Parents in central and western Maine will now get additional help paying for childcare thanks to a new endowment from the Catholic Foundation of Maine.

The foundation is giving $14,000 to Community Concepts and the Kennebec Valley Community Action Program to boost childcare programs that help working parents who are continuing their education.

Parents like Miranda Prime, 29, of Waterville say these programs are essential.

“Finishing school is huge,” Prime said Monday. “If you look at statistics and you look at a child’s growth, it’s very imperative that they don’t even, you know, just have someone to look up to, but that they can follow those footsteps.”

The foundation says it hopes others will give to the Father Arthur J. Dube-Emma J. Rossignol Child Care Endowment, which is currently funded at $525,000, to help it grow in the coming years.

Suzanne Walsh, CEO of KVCAP, said there are more than 50,000 children in Maine under the age of 6 who need childcare. And for an average family, childcare costs can take up about 20% of income, she said.

“When you couple that with the cost of housing, which can be anywhere from 30 to 50 percent of somebody’s household income, and transportation if they have it at all, there isn’t much left to spare,” she said. “This endowment and its generosity comes at a critical time for all of our families in Maine.”

Sister Judy Donovan of the Sisters of St. Joseph said over more than 100 years of service in Maine, they have focused on helping the poor and working poor. A few years ago, they received a donation and decided that the money could help address a pressing need in Maine — a lack of affordable childcare.

They spoke with several agencies and decided Community Concepts, which serves Androscoggin, Franklin and Oxford counties and KVCAP, which serves Kennebec and Somerset counties, would be the best groups to distribute the funds.

“These agencies work with working poor families and in childcare and we trust them to be able to disperse them to families that really need them,” she said.

Jim Martin, CEO of Community Concepts, said his organization runs the local Head Start program and offers several family services to help with things like nutrition and mental health supports.

“Reliable, affordable childcare is often the key that unlocks opportunities for parents to gain education and to find employment,” he said. “Without it, many parents are forced to choose between caring for their children or pursuing education or careers that could lift their families out of poverty.”