Investing in the Early Educator Workforce

During this July 28, 2020 Funder to Funder Conversation, Jacqueline Jones, Ph.D., President of the Foundation for Child Development, and Jessie Rasmussen, President of the Buffett Early Childhood Fund, described the membership, guiding principles and initiatives of the Early Educator Investment Collaborative. They also explained how the collaborative is responding to both COVID-19 and the swelling nationwide movement for equality and justice.

This national funder collaborative was established as a pooled fund three years ago when a group of early childhood funders set out to accelerate efforts to promote stronger outcomes for young children and to help close the opportunity and achievement gaps by advancing the highest standards of educator quality for those caring for our youngest learners. To achieve this goal, they are promoting equitable access to teacher preparation, ongoing professional learning and compensation that reflects the transformational value of early educators.

Jones and Rasmussen described several initiatives currently underway with support from the collaborative and explained how state and local funders might be able to benefit from and/or engage in them:

• Transforming Early Childhood Educator Teacher Preparation Programs Grant Opportunity— The collaborative is currently reviewing applications for a two-year grant to partnerships that include institutions of higher education and states/territories/Tribal Nations. This funding opportunity is intended to encourage innovative approaches to dismantle barriers to equitable access to educator training, including affordability, cultural responsiveness, language, scheduling and location. The collaborative received many more worthwhile proposals than they can support, and state and local funders can provide the funding needed to help advance unfunded applicants.
• Research on State and Institutions of Higher Education Policies and Practices — The collaborative commissioned a survey of the policy and practice environment across the 50 states to identify existing opportunities and challenges facing educator preparation programs and state competency and compensation policies.
• Study on the Feasibility of a National Early Childhood Educator Lead Teacher Certification— The collaborative commissioned a study to assess the potential of a national-level certification to strengthen and transform the early childhood educator workforce.
• Establishing a North Star Vision for the Early Childhood Educator Workforce — The collaborative hosted a series of online discussions with leaders in the field to develop a 15-year vision statement, outlining the goals and systems changes necessary to transform the profession.
• National Early Childhood Educator Workforce Policy Convening — In 2019, the collaborative hosted state leaders, research organizations, policymakers and practitioners to discuss how to better support and advance the profession, including key improvements that need to be made and actionable policy solutions.

Rasmussen explained how the collaborative is responding to COVID-19 by funding four initiatives designed to lift up the voices of those in the early childhood education field to understand what they need to survive this challenging period and to build back better. These initiatives include a
massive national survey to collect data from a wide range of early learning programs and staff to ascertain the impact of COVID-19 on programs, children and families and a rapid-response action plan to address key workforce issues in this moment.

Acknowledging that many early childhood educators are Black and Brown women who work long hours for low wages and limited benefits, Jones shared the collaborative’s statement, IN SOLIDARITY WITH THE FIGHT FOR EQUALITY AND JUSTICE, which expressed solidarity with the movement for Black lives and the social justice movement more broadly. She explained how systemic racism has helped to hold early childhood educators in poverty and limited the access of children of color to high-quality early learning programs.

Jones and Rasmussen were joined in conversation by two local funders and one national partner, each of whom is advancing efforts to strengthen the early childhood educator workforce:

• Naila Bolus, President of Jumpstart, a national organization drawing on local and national funding to work in 16 states and the District of Columbia. Bolus shared how Jumpstart has trained 55,000 college students and community volunteers — the majority of whom are people of color — to deliver high quality early learning programming and drive systems change.
• Martine Sadarangani Gordon, Vice President of Programs at the Washington Area Women’s Foundation (WAWF), working in the District of Columbia, Virginia and Maryland. Gordon shared how WAWF is part of a funders’ collaborative that is advancing competency-based career pathways for early childhood education that are tied to compensation.
• Erica Mitchell, Chief Community Impact Officer at United Way of Greater Nashville (UWGN). Mitchell shared how UWGN is leading the Blueprint for Early Childhood Success, a citywide early literacy initiative that includes a focus on professional development and compensation.

After these leaders described their respective efforts to strengthen the early childhood educator workforce, they discussed where they saw alignment between their efforts and the strategies of the Early Educator Investment Collaborative as well as opportunities for deeper collaboration.

All of the panelists included a focus on systems change, recognizing that strengthening the early childhood educator workforce benefits the children, families, educators and community-at-large. Mitchell stressed that the pandemic has increased awareness of the importance of the early educator workforce, spurring a collective urgency and the opportunity to advance systemic changes. Gordon pointed out the significant overlap between the national efforts and her local efforts and suggested they could leverage each other’s research and storytelling to ensure that data are presented in a compelling manner.

There was strong agreement on the need to maintain the diversity in the field while enhancing the quality of preparation programs. The panelists pushed back against the false choice that suggests advocates need to prioritize higher standards for educators or diversity in the workforce ― including encouraging more men to become early learning educators ― stressing that both are critical and should be advanced simultaneously.

They agreed that higher-education partners play an important role in this work, with Bolus stressing the importance of including extended opportunities for effective teaching practice in conjunction with building strong mastery of theoretical knowledge of child development. Jumpstart members are immersed in year-long classroom practice during their freshman or sophomore years, providing them with insights into the profession and the opportunity to apply
what they are learning.

They emphasized the importance of including all who care for young children in workforce efforts, including the home-based child care providers who care for many children of color and those living in rural and/or low-income communities. Bolus suggested that two federal programs could be leveraged to increase access to pre-service training and keep people in the field: federal loan forgiveness programs and work-study program requirements that a percentage of the funds be directed off campus.

Unfortunately, there was a technical issue during this session and the conversation was not recorded.
Apologies for the inconvenience. 

Panel

PRESENTER Jacqueline Jones, Ph.D. President and CEO Foundation for Child Development

PRESENTER Jessie Rasmussen President Buffett Early Childhood Fund

RESPONDENT Naila Bolus President and CEO Jumpstart

RESPONDENT Martine Sadarangani Gordon Vice President of Programs Washington Area Women’s Foundation

RESPONDENT Erica Mitchell Chief Community Impact Officer United Way of Greater Nashville