About Oscar Tang
In 2018, I sent an email to San Francisco’s Child and Family Policy Committee asking a simple question: before you plan to build new child care capacity, has anyone confirmed whether existing providers are actually full?
No one had an answer. So I went and found one. I surveyed 64 providers and discovered 118 infant/toddler vacancies and 32% of providers who couldn’t even access the system to report openings.
Eight years later, in February 2026, a city supervisor asked the exact same question at a budget hearing. The system still had no answer. I did — because I never stopped building one.
What I Build
- SF Child Care Dashboard — 1,000+ facilities across 11 districts, 27 ZIP codes, 6 data sources
- ECE Policy Simulator — Data visualization so communities can make decisions looking at the same numbers
- familychildcaresf.com — Vacancy registry where providers manage their own listings directly
- MyChildCarePlan.org — California’s statewide platform for families to find child care (my day job at the CA Child Care R&R Network)
Background
My family has been in family child care since 2011. We run 6 programs in San Francisco — if they all closed, roughly 100 families couldn’t go to work.
I arrived from Guangzhou via Hong Kong with a computer science degree and an immigrant family’s practical needs. I walked into the early childhood education field and never left.
During COVID, I independently ran a survey across 36 California counties — 375 responses — and found that 309 providers had received nothing from a $50 million federal allocation. I spent years advocating until the state’s mandatory reporter training was translated from English-only into Cantonese, Mandarin, and Vietnamese.
Recognition
- Rosie Kennedy Award 2021 — Language equity advocacy (California Family Child Care Network)
- “50 at 50” Honorees — Children’s Council of San Francisco (with Pyrena Hui Tang)
- Home Grown Leading from Home — National cohort member, 2021–present
- Board Member — Family Child Care Association of San Francisco (2016–present)
- Founding Member — Asian Early Childhood Educators Alliance (AECEA)
- Board Member — California Family Child Care Network (CFCCN)
Partners & Collaborators
Translation & Interpretation: SF Office of Early Care and Education (OECE) · California Department of Social Services (CDSS) · Children’s Council of San Francisco · Child Care Coordinating Council of San Mateo County · Wu Yee Children’s Services
Training & Consultation: Family Child Care Association of San Francisco · Chinese Family Child Care Network · First 5 San Francisco
Technical Assistance: Low Income Investment Fund (LIIF) · Family child care providers (individual TA)
Contact
- Email: oscar@mrchildcare.com
- Phone: 628-777-3986