Executive Director of Child Care Operations

State of Maryland•Baltimore City, MD

3d•Onsite

About The Position

The Executive Director (ED) of the Child Care Operations Bureau (CCOB) provides statewide leadership, strategic direction, and operational oversight for Maryland’s Child Care Licensing (CCL) and Child Care Scholarship (CCS) programs. The ED ensures statewide consistency, equity, responsiveness, and high-quality customer service for families, child care providers, and community partners. The ED oversees all regulatory, operational, policy, fiscal, and workforce components of the Bureau while driving modernization, customer-centered service delivery, and continuous improvement aligned with the Office of Early Childhood’s strategic vision. A core responsibility of the ED is leading a comprehensive statewide restructuring of the Child Care Licensing system to improve responsiveness, reduce the time needed to license new programs, strengthen provider capacity-building, and modernize operations. This includes evaluating national models, designing a dual-director structure (inspections/compliance and capacity-building/technical assistance), and implementing a data-driven, evidence-based, user-centered design process involving regional offices, licensing staff, unions, providers, Child Care Resource Centers (CCRCs), and interest holders. The ED ensures alignment with HB 477 (2025), which directs MSDE to analyze and propose updates to child care licensing rules—covering staffing, ratios, physical standards, profitability, and cross-state benchmarks—with interim and final reports due in 2026. While the ED does not oversee IT systems directly, they work in continuous partnership with the Executive Director of Finance and IT Systems to ensure that CCOB’s business requirements, data needs, workflows, and user experiences inform the design, procurement, enhancement, and implementation of IT systems that support licensing and scholarship operations. The ED ensures CCS program operations meet federal Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF) compliance expectations and collaborates with the CCS Director and the ED of Finance and IT Systems to strengthen processes, improve data use, enhance payment accuracy, and reduce improper payments. The ED serves as MSDE’s lead for monthly statewide child care provider meetings, ensuring transparency, feedback, and partnership. As a key member of the Office of Early Childhood leadership team, the ED leads statewide efforts to ensure safe, developmentally supportive, and high-quality child care for all Maryland children while improving outcomes for families and child care providers.

Requirements

Bachelor’s degree from an accredited college or university in Public Administration, Business Administration, Education, Early Childhood Education, Human Services, Community Engagement, Social Work, Public Policy, Organizational Leadership, or a related field.
Five (5) years of progressively responsible management experience in early childhood education, childcare administration, human services, regulatory operations, public administration, or a related field.
At least five (5) years of senior-level leadership experience overseeing multiple programs, divisions, or operational units with responsibility for strategic planning, policy implementation, fiscal management, and workforce supervision.

Nice To Haves

Experience leading statewide childcare licensing, childcare subsidy/scholarship, early childhood education, or regulatory compliance programs.
Experience implementing large-scale organizational restructuring, business process redesign, or operational modernization initiatives.
Experience designing and implementing customer-centered service delivery models, human-centered design strategies, or Lean process improvement methodologies.
Experience overseeing childcare licensing systems, inspections, compliance monitoring, technical assistance, provider capacity-building, or quality improvement initiatives.
Experience developing or revising regulations, policies, or administrative rules, including stakeholder engagement and change management processes.
Experience administering federal grant-funded programs, including Child Care and Development Fund (CCDF), Preschool Development Grants (PDG), or similar federally funded initiatives.
Experience with organizational readiness for regulatory reviews, licensing inspections, and funding-related monitoring.
Experience presenting policy recommendations, legislative analyses, or operational reports to executive leadership, governing boards, or legislative bodies.
Experience managing large-scale, interdependent operational programs involving regulatory compliance, service delivery, grants, contracts, or public benefit programs.
Experience managing budgets, contracts, procurements, and fiscal accountability processes.
Experience collaborating with diverse stakeholders, including government agencies, community organizations, service providers, advocacy groups, and the public.
Extensive knowledge of childcare licensing regulations, subsidy administration, early childhood systems, and national best practices in regulatory modernization.
Knowledge of state and federal early childhood funding streams, fiscal accountability requirements, and program integrity standards.
Skill in leading complex, statewide change initiatives involving multiple stakeholder groups and competing priorities.
Ability to build consensus among diverse stakeholder groups while maintaining accountability for outcomes.
Ability to drive innovation, operational excellence, and customer-focused service delivery across a statewide organization.

Responsibilities

Provides statewide executive leadership for CCOB to ensure unified, consistent implementation of licensing and scholarship operations.
Leads Bureau participation in statewide initiatives including the CCDF State Plan, Preschool Development Grant (PDG), Blueprint for Maryland’s Future, COMAR modernization, and HB 477 alignment.
Develops annual Bureau and Branch workplans with KPIs tied to inspection timeliness, licensing throughput, provider capacity-building, scholarship processing timelines, payment accuracy, and customer service.
Directs the use of evidence-based operational practices such as risk-based monitoring, efficient licensing pathways, and improved provider business supports.
Ensures coordinated work across CCRCs and Local Early Childhood Advisory Councils (LECACs) to assess local child care needs, support provider start-up and expansion, and strengthen early childhood infrastructure.
Oversees operational and fiscal management of CCOB contracts, grants, procurements, and vendor relationships with strong internal controls.
Leads data-driven continuous improvement initiatives using Lean processes, human-centered design, and real-time feedback from staff and providers.
Ensures compliance with state laws, federal regulations, fiscal policies, audit requirements, and proactive risk management.
Leads the statewide restructuring of the Child Care Licensing system, designing and implementing a modern dual-director model to support health and safety inspections, compliance, provider capacity-building, technical assistance, and root-cause resolution for non-compliance.
Leads statewide communication on child care licensing, CCS, regulatory changes, and operational updates.
Incorporates user experience and customer-centered design principles into Bureau operations through structured feedback loops with families, providers, and staff.
Serves as the primary liaison with CCRCs to align technical assistance, provider training, business supports, and recruitment/retention initiatives with statewide goals.
Ensures consistent implementation and interpretation of child care licensing and scholarship policies statewide.
Leads modernization of CCS and licensing regulations (COMAR), including HB 477 implementation and related stakeholder engagement and change management.
Directs data-informed monitoring and evaluation systems to track inspection timeliness, compliance trends, licensing throughput, CCS processing, fiscal integrity, and provider capacity.
Leads statewide communication on child care licensing, CCS, regulatory changes, and operational updates.