ITEM	Question/Description	Response
Domain 1: Research team and reflexivity
Personal characteristics
Interviewer/facilitator	Which author(s) conducted the interviews or focus groups?	All authors participated in at least one interview.
Credentials	What were the researcher’s credentials?	PhDs with extensive experience in interviews, qualitative methodology, and childhood.
Occupation	What was the occupation of the authors during the study?	Researchers.
Gender	Was the researcher male or female?	Female.
Experience and training	What experience or training did the researcher have?	Specific training and prior experience in qualitative studies using focus groups/interviews.
Relationship with participants
Relationship established	Was a relationship established prior to the study?	No.
Participant knowledge of the interviewer	What did the participants know about the interviewer?	Participants were not given formal information about the researcher beforehand. However, at the start of the interview, details of their training, credentials, and position were provided.
Interviewer characteristics	What characteristics were reported about the interviewer/facilitator?
Domain 2: Study design
Theoretical framework
Methodological orientation and theory	What methodological orientation was applied to support the study?	A qualitative approach based on phenomenology and thematic analysis was used.
Participant selection
Sampling	How was the sample selected?	Sampling was based on the level of involvement in the early childhood care system. Convenience sampling identified key informants.
Method of interviews	How were participants interviewed?	In person or online.
Sample size	How many participants were included in the study?	N = 28.
Non-participation	How many participants refused or dropped out?	N = 0.
Setting
Interview location	Where was the data collected?	Researchers traveled to the interviewee’s preferred location for face-to-face interviews.
Presence of non-participants	Was anyone else present besides the interviewer and participants?	No.
Sample description	What are the fundamental characteristics of the sample?	The sample included families, technical staff/coordinators, academics, and policymakers.
Data collection
Interview guide	Were questions, prompts, or guides provided by the authors? Were they tested?	A shared interview guide based on four thematic axes was adapted to each sample group.
Repeat interviews	Were any interviews repeated? How many?	No.
Audio/video recordings	Did the research use audio or video recordings to collect data?	Yes. For face-to-face interviews, a voice recorder was used with prior and verbal consent. For online interviews, the app’s recording tool was used.
Field notes	Were field notes made during and/or after the interviews or focus groups?	No field notes were made during interviews. Memos were created during analysis in Atlas.ti.
Duration	What was the duration of the interviews or focus groups?	Interviews lasted between 40 min and 1 h.
Data saturation	Was data saturation discussed?	No. Due to the small sample size, data saturation was not addressed.
Transcript return	Were transcripts returned to participants for comments and/or corrections?	No. Transcripts were not returned, but their integrity was ensured in the informed consent.
Domain 3: Data analysis and findings
Data analysis
Number of data coders	How many coders analyzed the data?	N = 1.
Coding tree description	Did the authors provide a description of the coding tree?	Yes. Two coding trees were provided: one showed code relationships (Figure 1) and the other showed co-occurrence strength (Supplementary Materials).
Theme identification	Were themes identified in advance or derived from the data?	Themes were derived from the data by grouping codes from interviews.
Software	What software was used to manage the data?	ATLAS.ti Mac (version 24.2.0).
Participant checking	Did participants provide feedback on the findings?	No. Feedback has not yet been provided but will be.
Presentation of findings
Quotations	Were participant quotations presented to illustrate themes/results? Were they identified in the text?	Yes. Verbatim quotes were presented and identified by group and interview number.
Data and findings consistency	Was there consistency between the data and the findings?	Yes.
Clarity of major themes	Were major themes clearly presented in the results?	Yes.
Clarity of minor themes	Is there a description of diverse cases or discussion of minor themes?	Yes.