A video showing national collaborative for infants & toddlers (ncit)
The United States is one of the only countries in the world that does not guarantee workers paid family and medical leave to bond with their young children or care for themselves or a sick or injured family member. Paid leave is important for the health of adults and children, especially infants and toddlers. Early relationships with parents and caregivers shape babies’ brain development, laying the foundation for lifelong learning, health, and well-being. It’s also good for the economy. Businesses that offer paid leave see increased productivity, profits, retention, and morale.
Throughout this toolkit, you’ll find resources that can help you advocate for all workers—regardless of where they live or who they work for—to have access to paid family and medical leave to ensure that they can be healthy and provide the care and stability infants and toddlers need to thrive.
Search our curated resources collection to find the information and tools you need to take action and advance policies and programs that support infants, toddlers, and their families in your community or state.
Resources include case studies that showcase what’s working, steps for getting started, the latest research, information on using data to track success, and messaging materials to help you make the case for the importance of investing in prenatal-to-three.
A government shutdown puts the health and stability of infants, toddlers, and their families at risk.
There are countless federal programs that deliver essential nutrition, health care, and child care services critical for the prenatal-to-three population. A lapse in federal funding puts these services at risk, creating uncertainty for providers, leaving families in limbo, and jeopardizing the support children need to thrive.
This shutdown is a matter of health and stability for infants, toddlers and their families.
✅ Take action now – tell Congress to reopen the government before more families are put at risk.
NCIT.org is here to support you in taking action to help all babies and toddlers thrive. Click on advocate, media or policy maker and be taken to areas of the site made just for you! Need something else? Send us an email!
Click on each icon to learn more on each supporter type.
It’s only when people like you share their voice can we pass the policies we need at the local, state, tribal and federal level. We can help you learn the issues, how to be an advocate and then take simple, effective actions to support good policies that help every child and family thrive.
Learn MoreNCIT is committed to advancing the most effective and promising policy solutions and we want to help policy makers with what they need to get these policies passed in their jurisdictions. Education on issues, white papers, access to experts, sample policies. We are here to support you from concept to passage and through implementation.
Learn MoreThe media is key to raising awareness and building support for those policies most critical to raising healthy, happy babies and toddlers. NCIT is here to support print, broadcasting and digital journalists with the info they need to develop and deliver compelling stories on the policies and programs needed to support every baby and toddler and their families. We can help with research, sources, data and copy.
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The National Collaborative for Infants & Toddlers is bringing together organizations and individuals across the US who want to improve the health and well-being of infants, toddlers, their families, and caregivers. Using policy advocacy as its tool, the NCIT and its members support federal state, local, and tribal efforts to pass effective policies and to maximize public investments in PN-3 systems.
The National Collaborative for Infants and Toddlers (NCIT) was created in 2017 as a vehicle to connect a diverse group of advocates, system leaders, philanthropy, researchers, policy experts and practitioners at the federal, state and local level who shared a common interest in addressing the needs of our nation’s youngest children. Developed with initial support from the Pritzker Children’s Initiative, NCIT was founded on the belief that beginning prenatally, every child and their family should have the support that they need for a strong start in life.
In its early years, NCIT focused on raising awareness of the need for stronger and more equitable prenatal-to-three (PN-3) policies and programs, measuring the impact of PN-3 investments and sharing what works to better support infants, toddlers and their families.
By 2022, American Heart Association (AHA), through its Voices for Healthy Kids project, became the steward of NCIT. Within this new home and with access to expanded funding sources, NCIT has been able to build on its original purpose, strengthen its support to advocates and increase its impact on PN-3 investments.
Voices for Healthy Kids, an initiative of the American Heart Association (AHA), provides the staffing and support structure for The National Collaborative for Infants & Toddlers. NCIT supports education and policies that at times are outside the realm of the AHA. This staffing and support should not be construed as endorsement by the American Heart Association.
