Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning

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Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning
Department overview
FormedMay 2004
JurisdictionGeorgia
Headquarters2 Martin Luther King Jr. Drive SE, Suite 754, East Tower
Atlanta, Georgia 30334
Department executive
  • Amy M. Jacobs, Commissioner
Parent department
Government of Georgia (U.S. state)
Websitewww.decal.ga.gov

The Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning, branded Bright from the Start and commonly known by the acronym DECAL, is an agency of the executive branch of the U.S. state of Georgia responsible for licensing child care providers and administering the state's early childhood education and child care subsidy programs.[1] DECAL administers Georgia's Pre-K Program, a free, lottery-funded prekindergarten program for four-year-olds; the Childcare and Parent Services (CAPS) subsidy program for low-income families; the Quality Rated child care rating system; and the state's Head Start State Collaboration Office.[1]

History

Georgia's Pre-K Program began in 1992 as a pilot serving 750 four-year-olds, funded by the newly created Georgia Lottery for Education under Governor Zell Miller; it later expanded into a universal, nationally recognized program.[2] In May 2004, Governor Sonny Perdue and the General Assembly created Bright from the Start: Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning by merging the state's Office of School Readiness with child care licensing and related units previously housed in the Department of Human Resources, the Department of Education, and the Georgia Child Care Council.[3] Marsha Moore served as DECAL's first commissioner.[3] The department's authority is codified at O.C.G.A. § 20-1A-1 et seq.[4]

Organization and functions

DECAL licenses and monitors center-based and home-based child care providers across Georgia, conducting unannounced inspections of licensed facilities at least twice a year.[5] As of 2025, the department serves more than 80,000 four-year-olds through Georgia's Pre-K Program and subsidizes child care for more than 40,000 children of low-income families through CAPS.[6] Quality Rated, DECAL's tiered quality rating and improvement system, awards participating child care programs a rating of one to three stars based on an on-site assessment.[7]

In its 2025 State of Preschool Yearbook, released in April 2026, the National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER) found that Georgia's Pre-K Program had become the first universal state-funded preschool program in the country to meet all ten of the institute's quality-standard benchmarks, which assess factors including teacher qualifications, class size, and program assessment.[8] NIEER attributed the milestone in part to a state investment of $97.6 million that funded reduced class sizes and pay parity between Georgia's Pre-K teachers and K-12 teachers; only five other states met all ten benchmarks that year, and none operated a universal program of comparable size.[8] A separate NIEER report had earlier identified Georgia among several states where Pre-K enrollment had declined since before the COVID-19 pandemic, a trend the institute said the state's quality investments were intended to help reverse.[9]

Oversight of child care providers

DECAL's regulation of the child care industry has drawn sustained scrutiny from Georgia news outlets. A multi-part Atlanta Journal-Constitution investigation found that the department's oversight of "exempt" child care programs, including many church-run operations not required to hold a state license, was effectively nonexistent, with state investigators rarely inspecting such programs and state officials unable to say how many exempt programs operated in Georgia.[10] The same investigation found that over a four-year period, $355 million in state child care subsidies, including $217 million from the CAPS program, went to day care providers the state had deemed noncompliant with licensing standards.[10]

A 2025 WSB-TV investigation found that DECAL frequently allows child care centers found to have committed serious violations, including cases involving injuries to children, to remain open under consent agreements and fines rather than revoking their licenses, and reported that the department's roughly 66 inspectors oversee more than 4,200 licensed centers statewide.[5] DECAL officials said the agency aims to help correctable violations be addressed while keeping programs available to families, reserving license revocation for the most serious infractions.[5]

Leadership

DECAL is headed by a commissioner appointed by the Governor of Georgia. Amy M. Jacobs has served as commissioner since her appointment by Governor Nathan Deal in 2014, overseeing an annual budget of more than $800 million.[11]

Headquarters

DECAL is headquartered in the East Tower of the James H. "Sloppy" Floyd Building at 2 Martin Luther King Jr. Drive SE in Atlanta.[12]

See also

References

  1. "Department of Early Care and Learning". Georgia.gov. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  2. "Georgia's Pre-K Week is turning ten!" (PDF). Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning. September 2020. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  3. "Decidedly DECAL [May 2014]". Digital Library of Georgia. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  4. "Rules and Regulations: Child Care Learning Centers, Chapter 591-1-1" (PDF). Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning. July 1, 2025. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  5. "Channel 2 Investigates looks at how the state deals with daycare violations". WSB-TV. August 2025. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  6. "Bright from the Start: Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning". Get Georgia Reading. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  7. "Quality Rated Program Manual" (PDF). Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  8. "Georgia leading the US in preschool quality and access, per national report". WABE. April 2026. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  9. "Executive Summary". National Institute for Early Education Research. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  10. "Some day care is unlicensed". The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  11. "About the Foundation". Georgia Early Education Foundation. Retrieved June 21, 2026.
  12. "Contact Us". Georgia Department of Early Care and Learning. Retrieved June 21, 2026.