Vol. III, Issue 20—November 1, 2014--November 15, 2014
Contents
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Highlights
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Federal Updates
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Policy Trends and Analysis
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New Research
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Upcoming Events
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Other News,
Announcements and
Resources
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News from the States
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Arizona
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California
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Colorado
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Georgia
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Illinois
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Kansas
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Louisiana
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Maine
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New Mexico
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New York
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Oregon
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Washington
HIGHLIGHTS:
Senate Reauthorizes Child Care Development
Block Grant
The Senate voted 88-1 to pass the Child Care Development Block Grant (CCDBG),
approving changes made by the House of Representatives earlier this fall. The
program, which helps parents obtain childcare, had not been authorized since 1996.
The CCDBG will be sent to President Obama for his signature. Read more here, here
and here.
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FEDERAL UPDATES:
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Maternal, Infant and Early Childhood Home Visiting Program: Fight
Crime Invest in Kids, an advocacy group of law enforcement officers, issued
a statement calling on Congress to renew the Maternal, Infant and Early
Childhood Home Visiting Program (MIECHV). Read more here.
Home Visiting Evidence of Effectiveness Project: Three new home
visiting models met the Health and Human Services (HHS) criteria for
evidence of effectiveness and received approval as evidence-based
programs. Read more here.
Office of Head Start: The Office of Head Start (OHS) announced new
changes to the Early Childhood Learning and Knowledge Center (ECLKC)
and that it had recently created resource apps for smart phones. Read more
here.
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POLICY TRENDS AND ANALYSIS:
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Child Care: The Center for the Study of Child Care Employment released
the study, “Worthy Work STILL Unlivable Wages: The Early Childhood
Workforce 25 Years after the National Child Care Staffing Study,” which
analyzes the wage levels, educational attainment, turnover and public
benefits usage of the early childhood workforce. The report concludes with
national and state policy recommendations to improve compensation levels
for the early childhood workforce. Read more here.
Social-Emotional Development: The Brookings Institution released the
report, “The Character Factor: Measures and Impact of Drive and
Prudence,” which used data from the Social Genome Model (SGM) to
measure character development from early childhood and identify its impact
on adult outcomes. Read more here.
Head Start: The Center for Law and Social Policy (CLASP) unveiled its
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annual state-by-state analysis of Head Start and Early Head Start programs.
CLASP used the yearly Program Information Reports (PIR) submitted by
Head Start grantees to identify state-level trends. Read more here.
Early Childhood Health: The Work Support Strategies project wrote a new
report, “Joint SNAP and Medicaid/CHIP Program Eligibility and Participation
in 2011,” which examines the participation rates of children and families
eligible for health care. The authors found that more eligible families and
children could be enrolled. Read more here.
Child Homelessness: The National Center on Family Homelessness
released the report, “America’s Youngest Outcasts: A Report Card on Child
Homelessness.” Finding an 8% increase in the number of children
experiencing homelessness nationally, the report breaks down the trends by
state and ends with policy recommendations for addressing the issue.
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NEW RESEARCH:
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Language Acquisition: Researchers recently published the study, “Gender
Differences in Adult-Infant Communication in the First Months of Life,” which
analyzed recorded interactions between newborn infants and their parents.
The researchers found that mothers talked with and responded to their
infants more than fathers. Read more here.
Cognitive Development: According to a study published in the Journal of
Learning Disabilities, children who attended preschool appeared to have a
decreased risk of persistent math difficulties. Read more here.
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UPCOMING EVENTS:
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December 2: The Thomas B. Fordham Institute is hosting the conference,
‘Education for Upward Mobility.” The event will explore ways schools can
promote socioeconomic mobility. Hugh Price of the Brookings Institution is
the keynote speaker. Read more here.
December 10: The White House will host a Summit on Early Education
during which President Obama will announce the awards for the Preschool
Development Grants and Early Head Start-Child Care (EHS-CC)
Partnerships. Read more here.
December 10: The Robert Shanker Institute will continue its Reclaiming the
Promise Conversation Series with the event, “What Happens to Beneficial
Effects of Quality Pre-K.” David J. Armor, W. Steven Barnett and Barbara
Bowman are slated as panelists. Register here.
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OTHER NEWS, ANNOUNCEMENTS AND RESOURCES:
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Support for Early Learning: A post on the National Institute for Early
Education Research’s (NIEER) blog provided a detailed outline of the recent
polling done regarding public support for early learning initiatives. The post
explored how a person’s political orientation had an impact on their
opinions. Read more here.
Child Care: An article by the New America Foundation overviewed the state
childcare licensing laws and described the proposed requirements in the
Child Care Development Block Grant (CCDBG) reauthorization recently
approved by the Senate. Read more here.
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Early Childhood Workforce: The New Republic interviewed a male
preschool teacher with more than 20 years of experience to learn about his
perspective working in a field predominated by women. Read more here.
Family Engagement: The New America Foundation provided an overview
of two-generation strategies, including Head Start’s family support services
that are being proposed to promote economic mobility for children. Read
more here.
Prek-3: An article in Phi Delta Kappan explored the role school districts can
play in implementing a birth-to-3rd grade approach by outlining specific
strategies that can be used. Read more here.
Quality Improvement: The BUILD Initiative created the Quality Rating
Improvement System (QRIS) Compendium, an online resource that details
QRIS elements and profiles state-level QRIS efforts. Read more here.
Early Childhood Development: An article in The Atlantic emphasized the
importance of incorporating math and science concepts into early education
for 3- and 4-year-olds. Read more here.
Early Childhood Policy: In a New York Times op-ed, Nicholas Kristoff
used the early childhood initiatives in Oklahoma, which include state prekindergarten for all 4-year-olds and Educare preschools, to discuss the
politics of early education reform. Kristoff believes early learning proposals
have bipartisan support. Read more here.
Early Childhood Instruction: Tools of the Mind has created a new
curriculum that focuses on developing executive functioning skills in
children. Read more here.
Early Childhood Investment: An opinion piece in Forbes advocated for
increased use of the Pay for Success model for funding public programs.
The author highlighted The Social Impact Bond Act proposed in Congress
as an example. Read more here.
Screen Time: Zero to Three recently released new guidance on screen time
for young children, which does not categorically advise against screen time
for infants and toddlers. An article on Slate discussed the screen time
debate and voiced support for the new recommendations. Read more here.
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NEWS FROM THE STATES:
Arizona
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Arizona's First Things First, the Flagstaff Community Foundation, and
private donors to the United Way of Northern Arizona have provided funding
for KinderCamp, a summer program designed to give children the skills
needed to be prepared for kindergarten. Last year, more than 300 children
were enrolled in the Coconino County program. Read more here.
California
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A story on Southern California Public Radio described the funding model
used in San Francisco to finance its Preschool For All program. Read more
here.
The California Budget Project discussed the recent increases in child care
reimbursement rates mandated in the state’s 2014-2015 spending plan.
Read more here.
Spending for the state superintendent of public instruction outpaced
donations for all other statewide offices. EdSource detailed the outside
groups that have donated to both of the candidates running in the election.
Read more here.
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EdSource analyzed the implications of Tom Torlakson’s successful bid for
the state superintendent post. According to the author, Torlakson’s election
would work to support the reforms currently being implemented. Read more
here.
Schools in Marin County are experiencing difficulty in hiring teachers for
open positions. The pool of candidates entering the workforce has declined
due to cuts in teacher preparation programs and decreased participation in
the programs. Read more here.
Colorado
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Voters in Denver approved a ballot measure to reauthorize the Denver
Preschool Program and implement a.03 tax increase to fund the initiative.
Read more here.
Georgia
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The Department of Early Care and Learning commissioned The University
of Georgia and Georgia State University to conduct a study to investigate
the impact of child care industry on the state economy. The report will be
released in June 2015. Read more here.
Illinois
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The Chicago City Council voted to approve Mayor Rahm Emanuel’s
proposal to use social impact bonds to enroll 2,618 additional 4-year olds in
Child-Parent Centers. Read more here.
Kansas
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The Kansas Health Institute reviewed the impact of Gov. Sam Brownback’s
approach to reducing childhood poverty, which has emphasized welfare-towork programs. The author summarized the debate surrounding the
effectiveness of the Governor’s policies. Read more here.
Louisiana
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New Orleans Public Radio conducted an interview with Melanie Bronfin, the
executive director of the Policy Institute for Children, who offered an
overview of the state early education reform law, Act 3. Read more here.
Members of an advisory panel met to make recommendations to the state
Board of Elementary and Secondary Education on their planned adoption of
Act 3. Ensuring adequate funding for the new requirements was a major
point of discussion. Read more here.
Maine
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The Bangor Daily News profiled the state lawmakers from the Republican
and Democratic parties that plan on running for leadership positions in the
127th legislature. Read more here.
New Mexico
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The chief executive officer of the Los Alamos National Laboratory
Foundation wrote an op-ed in the Santa Fe New Mexican in which she
emphasized the benefits of home visiting programs on cognitive and social-
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emotional development. Read more here.
The Department of Education (ED) approved the state’s request to extend
its Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) waiver through the
2014-2015 school year. Read more here.
New York
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A story on WNYC Public Radio addressed the challenges in identifying costper-child reimbursements rates that meet the needs of pre-kindergarten
programs in different areas of the city. Read more here.
The New York City Department for Education and the Center for Economic
Opportunity will collaborate with researchers from New York University to
study the effects of city’s expanded pre-kindergarten initiative. The study will
focus on the cognitive impacts for participating children. Read more here.
Oregon
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The Oregon Center for Public Policy analyzed data from the American
Community Survey to find that 89.8% of poor Latino families living in the
state had a parent who worked within the past 12 months. Read more here.
The BUILD Initiative and the National Academy for State Health Policy
provided a history of state-level initiatives to integrate the health care and
early education systems. Read more here.
Washington
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Seattle voters approved Proposition 1B, which will implement a property tax
to fund city-subsidized pre-kindergarten. Read more here and here.
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The Ounce of Prevention Fund gives children in poverty the best chance for success in school and in life by advocating for
and providing the highest quality care and education from birth to age 5.
The Ounce National Policy Team partners with and supports early childhood leaders in states as they advance a
comprehensive agenda for at-risk children and families. We do this by providing individualized strategy and policy
consultation and resources; facilitating peer-to-peer learning and networking across states; and supporting Educare Schools
and the Educare Learning Network in the development of their policy and advocacy work.
The National Policy Digest is a bi-monthly newsletter that shares up-to-date and noteworthy developments in state and
federal early childhood news, policy and funding changes, research, policy trends and analyses, upcoming events, etc. culled
from diverse sources in the field. To subscribe, please contact Gregory Tate (gtate@theounce.org), or use the links below
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