Provider Appreciation Day - May 12
The Cabarrus County Board of Commissioners has proclaimed May 12, 2023 as Provider Appreciation Day.
Child care provides a safe, nurturing place for the enrichment and development of millions of children nationwide, and is a vital force in our local economy. In Cabarrus County alone, there are 968 child care providers actively caring for around 3,777 children.
Child care programs, which are mostly small businesses, run and staffed predominantly by women, are still recovering from health and financial hardships stemming from the pandemic while still continuing to meet the needs of our local families. The pandemic illuminated how indispensable child care providers are for the well-being and economic security of Cabarrus County’s young children, families and communities.
The Cabarrus County Partnership for Children provides support to our local child care providers through training, support and by connecting them with the resources they need to ensure every child in their care is receiving high-quality care.
Thank you to our child care providers for making sure our children are safe and cared for.
This month for Teacher Appreciation Month, every early childhood professional working in a licensed Cabarrus County childcare facility will receive a starfish, a Making a Difference keychain and the Starfish story:
Once upon a time, there was an old man who used to go to the ocean to do his writing. He had a habit of walking on the beach every morning before he began his work. Early one morning, he was walking along the shore after a big storm had passed and found the vast beach littered with starfish as far as the eye could see, stretching in both directions.
Off in the distance, the old man noticed a small boy approaching. As the boy walked, he paused every so often and as he grew closer, the man could see that he was occasionally bending down to pick up an object and throw it into the sea. The boy came closer still and the man called out, “Good morning! May I ask what it is that you are doing?”
The young boy paused, looked up, and replied “Throwing starfish into the ocean. The tide has washed them up onto the beach and they can’t return to the sea by themselves,” the youth replied. “When the sun gets high, they will die, unless I throw them back into the water.”
The old man replied, “But there must be tens of thousands of starfish on this beach. I’m afraid you won’t really be able to make much of a difference.”
The boy bent down, picked up yet another starfish and threw it as far as he could into the ocean. Then he turned, smiled and said, “It made a difference to that one!”
» View the Proclamation from the Cabarrus County Board of Commissioners