Efforts underway to expand access to high-quality child care and pre-K programs in Pennsylvania are aimed at improving school readiness for low-income children and mitigating the wide achievement gaps that plague them in the later grades. In order for those efforts to be successful, more early education providers must have the capacity and financial stability to serve children in high-quality settings. But what does it really cost to provide high-quality care, and are the reimbursement rates for public programs that allow providers to serve low-income children adequate to support quality? If not, what sacrifices are made? Because there is no statewide data on provider finances, little is known about the true cost of high-quality child care and how high-quality Pennsylvania providers are currently making ends meet. As a first step towards filling in these knowledge gaps, Research for Action (RFA) studied how six early education providers of different shapes, sizes, and community contexts from across the Commonwealth financed high-quality child care. (author abstract)