Partner Up! Grant Program

The Partner Up! grant program will provide funding to support partnerships between businesses who purchase slots at existing regulated child care providers. The various Partner Up! cohorts have been funded by the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA), the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act (CRRSA), the Preschool Development Grant (PDG), and Quality Jobs, Equity, Strategy and Training (QUEST).The funding from this program can be used to increase staff compensation, reserve child care slots for local business employees, improve the quality of a child care program, and more.

As of December 1, 2023, DCF took over the administration and grant payments of the Partner Up! program. Businesses and parents (if there is a parent pay portion) are now directly responsible for paying their portion of the True Cost of Care directly to the child care program.

If you have any issues with your payments or need updates to your contract, please submit them using our online form by November 30, 2024. After that date, we will not review any more missing payment issues.

Partner Up! includes three cohorts of already awarded businesses. At this time, there are no further rounds of Partner Up! funding planned.

View a full list of all awardees from Cohort 1, Cohort 2, and Cohort 3.

Additional Resources

Monthly True Cost of Care Tables

The per child monthly true cost of care amounts for part-time and full-time care are below.

Full-Time (21+ hours per Week)
Age Group	Monthly Total	10% (Maximum parent pay for newly contracting businesses)	25% (Minimum contribution for newly contracting businesses)	35% (Minimum contribution for businesses renewing contracts)
0-1 year, 11 months	$1,800	$180	$450	$730
2-year-old	$1,400	$140	$350	$490
3-year-old	$1,100	$110	$275	$385
4 & 5-year-olds	$1,000	$100	$250	$350
6+ years old	$900	$90	$225	$315
Part-Time (1-20 hours per week)
Age Group	Monthly Total	10% (Maximum parent pay for newly contracting businesses)	25% (Minimum contribution for newly contracting businesses)	35% (Minimum contribution for businesses renewing contracts)
0-1 year, 11 months	$1,200	$120	$300	$420
2-year-old	$925	$92.50	$231.25	$323.75
3-year-old	$725	$72.50	$181.25	$253.75
4 & 5-year-olds	$675	$67.50	$168.75	$236.25
6+ years old	$600	$60	$150	$210

Cohort 3 Terms and Conditions

Download the PDFs below to access the Partner Up! Terms and Conditions for Cohort 3.

Sample Tuition Contract Addendum

This is a sample contract addendum for providers participating in Partner Up! The Partner Up! grant program is administered by the Wisconsin Department of Children and Families (DCF). Both providers who are contracting as a business for their own employees and those providing care for children can use this document.

Businesses awarded a new grant in 2023 include a 10% parent pay portion. Some businesses chose to cover that cost for their employees. In these cases, the child care provider will receive the full business and parent pay portions of the True Cost of Care directly from the business. It also means this sample contract is not needed.

For businesses that are not covering the parent pay, parents must pay their portion to the provider directly. This includes the 10% parent contribution.

We recommend child care providers either create a fee addendum, as described below, or sign a new contract with parents. This contract should be for the length of participation in Partner Up! Child care providers may use the language included here or may create their own forms.

Be sure to date the contract or addendum, save a copy for your own records, and provide a copy to the parents/guardians.

Sample Survey on Employee Needs for Child Care

Download the Survey on Employee Needs for Child Care to gain better insight into the child care needs of your employees. This sample survey is provided in a Word document format so that you can adjust the questions to best fit your business. You can send the survey to your employees in this format to fill out, by email, or create your own online form. Please keep in mind that your employees may perceive these questions as sensitive, so we strongly suggest that:

You keep the survey anonymous and offer for employees to share their name only if they want to.
You keep all results anonymous and unidentifiable when sharing.

Download the survey now.

Project Growth Evaluation

Project Growth is one of many initiatives DCF has introduced to stabilize our communities’ child care systems and bolster Wisconsin’s economy. To date, $30 million has been invested in businesses, communities, child care programs, and families through Project Growth and its two grant programs: Dream Up! and Partner Up! Now that two cohorts have been awarded for each grant program, DCF has partnered with KW2 to conduct an evaluation of both grant programs. These findings were released preliminarily in October 2022 and the final report for Partner Up! is now available as well.

Frequently Asked Questions

Have questions? Visit the Partner Up! Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) webpage.

Questions? Contact DCFMBDECEProjectGrowth@wisconsin.gov