Regional Spotlight: QUALITYstarsNY in the Capital District

Community Loan Fund

The Community Loan Fund has been supporting the economic development of New York’s Capital District since 1985 through a number of initiatives. Our Capital District team has been partnering with the Community Loan Fund to offer trainings on financial accountability and program management for our participating early childhood programs. Financial Accountability and Sustainability (FAS) and Program Management Qualifications (PMQ) are both subcategories of the QUALITYstarsNY Standards that reflect high-quality financial and business management practices that lend themselves to running a successful early childhood business. These training sessions on financial and management practices help our Capital District participants both strengthen their skills at running their business and achieve training hours toward FAS and PMQ Standards.

Through this partnership, participants are able to access trainings on a range of business topics that are not readily available to New York’ early childhood community. One such example is Childhood Friends, Inc owner, Alison Cozzolino, who attended the Community Loan Fund Summer Business Series in 2025 to formalize her high-quality business practices. This helped her implement the use of Quick Books to support her financial practices and she has plans to expand her early childhood business in the future. Additionally, Sheila Eggleston, joined QUALITYstarsNY after starting her group family day care, Sheila’s Daycare in Hudson Falls and has been eagerly seeking out opportunities for improvement. Through attending trainings with Community Loan Fund, she will be able to achieve PMQ-1 points during her next rating cycle, which will help her make progress toward increasing her Star Rating when her program is re-rated.

Brightside Up & Physical Activity Learning Trainings

Another great partnership in the Capital District launched last fall between QUALITYstarsNY and Brightside Up, the Child Care Resource and Referral Center for the Albany region, to offer Physical Activity Learning Sessions (PALS) in their local community. Scheduling movement times and active transitions, reassessing environments, and varying curriculum can help educators keep physical activities fun, fresh, and interesting. Through this partnership, three free PALS sessions have been offered at different locations in the Capital District for QUALITYstarsNY participants interested in learning more about implementing high-quality practices around physical activity and movement.

These sessions have been designed to help educators elevate their learning with a variety of movement skills that support infant, toddler, and preschool development in several domains. These trainings gave attendees the opportunity to assess their current physical movement practices; discuss concrete strategies for family engagement to promote playful movement; and explore ways to overcome challenges and foster children’s ability, confidence, and motivation to engage in physical activities throughout their lives, among other topics.