Chancellor Kamar Samuels has tapped a former executive of a national home-based daycare association as his top aide for the New York City school system’s early childhood office, just a couple of days before the launch of free childcare for 2-year-olds, Samuels announced Tuesday.
Erica Phillips, who most recently served as executive director of the National Association for Family Child Care, will become the deputy chancellor of the Division of Early Childhood Education, according to a news release. She is a more than 20-year veteran of the industry and born to a family of childcare providers.
“As the daughter and granddaughter of early educators and caregivers, early childhood education is deeply personal for me,” Phillips said in a statement. “A quality early childhood education is what everyone deserves, and what I am ready to help deliver as Deputy Chancellor.”
Before her most recent position, Phillips was the president and served in other roles for eight years at All Our Kin, a nonprofit that trains and advocates for childcare workers in residential settings. Her experience with home-based providers could pay off as Mayor Mamdani looks to expand the city’s free childcare to even younger children, whose parents may prefer family daycares to larger childcare centers for their infants and toddlers.
Mamdani’s expansion will start this year with the first 2,000 seats of his signature 2-K program added in five local school districts, with plans to expand citywide over the next few years. The first day of school is Thursday.
Phillips takes over the early childhood division from Simone Hawkins, a well-regarded education official who stepped down from Samuels’ cabinet as Mamdani expanded the role of the Mayor’s Office of Child Care and Early Childhood Education, which is run out of City Hall rather than the education department.
Phillips’ first day is Sept. 18, according to an email Samuels wrote to the division. The date leaves a nine-day gap between when Hawkins leaves and Phillips starts, during which the division will report to the office of the chancellor’s first deputy, Danielle Giunta.
Beyond helping to launch 2-K, Phillips will be tasked with fixing payment delays and restoring headcount in the division, starting with 200 new hires. The office suffered an exodus of hundreds of employees under former Mayor Eric Adams as he backed off plans to expand free preschool.
“Child care isn’t a luxury,” Samuels said in a statement. “It’s a critical part of our city’s infrastructure and one of the most important investments we can make in our children, and I am proud to work alongside incoming Deputy Chancellor Erica Phillips to make this a reality.”
“Universal child care is not some distant aspiration. It is an urgent priority for this administration,” Mamdani said in a statement. “That is what Erica will help us deliver as Deputy Chancellor.”