News

29 Aug

Posted at 21:31h in News by

Time
August 27, 2025
By Dana Suskind
On a recent Sunday afternoon, I witnessed my son step into the long tradition of medicine at the University of Chicago's white coat ceremony. I watched him stand tall, reciting words physicians have spoken for centuries: “First, do no harm.” As a doctor myself, those words have been my compass in every diagnosis, every surgery, every hard conversation. But as I left the auditorium, I couldn't stop thinking: In 2025, there's another group of professionals whose decisions...

06 Aug

Posted at 21:23h in News by

The New York Times
August 5, 2025
By Sarah Nir
At the edge of Lake Kanawauke in New York’s Hudson Valley, third graders splished in the shallows, giggling till they came ashore spluttering. On the portico of a bunkhouse, teenage boys raced paper boats in buckets. Under the eaves of their tent, 7-year-old girls in a bunk bed exchanged friendship bracelets. Beneath a nearby beech tree, their bunk mates held a solemn funeral for a ladybug. Summer camp is always an oasis, particularly for...

05 Aug

Posted at 20:57h in News by

The Atlantic
August 4, 2025
By Lenore Skenazy, Zach Rausch, and Jonathan Haidt
One common explanation for why children spend so much of their free time on screens goes like this: Smartphones and social-media platforms are addicting them. Kids stare at their devices and socialize online instead of in person because that’s what tech has trained them to want. But this misses a key part of the story. The three of us collaborated with the Harris Poll to survey a group of Americans whose...

29 Jul

Posted at 21:18h in News by

Fortune
July 29, 2025
By Marco Quiroz-Gutierrez
YouTube cofounder Steve Chen is the latest tech trailblazer to warn against social media’s impact on kids. Chen warned in a recently published talk that short-form video “equates to shorter attention spans” and said he wouldn’t want his own kids to exclusively consume this type of content. Companies that distribute short-form video (which includes the company he cofounded, YouTube) should add safeguards for younger users, he added. Steve Chen, who served as YouTube’s former chief technology officer...

18 Jul

Posted at 21:08h in News, Press, Stanford by

CBS News
July 18, 2025
By John Shumway
Much has been said about the detrimental impact of screens on childhood development, but a new study takes that concern to an even younger age. This is as much about what children aren't doing as it is about what they are doing. There is no question that we are seeing the screen time impact on our children. "A lot of them have lost the ability to interact, to make eye contact, and have conversations," said...

04 Jun

Posted at 00:00h in News by

Alliance for Early Success
May 2025
Support for state early childhood policies and funding continued to be strong in 2024, with policymakers from every region and political landscape acting to improve their early childhood policies. In our annual survey of state early childhood advocates, all states with a legislative session reported a policy win, and 83 percent reported a win that included an increase in state funding. Many legislatures appropriated state funds to close federal funding gaps, signaling the importance of investing...

26 May

Posted at 21:22h in News by

NYT Opinion
May 13, 2025
The Ezra Klein Show
I honestly don’t know how I should be educating my kids. A.I. has raised a lot of questions for schools. Teachers have had to adapt to the most ingenious cheating technology ever devised. But for me, the deeper question is: What should schools be teaching at all? A.I. is going to make the future look very different. How do you prepare kids for a world you can’t predict? And if we can offload more...

21 May

Posted at 23:50h in News by

ZerotoEight
May 21 2025
Early Learning Nation is relaunching as zero2eight, a new editorial vertical at The 74. Our coverage will build upon the previous work of Early Learning Nation, continuing to cover the issues most critical to America’s youngest children. What can you expect as a reader? While we have a new name, page and logo, zero2eight will continue and expand the mission of Early Learning Nation, examining the field of early care and education for children 0 to 8 years old, a crucial period...

15 May

Posted at 23:48h in News, Stanford by

Stanford Center on Early Childhood
May 14, 2025
The Stanford Center on Early Childhood is proud to announce two new fellowships that have been graciously funded by The Zaentz Charitable Foundation.
The Zaentz Community Fellowship Program (ZCFP) This program aims to support leadership development in early childhood champions within RAPID communities. The Zaentz Fellows Program (Masters) This is a new fellowship designed to support the leadership development of graduate students interested in early childhood....

30 Apr

Posted at 23:34h in News by

Schoolhouse Connection
April 30, 2025
A new report from national nonprofit SchoolHouse Connection reveals that an estimated 446,996 infants and toddlers—ages birth through three—experienced homelessness during the 2022–2023 program year. This marks a staggering 23% increase in just two years. The report, Infant and Toddler Homelessness Across 50 States: 2022–2023, produced in partnership with Poverty Solutions at the University of Michigan, is the only 50-state analysis of homelessness among our nation’s youngest children. It presents the latest state-level estimates of infant and toddler...

28 Apr

Posted at 22:07h in News by

K-12 Dive
April 28, 2025
By Kara Arundel
A program that supports infants and toddlers with developmental delays and their families could face significant fiscal pressures due to the Trump administration’s overall efforts to reduce the size and budget of the federal government. While no specific cuts to the Part C program have been announced yet, Congress will be contemplating proposals to whittle down annual allocations and a possible reduction to Medicaid payments — both of which help prop up early intervention services...

28 Apr

Posted at 19:49h in News by

EdSurge
April 21, 2025
By Claire Woodcock
Along the Canadian border in north central Washington’s Okanogan County, where the closest major city is at least 100 miles away and infrastructure is sparse, the Okanogan County Child Development Association oversees nine Head Start centers in the region. In an area where wages haven’t kept up with inflation, forcing working families to make measured financial choices, these centers provide child care to nearly 160 area preschoolers, toddlers and infants who are living at or below the...

28 Apr

Posted at 19:22h in News, Zaentz Initiative by

The Harvard Gazette
April 25, 2025
By Mackenzie L. Boucher
Nonie K. Lesaux had been a professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education for more than two decades — nearly her entire professional career — by the time she was named dean in March. A scholar of early childhood education and literacy, Lesaux’s extensive scholarship and minimal political engagement has allowed the new dean and the education school to fly under the radar amid an escalating campaign by the Trump administration to defund...

31 Mar

Posted at 22:07h in News, Press by

Time Magazine
March 31, 2025
By Michelle Bezark
The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) is tearing through the federal government agency by agency, slashing programs, firing civil servants, and cutting research dollars. Polling indicates Americans may be souring on this approach, as program cuts come closer to home. Even then, some 40% of Americans believe the country could run with almost no federal employees. This reflects how disconnected Americans have become from federal agencies and the programs and services they provide....

31 Mar

Posted at 18:49h in News, Zaentz Initiative by

The Harvard Gazette
March 27, 2025
By Nicole Rura
Nonie K. Lesaux, the Roy Edward Larsen Professor of Education and Human Development, has been named dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Lesaux has served as interim dean since July. “For the past eight months, Nonie has led as interim dean with a wonderful combination of energy and insight,” said Harvard President Alan M. Garber. “Amid unprecedented challenges to both K-12 and higher education, she has demonstrated her ability to meet the moment,...

05 Mar

Posted at 23:38h in News by

First Five Years Fund
March 5, 2025
Parents want to make child care choices that best support their family’s individual needs and their child’s development. This is especially true for the two-thirds of children ages five and under who require care because all available parents in their household are working. Yet today, too many parents are left with very few options and struggle to afford the care they do find. The Child Care Availability and Affordability Act and the Child Care Workforce Act...

04 Mar

Posted at 17:00h in News by

The New York Times
March 1, 2025
By Brian Goldstone
At 10 p.m., a hospital technician pulls into a Walmart parking lot. Her four kids — one still nursing — are packed into the back of her Toyota. She tells them it’s an adventure, but she’s terrified someone will call the police: “Inadequate housing” is enough to lose your children. She stays awake for hours, lavender scrubs folded in the trunk, listening for footsteps, any sign of trouble. Her shift starts soon. She’ll...

26 Feb

Posted at 17:16h in News by

The Mercury News
February 26, 2025
By Jeff Collins
Presley Wilson’s priorities shifted from college to finding a new home after she got booted from her studio apartment in the middle of her first semester at Cal State Long Beach. Homelessness loomed for the transfer student when her financial aid package arrived too late to keep her from falling behind on her rent. Then, three weeks before she had to leave her apartment, a university case worker located a slot in a state-funded program designed...

13 Feb

Posted at 16:46h in News by

Vox
February 13, 2025
By Anna North
It’s preschool application season in New York City, where I live. That means parents of toddlers are eagerly and anxiously signing on to a (surprisingly user-friendly) city-run website and ranking their preferred programs, in the hopes that, come fall, their 3- and 4-year-olds will be able to go to a high-quality pre-K in their community — for free....