In support of the Every Child Ready Chicago initiative, Start Early began exploring the creation of a Chicago early childhood research consortium, which would bring together researchers, policymakers, practitioners, families, and community representatives across sectors in a robust, long-term research-practice partnership focused on helping Chicago achieve its vision for a strong early childhood system.

Access to relevant, actionable, and timely evidence and data that can guide the decisions of policymakers and program leaders is critical to the success of early childhood, and any other, systems-building initiatives. For an early childhood system as large and ambitious as Chicago, no one research partner or institution can provide these supports alone; a consortium of researchers and research institutions working together is key. Chicago already benefits from several research consortia, but none focus specifically on the city’s early childhood system.

Our exploratory report presents the findings of the initial inquiry phase: stakeholder interviews with 26 participants from 16 different organizations, including researchers, advocates, practitioners, leaders of community-based organizations, City of Chicago officials and staff, and other experts. The consensus that emerged was clear:

• Chicago needs an early childhood research consortium to serve as a long-term, sustainable research partnership focused exclusively on Chicago’s cross-sector, systemwide early childhood priorities.
• The research consortium should function as:
  • A neutral third-party without allegiance to, or conflicts of interest with, any City agency, office or department.
  • A trusted thought partner and capacity support for City agencies, offices and departments, as well as community and systems leaders.
  • A “hub” for researchers across institutions and disciplines.
  • An integrated complement to existing and emerging infrastructure, systems, consortia and partnerships; it should not duplicate or replace them.

The exploratory interviews also helped to specify a set of important strategic questions that remain unanswered. In the next phase of this work, it will be important to bring together potential partners for nuanced discussions regarding these recommendations, strategic questions and additional topics that emerge as this work progresses. We are excited to catalyze these conversations and facilitate this process for Chicago’s early childhood community.

We are excited to share our annual Start Early 2020 Year In Review report, which showcases the incredible work achieved throughout last fiscal year (July 1, 2019 – June 30, 2020). The last half of the year proved to be challenging and uncertain – yet, the unyielding resilience of families and the early learning and care field during a devastating global pandemic has been inspiring.

The highlights from this past fiscal year demonstrate how our work and our longstanding goals for transformation have been accelerated by the crises that face our country. The report also showcases the innovative solutions that early learning champions developed and deployed to address the unprecedented challenges impacting families.

2020 Year in Review

As we look forward, Start Early recommits to strengthening and deepening our role as an anti-racist organization that works in true partnership with communities to ensure the voices of families are represented, heard and valued. We are grateful for the ongoing support of our partners and donors, and together, we can advance better, more equitable early learning opportunities for our youngest children.

Start Early, provides resources, technical and support services, content expertise and peer learning opportunities to early childhood advocates and practitioners and systems and government leaders. Our goal is to create conditions that enable meaningful policy reforms and system improvements at local, state and federal levels and transform practice across the nation.

That said, we are pleased to share our annual 2020 State Policy Update Report, which provides a snapshot of early childhood care and education budget and policy changes during the 2019-2020 legislative sessions. This robust report illuminates trends and connects early childhood policy and funding advances across the country.

Included in the Report:

• Legislative, budgetary and administrative changes across 29 states organized by topic, demonstrating the breadth of the work done by state early childhood leaders and advocates.

Topics Include:

• Early Care and Education
• Infant and Family Supports
• Early Intervention
• Home Visiting
• Workforce and Higher Education
• Revenue, Data and Governance

Additional Report Insights:

• Data that illustrates how state priorities shifted in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and policy recommendations based on the lessons learned during the subsequent economic upheaval
• Stories from state advocates that give voices to policy wins and showcase the direct impact of their work

Amid the challenging and ever-changing circumstances of 2020, Start Early continued to expand its reach and rapidly responded to the changing needs of children and their families across the country. Our work would not be possible without you – our generous and dedicated donors.

I am excited to share with you Start Early’s annual Year In Review. The fiscal year 2020 edition highlights the unyielding resilience of children, families and early learning and care professionals during a devastating global pandemic. It also includes the innovative solutions and supports that early learning champions developed and deployed to address the unprecedented challenges impacting families. I am most humbled by the inspirational stories of strength from the field, especially those of parents and our youngest learners.

2020 Year in Review

I look forward to connecting with you soon and wish you and your family a wonderful and safe holiday season.

All the best,
Diana

The Challenge

In 2018, California passed a bill (AB 2960) to ensure that families have access to timely, accurate information about high-quality Early Learning and Care (ELC) programs, how to enroll their children, and benefits they may be eligible for via an eligibility screener and the development of a public online portal – referred to as the “Parent Portal” – which must be created by June 30, 2022.

The Early Learning Lab (The Lab) was brought on board to provide design recommendations for the portal that would ensure it meets the needs and desires of the parents, providers, and stakeholders who will use the site.

The Results

Through this project, The Lab delivered a set of near-term and longer-term recommendations to develop the Parent Portal as a robust platform that supports all of the stakeholders across the early learning and care sector in California.

These include specific recommendations on:

1. Integrating subsidized child care related services into existing eligibility screeners offered by the State of California
2. Increasing transparency and addressing the complexity of the waitlist process for subsidized child care slots
3. Additional data on child care programs that families would find useful when evaluating program
4. A roadmap and plan for ongoing platform improvements and enhancements for the Parent Portal to ensure it meets the evolving needs of stakeholders
5. A communications strategy to increase awareness of the Parent Portal among various stakeholders

Of the 12 million children under age 3 in the United States, nearly 25 percent live in a family with earnings below the poverty level, with little to no access to quality and affordable child care. To address this problem, Congress appropriated $500 million in 2014 to expand access to Early Head-Start programs, which included the creation of Early Head Start – Child Care Partnerships (Partnerships).

In 2019, Start Early conducted interviews with a variety of state leaders regarding Partnerships programs. Interviewees included those who administer a Partnerships grant, and some who supported implementation of Partnerships in their states but did not have a Partnerships grant. As a result of these interviews, Start Early is proud to share our report on the lessons of implementation of the Partnerships across states.

Start Early initiated the Educare Chicago Follow-Up Study in 2005 to determine how well our high-quality, birth-to-five, early care and education program prepared children and their families for elementary school and beyond. This ongoing study is designed as a longitudinal, mixed methods investigation of 12 cohorts of over 300 former Educare Chicago students and their families. Our research team hopes to follow graduates’ achievements throughout their K-12 education and into adulthood.

The study findings help support our early childhood policy and advocacy work and drive continuous quality improvement at Educare Chicago, as well as at the national Educare Learning Network of schools. The study findings also contribute to the body of evidence that confirms the long-lasting, positive outcomes of a high-quality early educational experience.

The Educare Chicago Follow-Up Study continues to provide researchers, policymakers and practitioners valuable insights on how to improve the quality of early learning environments for all children, including those living in often under-resourced communities.

Funders

• W. Clement & Jessie V. Stone Foundation
• Alvin H. Baum Family Fund
• Paul M. Angell Family Foundation

This paper shares the importance of including the early years in state accountability systems; those years are of critical importance to achieving long-term educational success but have been largely ignored in previous state accountability efforts. States have the opportunity under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) to encourage and support improved practice at the early elementary level — and earlier.

Family engagement is integral to the quality and success of early education and Start Early is always looking for innovative ideas to support children and families both in the classroom and at home. In 2012, we joined researchers at Northwestern University and the educational technology company, Parent University, to test out one of these new ideas.

Through the Pocket Literacy Coach project, parents at three Head Start programs in the Chicago area enrolled in the Parent University texting service. Parents received a daily text message that provided a fun, easy idea for a parent-child activity that focused on literacy, math skills and critical thinking. The idea was simple: could a simple text message, once a day, prompt families to engage in everyday moments of learning? We conducted the first phase of the pilot to test the impact of the content and technology. The findings were overwhelmingly positive.

This paper is intended to help state and local education decision-makers understand how to use kindergarten readiness assessment results appropriately — and how to avoid stretching them too far. This paper describes:

• What kindergarten readiness is and how it is assessed.
• The beneficial uses of kindergarten readiness assessment.
• Why states should not use kindergarten readiness assessment results as part of an accountability system for children, early learning providers or teachers.