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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...

04 June, 2025 /

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...

21 May, 2025 /

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....

15 May, 2025 /

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...

30 April, 2025 /

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 April, 2025 /

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 April, 2025 /

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...

28 April, 2025 /

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 March, 2025 /

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,...

31 March, 2025 /

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...

05 March, 2025 /

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...

04 March, 2025 /

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...

26 February, 2025 /

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....

13 February, 2025 /

John Templeton Foundation
January 9, 2025
The John Templeton Foundation is proud to announce nine new grants focused on youth thriving in the digital age. These projects, awarded through the Cultivating Character in the Digital Age funding call, promise to create tools and resources to support character development, advance our understanding of how youth use technology, and spark conversations on how technology can be used for good....

22 January, 2025 /

U.S. News & World Report
January 13, 2025
By Elliott Davis Jr., Jaclyn Jeffrey-Wilensky and Julia Haines
The estimated number of people experiencing homelessness in America surged to about 771,000 in 2024 – shattering last year’s record total since reporting began in 2007. That’s according to the latest release of the Annual Homelessness Assessment Report to Congress from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The report found that on a single night in January of 2024, at least 771,480 people were experiencing...

14 January, 2025 /

John Templeton Foundation
January 9, 2025
The John Templeton Foundation is proud to announce nine new grants focused on youth thriving in the digital age. These projects, awarded through the Cultivating Character in the Digital Age funding call, promise to create tools and resources to support character development, advance our understanding of how youth use technology, and spark conversations on how technology can be used for good....

10 January, 2025 /

Columbia Magazine
Winter 24-25
By David J. Craig
On a misty morning this past June, Denver mayor Mike Johnston stood before a small crowd in his city’s bustling downtown business district and made a surprise announcement. Despite Denver’s mounting homelessness crisis — on any given night some 1,300 people could be found sleeping in boxes, tents, and vehicles —the city was on the cusp of solving the issue for one key group: military veterans. Nearly one hundred veterans a night had been sleeping...

05 January, 2025 /

CBS News
December 27, 2024
Money Watch
Homelessness in the U.S. jumped 18.1% this year, hitting a record level, with the dramatic rise driven mostly by a lack of affordable housing as well as devastating natural disasters and a surge of migrants in some regions of the country, federal officials said Friday. More than 770,000 people were counted as homeless in federally required tallies taken across the country during a single night in January 2024, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development said...

30 December, 2024 /

The New York Times
December 27, 2024
By Jason DeParle
Homelessness soared to the highest level on record this year, driven by forces that included a surge in migrants seeking asylum, a national housing crisis and the end of pandemic-era measures to protect the needy, the federal government reported on Friday. The number of people experiencing homelessness topped 770,000, an increase of more than 18 percent over last year and the largest annual increase since the count began in 2007. Nearly every category of...

27 December, 2024 /

CBS News Chicago
November 7, 2024
By Jeramie Bizzle
Barbara Bowman, a pioneer in early childhood education, has died, the Erikson Institute announced this week. Bowman passed away Monday at the age of 96. She began as a preschool teacher in 1950, got her master's in education from the University of Chicago, and co-founded the Erikson Institute. The institution trains people in social work, child development, and early childhood education. It's meant to give educators the skills to help children thrive. "Barbara Taylor Bowman was a...

08 November, 2024 /

The Baltimore Banner
October 29, 2024
By Maya Lora
Traditionally, pre-K is thought of as learning that sets kids up for kindergarten. But research suggests pre-K prepares children not just for school, but for life, said Christy Tirrell-Corbin, the executive director of the Center for Early Childhood Education and Intervention at the University of Maryland. Those who go into kindergarten with a preschool background have stronger scores in literacy and math, better physical and motor development, improved high school graduation rates, higher incomes and...

30 October, 2024 /

San Antonio Report
October 29, 2024
By Isaac Windes
A new 25,000-square-foot early childhood education facility that will serve around 200 children on the South Side of San Antonio is set to break ground in January after years of planning and discussion. The Educare San Antonio initiative joins over two dozen others nationwide and is designed to help fill a need in one of the city’s many “child care” deserts, where there are far fewer quality child care slots than needed. The school will...

30 October, 2024 /

The Seattle Times
October 28, 2024
By Michele Matassa Flores
For more than a decade, The Seattle Times’ Education Lab has focused intently on the importance of high-quality public education and the challenges of meeting that need for all children. Now we’re bringing even more attention to that critical issue with an initiative centered on very young children — specifically on early childhood education, how it positions students for success and how it can be made more accessible. Washington last year ranked 33rd...

30 October, 2024 /

The Hechinger Report
September 26, 2024
By Jackie Mader
Decades of research have shown that children who are born into low-income households have less access to opportunities like high-quality child care and afterschool activities. Now, a 26-year longitudinal study has quantified the severity of this opportunity gap for the first time, as well as the sizable impact this has on children as they grow into young adults. The new study, published by the American Educational Research Association, followed 814 children from low-, middle- and...

28 September, 2024 /

State of Connecticut
Press Release
September 26, 2024
Governor Ned Lamont today announced that his administration is making several changes to Connecticut’s early child care and education programs that will result in more children being able to receive access to these programs, while also lowering the associated costs to their parents. “Access to child care and early education programs is massively important to the success of our state, not only because these programs provide valuable tools for children that will lead them to success...

28 September, 2024 /

The Tennessean
September 27, 2024
By Rachel Wegner
A newly launched coalition made up for 29 community partners across Nashville is taking aim at what it calls a child care crisis in Davidson County. The group, dubbed the Nashville Early Education Coalition, said nearly half of children who are infants up to 5 years old lack access to high-quality, affordable early childhood education. Nearly 60% of families in Nashville say their employment has been disrupted by a lack of child care available to them,...

28 September, 2024 /

The 74 Million
September 25, 2024
By Amanda Geduld
In Dan Wuori’s upcoming book he argues that America’s early childhood policy has been premised on a harmful myth: “This is the myth of daycare,” he writes, “which — in reality — simply doesn’t exist.” How could a system millions rely on simply not exist? Wuori’s answer: That a “crisis of misunderstanding” has turned early childhood centers into an exceedingly expensive and “industrialized form of babysitting” based on the false idea that child care is somehow...

28 September, 2024 /

The 74 Million
September 2, 2024
By Emily Tate Sullivan
Tiaja Gundy was just 19 years old when she started working at Federal Hill House, an early learning center in Providence, Rhode Island. It was 2016, and back then, she lacked experience and expertise working with young children. She had no intention of staying in the field long-term. But the work grew on her. Gundy started out as a “floater,” helping with infants, toddlers and preschoolers as needed. She found she loved being around...

02 September, 2024 /

Vail Daily
August 31, 2024
By Zoe Goldstein
Eagle County School District held a groundbreaking ceremony for the new Gypsum Early Learning Center and accompanying employee housing on Thursday, Aug. 29. Employees and board members of the Eagle County School District, as well as representatives of the construction companies RA Nelson and Haselden Construction Company, gathered on the cleared site that will soon become homes and an educational facility to kick off the journey. The early learning center and housing site already belong to...

31 August, 2024 /

nyc.gov
August 29, 2024
New York City Mayor Eric Adams and leadership of the New York City Council today announced a historic joint effort to strengthen early childhood education across the five boroughs and address longstanding systemic issues, while boosting enrollment and connecting families with more Pre-K and 3-K seats. The strategic plan – developed by an unprecedented joint Adams administration-Council working group, chaired by Deputy Mayor for Strategic Initiatives Ana J. Almanzar and Speaker Adams – will be anchored by $100...

29 August, 2024 /

Motherly
June 28, 2024
By Katrina Nattress
It’s an election year, and one of the largest hot topic issues for parents is the surging cost of childcare. Nonprofit Moms First, founded by activist Reshma Saujani, vocalized the importance of the childcare crisis to voters by starting a petition urging CNN to address the problem during the first presidential debate between Joe Biden and Donald Trump, which aired on Thursday, June 27. “The extreme cost of child care is crushing moms all over the country,”...

28 June, 2024 /

NC Newsline
June 26, 2024
By Greg Childress
Stephanie Smith’s nearly eight-year run as a home childcare provider in Durham is coming to an end just as the Child Care Stabilization Grants that came from the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) expire. The childcare veteran with more than 20 years of experience says she can no longer afford to keep the doors open due to rising expenses and state and federal childcare subsidies that haven’t kept pace with the cost of doing business. So, Smith...

26 June, 2024 /

Chalkbeat Detroit
June 17, 2024
By Patrick Dunn
In a cozy second-floor room at Brilliant Detroit’s Morningside facility, a small group of moms, grandmas, and caretakers learned about the importance of singing to the children in their lives. Surrounded by children’s art and photos of notable Black Americans, the women listened, chatted, and laughed as they participated in what’s known as a “Six-a-Day” workshop. The workshops, held weekly in multiple locations by the nonprofit Detroit Champions for Hope, teach family and caregivers to help young...

17 June, 2024 /

The 74
May 27, 2024
By Susan B. Neuman & Lily Wong Fillmore
In joyful preschool classrooms, three- and four-year-olds play and pretend together. They sing and dance, listen eagerly at story time, and ask endless questions. Nearly everything is new, which fuels an intense enthusiasm for learning. High-quality preschool supports social skills, fosters friendships, and builds a sturdy foundation for kindergarten and beyond. As researchers specializing in linguistics and early literacy development, we celebrate the growing movement to connect preschool instruction with the...

27 May, 2024 /

Los Alamos Daily Post
May 26, 2024
By Carol A. Clark
$1.1 billion. That’s how much money Virginia included in the compromise budget for the next biennium early toward early childhood education. “This is the first time that we’ve seen funding levels as high as they are,” Senior Director of Early Education for United Way of Greater Charlottesville Meredith Locasio said. “The bipartisan sponsorship from the governor and the general assembly is a huge historic win for early education.” Locasio says this monumental investment will...

26 May, 2024 /

Virginia 29 News
May 26, 2024
By Jacob Phillips
$1.1 billion. That’s how much money Virginia included in the compromise budget for the next biennium early toward early childhood education. “This is the first time that we’ve seen funding levels as high as they are,” Senior Director of Early Education for United Way of Greater Charlottesville Meredith Locasio said. “The bipartisan sponsorship from the governor and the general assembly is a huge historic win for early education.” Locasio says this monumental investment will allow organizations...

26 May, 2024 /

Wisconsin Examiner
May 20, 2024
By Sarah Kazell
You hear the refrain everywhere — when it comes to raising children, it takes a village. As an early childhood educator, I know this to be true. It takes a community of parents, child care providers, community members and our elected officials all working together to set the next generation up for success. Unfortunately, unlike all other developed nations, the U.S. supplies bare minimum public funding for early care and education despite decades of research showing...

20 May, 2024 /

Chalkbeat Colorado
May 13, 2024
By Ann Schimke
Fourteen preschoolers sang “Eggs, larva, pupa, adults,” on a recent morning, curling up on the grass, wriggling around like caterpillars, lying still, and then flapping their arms in search of wildflowers. The song, along with redwing blackbird calls and a bit of traffic noise, was the soundtrack of their morning circle, which kicked off near a wetland in southeast Denver....

16 May, 2024 /

Nebraska Examiner
May 1, 2024
By Cindy Gonzalez
More than 80% of respondents in a new statewide survey agree, and about half strongly agree, that Nebraska lawmakers should support child care and early learning programs as they do for K-12 grades and higher education. About the same proportions believe state legislators should make child care and early learning a higher priority than it is today. And the bulk of parents, nonparents, rural and urban folks alike favored using a portion of a state...

02 May, 2024 /

The Harvard Crimson
April 25, 2024
By Katie B. Tian
Nonie K. Lesaux will serve as interim dean of the Harvard Graduate School of Education after Bridget Terry Long departs the post at the end of this academic year, interim Harvard President Alan M. Garber ’76 announced in a Thursday email to HGSE affiliates. This decision comes three months after Long’s announcement of her resignation back in January, during which time HGSE released no public information about a search for her successor. The first...

25 April, 2024 /

The New York Times
By Dana Goldstein
March 31, 2024
Watch These Cute Videos of Babies (and Learn Something, Too)
SZCF's own Dan Wuori was interviewed and profiled in the New York Times for his incredible work in ECE and for his unique and influential Twitter/X presence. ...

02 April, 2024 /

Harvard's Center on the Developing Child
April 1, 2024
After 18 years at the helm, Jack P. Shonkoff, M.D., has decided to step down as Center Director at the end of June to dedicate all his time to an external, field facing agenda. Jack is not retiring—in his new role as Founding Director, he will remain an active member of Harvard’s faculty and double down on a portfolio of work that remains aligned with the Center’s core mission. He will focus his...

01 April, 2024 /

Early Learning Nation
By Mark Swartz
March 26, 2024
Ellen Galinsky’s The Breakthrough Years is the product of nearly a decade of exploration into the adolescent mind. A companion piece to Galinsky’s previous landmark book, Mind in the Making, which addresses early childhood development, it reaches a surprising conclusion about adolescence. Rather than an ordeal of sullenness and rule-breaking, it is a process of exploration necessary for human development. In other words, don’t fear the teens in your life. Instead, prepare to be dazzled...

26 March, 2024 /

Capita
By Elliot Haspel
March 20, 2024
Last week, the Massachusetts Senate made significant strides in prioritizing the betterment of children and families by passing a major child care bill, S.2697. If enacted into law, this legislation would be another step in reshaping the state's child care landscape, setting a course for others to learn from. The bill also includes arguably the strongest guardrails against undue profit-seeking behavior by large corporate for-profit chains ever seen in the United States. This legislative language may...

20 March, 2024 /

Alabama Daily News
By Alexander Willis
March 17, 2024
Leadership Hyundai Motor Manufacturing Alabama announced the launch of a new initiative Friday that it says will not only streamline access to child care for its employees, but provide a monthly stipend. The new initiative was born out of a new partnership between Hyundai and TOOTRiS, a child care technology platform that connects employers with child care providers. Providing access to child care for workers in today’s world, argued Reggie Williams, senior manager of human...

19 March, 2024 /

March 7, 2024
The Saul Zaentz Charitable Foundation is please to announce Ellen Galinsky's new book, The Breakthrough Years, out on March 26th. The book provides a paradigm-shifting, yet practical, understanding of adolescence. Click the image above to pre-order/order your copy!...

07 March, 2024 /

Alabama Political Reporter
By Jacob Holmes
February 28, 2024
A collaborative partnership involving the Alabama Partnership for Children, the Alabama School Readiness Alliance, and VOICES for Alabama’s Children unveiled the Alabama Child Care Roadmap Tuesday, a strategic plan of recommendations for addressing six core areas of the intensifying challenges facing child care providers, families, children and employers and the overall child care shortage in Alabama. “The gap in child care coverage for children under age 6 is at 40 percent, which is higher than...

28 February, 2024 /

Business Insider
By Jacob Zinkula
February 27, 2024
If you're having a hard time affording childcare, you're not alone. The United States has one of the most expensive childcare systems in the world. That was among the key findings of a new Bank of America report released on February 22, which analyzed how high childcare costs could slow the growth of women in the US workforce. Using data from the OECD, an international economic coalition of 38 countries, Bank of America estimated the average childcare...

27 February, 2024 /

The New York Times
By Troy Closson
February 27, 2024
In Brooklyn Heights, a couple that wanted to have a second child is reconsidering, anxious over crushing child care expenses and cutbacks to prekindergarten programs. In Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, a mother may move to a more expensive neighborhood nearby where she would be more likely to receive no-cost child care when her daughter turned 3. And in Stuyvesant Town in Manhattan, a mother who lost her job worries about what the future might hold if...

27 February, 2024 /

AP News
By Bruce Schreiner
February 27, 2024
An ambitious measure to expand early childhood education in Kentucky passed an early test Tuesday, winning broad support from a legislative panel as lawmakers look for ways to relieve parental stress by increasing access to childcare. The proposal cleared the Senate Families and Children Committee on a 9-1 vote. The legislation still has several hurdles to clear in the final weeks of this year’s 60-day legislative session. In promoting his bill Tuesday, Republican Sen. Danny Carroll recounted...

27 February, 2024 /
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