What’s in Build Back Better? Lots to Help Working Families Get Ahead

This blog examines an expected outcome of the Build Back Better Act that should receive more attention — the role of BBB in promoting family economic mobility.  The blog discusses how BBB will help working families get ahead by reducing harmful benefit cliffs.

States’ Growing Commitment to Preventing Young Children’s Expulsion from Early Care and Education Programs: RESULTS OF A 50-STATE POLICY SURVEY

This report examines features of states’ expulsion and suspension prevention policies, based on survey responses and interviews with selected states. The results point to the widespread efforts states are making to develop and implement expulsion prevention policies. Features of policies are varied, and include supports for programs (e.g., professional development, early childhood mental health consultation), […]

Early Childhood Education Throughout the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Experiences of Arkansas Educators

The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed the experiences of young children and their caregivers over the past year. SRI Education and the National Center on Children in Poverty partnered with the Arkansas Division of Child Care and Early Childhood Education (DCCECE) to examine early care and education programs throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. This brief, which represents the second of two reports, shares […]

How Early Childhood Education Providers Can Use COVID-19 Relief Funds to Establish Lasting Mental Health Supports for Staff and Children

After more than a year of the COVID-19 pandemic, many young children have experienced disruptions to their daily routines, missed seeing family and friends, mourned the death of loved ones, or felt the strain and uncertainty of economic difficulties. These disruptions and trauma can have lasting effects to children’s social and emotional development and contribute […]

Early Childhood Education During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Experiences of Arkansas Educators

This report presents information from surveys and focus groups with Arkansas childcare providers examining how the pandemic has shaped their practices and children’s experiences in early care and education programs. Key findings include: Generally high compliance with Covid-19 related safety restrictions An increase in teacher practices that limit child choice A relationship between teacher practices […]

Supporting Social-Emotional and Mental Health Needs of Young Children Through Part C Early Intervention: Results of a 50-State Survey

This report examines features of states’ Part C Early Intervention programs that help them identify and serve infants and toddlers with social-emotional delays and mental health conditions. A 50-state survey conducted by the National Center for Children in Poverty and Georgetown University Center for Children and Families asked state Part C Coordinators about their programs’ […]

Young Children in Deep Poverty: Racial/Ethnic Disparities and Child Well-Being Compared to Other Income Groups

Nine percent of young U.S. children live in deep poverty, with state rates ranging from 17 percent in Mississippi to 4 percent in Utah. The families of these children have incomes below 50 percent of the federal poverty line, or less than $10,289 for a family of one parent and two children. These figures, based […]

The Voices of Michigan’s Early Care and Education Teachers: Children’s Challenging Behavior, Expulsion, Disparities, and Needed Program Supports

Michigan policymakers have a long history of leadership in addressing the social-emotional needs of the state’s infants and young children so that they can learn and thrive in their homes and in early care and education programs. The state’s investments in healthy social-emotional development of very young children include home visiting services by infant mental […]

New York City Pre-K Leadership Study

A key challenge for the Early Care and Education (ECE) field is identifying key features of program quality that matter for children’s learning and social-emotional outcomes. In recent years, the role of leaders in ECE programs has been recognized as critical to achieving and maintaining effective teaching and other aspects of quality.1 These leaders are […]

Early Care and Education Teacher Well-being: Associations with Children’s Experience, Outcomes, and Workplace Conditions: A Research-to-Policy Brief

Learn about our Research Connections project. Identifying features of early care and education (ECE) settings that positively affect children’s early learning and development is a critical challenge for the field. Most research related to this challenge has focused on structural features of ECE quality, such as teacher-child ratios and teacher credentials, and on process quality, […]