As the organizing partner, we’re excited to share some big news in celebration of the 30th anniversary of Children’s Week Florida™—registration for this year’s events are now open!

We hope you’ll join us in Tallahassee for a powerful week of advocacy and connection, uniting young children, teens, families, and dedicated professionals working to create a lasting impact across Florida.

You can register for Children's Week events and activities

using the buttons below — We look forward

to celebrating with you this April!

Advocacy Dinner and Awards Ceremony

Monday, April 14, 2025

5:00-8:00 PM

Donald L. Tucker Civic Center

Children's Day

Storybook Village

This year’s literacy space will also include Storybook Garden – a quiet, inviting, and unique ability-friendly area intended to serve a smaller set of children, who may need a more nurturing and supportive space to engage in during Children’s Day at the Capitol. 

Teen Day

During this teen enrichment event, middle and high school students will have the unique opportunity to delve into Florida’s legislative history, explore the legislative process, tour both the historic and current state capitol buildings, and engage directly with lawmakers and lobbyists.

The Children's Forum is seeking motivated and skilled professionals to join our team. If you are passionate about early care and education and eager to make a difference, we encourage you to apply for our open positions.

At the Forum, we connect educators, children, and families to early learning services and supports, both within and beyond the classroom, to promote positive experiences and outcomes for young children in school and life.

Celebration of the Hands is an incredible and larger than life display inside the Capitol Rotunda. Created from hand artwork submitted by young children, teens, teachers, families, and legislators from across the state, Celebration of the Hands, serves as a daily reminder to all Capitol visitors that the future of our children rests in our hands. You can see this magnificent display at the Capitol April 13-18.

Children's Week Florida^TM is now collecting hand artwork and would love to feature your masterpieces in the 2025 display!

Please submit

artwork before Friday, March 28.

To learn more, visit https://childrensweek.org/events/celebration-of-the-hands

The benefits of SEEC include:

• Free training—120 hours of online training and resources from Teaching Strategies®.
• Free coaching—access to a personal CDA^® coach and counselor.
• Access to a TEACH scholarship to cover the CDA^® assessment fee and completion bonus.
• Training and coaching available in English and Spanish. 

Created to attract and retain a strong and competent early learning workforce, SEEC allows the Children’s Forum to build on the findings and achievements of previous workforce programs. The initiative will support 260 educators throughout Florida in their journey to acquire a CDA^®. 

“SEEC will empower educators to prepare young children from high-need communities for success in school and in life,” said Erin Smeltzer, President and CEO of the Children’s Forum. “I want to acknowledge JPMorganChase’s commitment to the state of Florida on this initiative and Teaching Strategies^® for their collaboration on improving outcomes for educators and the families they serve.”

We are excited to announce that Help Me Grow^® Florida (HMGF) is expanding its services throughout the state! The Early Learning Coalition of Broward County and the Early Learning Coalition of Pinellas County have taken the charge in serving families in their communities.

Additionally, HMG Alachua at Partnership for Strong Families, funded by the Children’s Trust of Alachua County, became the most recent HMGF affiliate.

We look forward to enhancing support for young children and their families within Broward, Pinellas, and Alachua counties!

HMGF provides free expert knowledge on child development and ensures children and families are connected to needed community-based services and supports. They are based in 43 counties across Florida and are constantly growing. Together, they are working to help all children thrive.

We are incredibly proud of Erin Smeltzer, our President and CEO, for being recognized as one of the newest Bosses for Babies with The Children's Movement of Florida! As a statewide initiative, Bosses for Babies is designed to engage business leaders in boosting their workforce and contributing to community prosperity through family-focused practices.

The Children’s Forum is committed to adopting policies that encourage employees to balance work and family life. These include generous parental leave, remote work options, a family-friendly office environment where children are welcome and their visits are celebrated, and flexible schedules to accommodate both childcare and school drop-off/pick-up.

You can learn more about Erin and how she is creating a family-friendly work environment at https://www.childrensmovementflorida.org/.../erin-smeltzer

As the owner of Gardner Media and a Forum Forward member, Joe Gardner is cultivating relationships within the early learning community in Florida. In addition, he has seen a shift in the world of book publishing and reading, and thinks books are needed now more than ever.

"For so much of my adult life, talking about books meant percentage discounts, planograms, return rates, shipping costs," said Gardner. "Now, we’re talking about brain science, about how children learn, and how books are such an important part of that."

Gardner has been a publishing professional for over 35 years, and to say that he’s witnessed a tremendous change in the market for children’s books would be an understatement. "In my adult life, the pace of change in what is published, distributed and read has been seismic and continuous," he added.

More books are published today than ever before. Yet reading rates, among children of various ages, is plummeting as attention spans are reconfigured by digital communication and social media. The pandemic, and the associated surge in mental health issues, has exacerbated a growing trend in the loss of concentration, and of connection.

"Engaging children and families in active literacy has never been more important," said Gardner. "We know that higher rates of literacy in early childhood improve our children’s long-term health outcomes. We also know that books and reading create connection, that interaction and conversation stimulate insight and creativity, and give us the joy of sharing ideas and feelings in a sometimes surprising way. In a world where challenges sometimes seem so overwhelming, experiences such as these invite and encourage us to be hopeful."

Gardner Media is a family-owned publisher and wholesale distributor of books that support the developmental stages of children 0 – 8 and their families. Its published lines include Spanish and Haitian Creole bilingual books.

Its wholesale distribution program helps educators curate and develop reading lists for specific themes and programs, with an emphasis on meeting administrative, budgeting and scheduling issues associated with both for and not-for-profit entities. The company is unique in its focus on books for early childhood and can supply any book that is currently in print and available.

Gardner Media is also a custom publishing program and has produced several books specifically for education partners and their initiatives.

"We are proud of the relationships we’ve formed with early childhood literacy providers in Florida," said Gardner. "We are grateful to be working with our partners supporting, promoting and participating in local community programming."

Participants of the Florida Early Childhood Advocacy Fellowship (FECAF) began the second half of their journey with a visit to Tallahassee! Their jam-packed two days included important conversations with legislators at the Capitol, an intimate tour of the House Chamber with Representative Dana Trabulsy, and a crash course in bill analysis at the Children’s Forum. In addition to our virtual meetings, these in-person opportunities offer the group unique experiences and insight that empower them to make connections as they continue their advocacy adventures.  

The Children’s Forum is excited for their return to the Capitol in April 2025. During the Children’s Week Florida™ events, the fellows will have opportunities to further expand their network and deepen their advocacy skills. The trip will conclude with a special graduation ceremony, celebrating their commitment and future impact in the field. We are proud of the hard work and dedication this year’s group has shown during their journey.

Be sure to follow all of our Children’s Forum socials to stay up to date on FECAF events and news!

Click here to learn more about the Florida Early Childhood Advocacy Fellowship program.

We’re happy to share the 2023-2024 Children's Forum Annual Report, highlighting the incredible impact we've made together over the past year. This report showcases key achievements and the collective efforts of advocates, families, and partners dedicated to supporting Florida’s children and youth.

We invite you to explore the report and celebrate the milestones we’ve reached, the challenges we’ve overcome, and the continued commitment to creating a brighter future for all children.