Jessica Sager &
Janna Wagner

Jessica Sager, J.D., and Janna Wagner are founders of All Our Kin, a nonprofit dedicated to training, supporting and sustaining family child care educators. All Our Kin provides home-based providers with the resources and community connections to create quality early childhood environments and run successful small businesses.  

Galvanized by the stringent conditions imposed on working parents by welfare reform in the ‘90s, Ms. Sager and Ms. Wagner founded All Our Kin as a lab school to equip mothers to open licensed programs in their homes, allowing them to care for their own children and contribute to their communities. Home-based child care is a vital service, offering flexible, accessible care that is often culturally and linguistically responsive. Most importantly, quality early care plays a critical role in early childhood development.   

Today, All Our Kin is a national network offering comprehensive direct support, including licensing assistance, business courses, and educational training and coaching in English and Spanish. It also advocates for fair compensation and ensures family care educators are at the forefront of policy discussions – advocacy that is critical given that nationally, family child care educators earn $29,377 annually (roughly $10 an hour). Studies show that within one year of completing All Our Kin’s licensing or business programs, most providers increase earnings by $5,000 or more.  

Independent analyses show that All Our Kin’s work contributes to the creation of thriving, neighborhood-based, early learning environments. All Our Kin-trained providers generate high scores on assessments, which correlates strongly with positive outcomes in terms of children’s cognitive, social and emotional skill development and attitudes toward learning.