When a Hispanic or Latino family enrolls their three-year-old in a Catholic early childhood program, they are not simply choosing a preschool. They are making an act of confianza—trust. For many, placing their youngest child in the care of any institution is significant. Placing them in the hands of a Catholic school is more than that. It is an invitation that, if answered with a genuine mission, can anchor a family to Catholic education for a generation.
More than 90 percent of brain development occurs before age five—a window when relationships, language, and experience shape everything that follows. Nobel economist James Heckman has documented that quality early childhood education for lowerincome children yields an estimated 13 percent annual return on investment. Hispanic and Latino children have the most to gain yet remain underrepresented in formal early childhood settings—not because families don’t value early education, but because many already have one, in the form of abuela, tía, and the extended family network that surrounds their youngest children. Mission-driven Catholic early childhood programs don’t seek to replace that network. They seek to join it.
In Hispanic and Latino culture, confianza is not taken for granted. It is built slowly, through consistent presence, honest communication, and genuine care—and it is precisely what mission-driven early childhood programs must earn first.
Early childhood education programs engage families at the most formative moment: the very beginning. A family whose first experience is one of genuine welcome—where their child’s name is pronounced with care, where Spanish is an asset, where the grandmother who drops off on Tuesdays gets greeted with the same warmth as the child herself—will carry that trust through kindergarten, middle school, and beyond. A family whose first experience is one of cultural invisibility may never return. And they will tell others.
“After more than a decade in early childhood education, I’ve learned that families are not first looking for a perfect program—they are looking for people they can trust with what matters most to them. Trust is built in the small moments: greeting families by name, listening before speaking, honoring their culture, and showing every day that their child is deeply known and loved.”
— Nazly Cabral, Director, Annunciation Catholic Preschool, Orlando, FL
Confianza does not happen automatically because a school is Catholic. It happens because the people within it choose, every day, to show up for families in ways that make them feel known.
There is a meaningful difference between serving Hispanic and Latino families and accompanying them. Service delivers a product—safe environments, qualified teachers, and academic readiness. Accompaniment goes further: it treats families not as beneficiaries of the mission, but as co-authors of it.
“The Church which ‘goes forth’ is a community of missionary disciples who take the first step, who are involved and supportive, who bear fruit and rejoice.”
— Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium, 24
For Catholic early childhood leaders, “taking the first step” means reaching Hispanic and Latino families proactively—in Spanish, through trusted community relationships, in partnership with local parishes and diocesan Hispanic ministry offices—rather than waiting for them to find their way to your door. What that accompaniment looks like in practice is captured powerfully in this reflection from a Latina preschool director:
“I currently have a family whose son has autism and requires additional support in the classroom. Because their child needed extra care, trust did not come easily at first—and understandably so. But over time, they saw the love, patience, and intentional care we gave their son each day. Eventually, the relationship shifted from hesitation to deep trust. Now they tell me they know every recommendation I make comes from a place of wanting what is best for their child. That kind of confianza is not built in a single meeting; it is built through daily accompaniment.”
What makes Catholic early childhood education irreplaceable for Hispanic and Latino families is what it alone can offer: the integration of faith, family, and formation from the very first years of life.
Many Hispanic and Latino Catholic families already live a rich domestic faith—prayer before meals, devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe, and the celebration of feast days as family events. The catechism affirms that “parents have the first responsibility for the education of their children” (CCC 2223). For these families, this is not the teaching they need to receive. It is something they are already practicing. Mission-driven early childhood education programs honor this by treating the classroom as a continuation of the home rather than a departure from it.
“For Hispanic and Latino families, confianza is earned over time. It happens when parents feel seen, respected, and included as partners in their child’s education. As a teacher and now as a preschool director, I have seen that once families know you truly care for their child, they don’t just stay connected to the school—they become part of the community.”
The unique value proposition of Catholic early childhood education is one that no secular preschool can duplicate. When we believe it and live it faithfully, it resonates with exactly the families we most want to reach.
Catholic early childhood programs are often the smallest, least visible programs in a Catholic school. They are also the most important. For Hispanic and Latino families—who represent the fastest-growing population in Catholic schools and the future of Catholic education in many dioceses—the early childhood years are not a prologue to the story. They are the story.
Every three-year-old who walks through the door is the beginning of a family relationship that, cultivated with intention, could last 20 years and beyond. The demographic moment is here. The cultural alignment is present. None of this requires a complete overhaul—it requires a readjustment of position. A daily decision to see Hispanic and Latino families not as a population to serve, but as partners in a shared mission.
Maria Del Amois the director of Hispanic/Latino engagement for NCEA.maria@ncea.org