economically-disadvantaged children access to high-quality early education so that they are able to enter kindergarten “ready” with all their developmental milestones met. Research indicates that 75% of children who enter kindergarten developmentally behind will never catch up.
- We provide partial scholarships to low-income working families, and over 75% of the 300 children enrolled receive this financial assistance.
- We operate four early learning centers in Collier County.
- Child’s Path seeks to meet the need for early education during a child’s most crucial developmental years. By age 3, a child’s brain has reached 80% of adult size. By age 5, it has reached 90% – nearly full grown!
- Child’s Path aims to stop the cycle of poverty at its roots. At-risk children who do not receive high-quality early education are exponentially more likely to later drop out of high school, become a teen parent or commit a violent crime.
- Child’s Path uses the highly-regarded Reggio Emilia approach to education, which instills a love of learning in each child by building upon his or her interests. There is also a focus on art experiences and engagement with nature.
- Child’s Path provides approximately 85,000 healthy meals annually free for the children.
- We aim to attract and retain the best and brightest teachers.
- Child’s Path demonstrates its impact and quality. In 2019, 83% of children from Child’s Path who graduated on to kindergarten tested “kindergarten ready” by the state. In contrast, only 43% of children in Collier County tested “kindergarten ready.”
- We assist parents in being their child’s first teacher by offering monthly parent workshops on topics that parents express an interest in.