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WRAL News
WRAL Staff
February 26, 2026
State and local leaders met with child care providers in Durham to talk about solutions to what lawmakers call a "child care crisis" in North Carolina. Sen. Natalie Murdock, D-20, headed the State of Child Care in NC Roundtable session that took place at Kate's Korner on Blackwell Street in downtown Durham. Kate's Korner is an early childhood learning center. The founder, Kate Goodwin, was in attendance. ...

28 February, 2026 /

WRAL News
WRAL Staff
February 26, 2026
State and local leaders met with child care providers in Durham to talk about solutions to what lawmakers call a "child care crisis" in North Carolina. Sen. Natalie Murdock, D-20, headed the State of Child Care in NC Roundtable session that took place at Kate's Korner on Blackwell Street in downtown Durham. Kate's Korner is an early childhood learning center. The founder, Kate Goodwin, was in attendance. ...

28 February, 2026 /

Time Magazine
By Rebecca Schneid
February 26, 2026
At an event in September 2024, lawyer and activist Reshma Saujani asked President Donald Trump a question about his plans to address child­care affordability. His fumbling answer went viral, and raised awareness about how expensive childcare has become in the U.S.: for most American families with young children, it eats up more than 20% of their income. One report found that the burden on the U.S. economy comes out to more than $122 billion a...

26 February, 2026 /

Transcend
January 2026
As we enter a new year, a growing dissonance is becoming impossible to ignore: the gap between what most young people experience in schools and what they actually need to thrive in this moment and beyond. For the past few years, we've been obsessed with the question of what ongoing advancements in AI mean for the future of school. We've watched as districts chase efficiency through disconnected pilots. We've seen AI readiness appear in glossy materials without changing classroom practice....

01 February, 2026 /

Harvard Center for the Developing Child
January 22, 2026
We are thrilled to share the news that Stephanie M. Jones, PhD, has been named the next Faculty Director at the Harvard Center on the Developing Child. Dr. Jones is the Gerald S. Lesser Professor of Early Childhood Development at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, where she is Director of the EASEL Lab and co-Director of the Saul Zaentz Early Education Initiative. An accomplished researcher, she brings a broad range of relevant...

01 February, 2026 /

The New York Times
By Robert Wachter
January 19, 2026
We physicians have a long tradition of the curbside consult — when we bump into specialists or more seasoned colleagues in the hospital cafeteria and ask for their advice on a vexing clinical case. Over my 35 years of practice, I used to track down other doctors for a couple of curbsides during morning rounds each day. These days, I’m getting far more curbsides, but they are not with colleagues. They’re with A.I. Sometimes...

30 January, 2026 /

Alabama Daily News
By Trisha Powell Crain
December 23, 2025
Alabama could become one of the first states to set statewide standards for screen time for children 5 and younger in publicly funded early learning settings. Rep. Jeana Ross, R-Guntersville, said the bill pre-filed for the upcoming legislative session reflects a priority on how young children learn and grow. “The earliest years of life – from birth to age five – are the most important period of brain development a child will ever experience,” Ross...

23 December, 2025 /

WUNC - North Carolina Public Radio
By Colin Campbell
December 18, 2025
Former North Carolina Gov. Jim Hunt has died. The Wilson County native served the state for four terms as a Democrat, expanding the role of the governor and pushing for major education initiatives. Hunt was 88 years old. Hunt's family members, including his daughter, Lt. Gov. Rachel Hunt, announced his passing Thursday afternoon. A funeral service will be held at 1 p.m. Friday, Dec. 26, at First Presbyterian Church in Wilson. The...

22 December, 2025 /

Time Magazine
By Dr. Dana Suskind
December 18, 2025
Every week brings new product announcements promising AI-driven companionship for children: Barbies who call you by name, Curio stuffies that propose adventures and imaginary games, chatbots for kids from Meta and xAI. Even Disney recently joined the AI revolution, purchasing a $1 billion stake in OpenAI to bring its beloved characters to Sora. Whether they arrive as disembodied voices, avatars on a screen, or irresistibly plush toys, these products represent a fundamental break from every...

20 December, 2025 /

Start Early
By Diana Rauner
December 4, 2025
We are excited to share the Start Early 2025 Year in Review, celebrating a year of growth, innovation and transformative milestones during the last fiscal year (July 1, 2024 – June 30, 2025). At Start Early, we strive to ensure that every child has access to high-quality early learning opportunities. This past year has tested the resolve of the early learning field in ways few of us could have predicted. Delayed federal and state funding, regional...

20 December, 2025 /

The Economist
December 4, 2025
CHRISTMAS STOCKINGS may contain more surprises than usual this year, as children open presents that can talk back. Toymakers in China have declared 2025 the year of artificial intelligence (AI) and are producing robots and teddies that can teach, play and tell stories. Older children, meanwhile, are glued to viral AI videos and AI-enhanced games. At school, many are being taught with materials created with tools like ChatGPT. Some are even learning alongside chatbot-tutors. In work and play,...

04 December, 2025 /

NJBIA
December 2, 2025
As artificial intelligence (AI) continues transforming classrooms worldwide, Kean University Professor Jennifer Chen, Ed.D., is leading research into how AI affects young learners ages 3 to 8 and what educators and families need to know to use it ethically, responsibly and effectively. Her latest articles, published in AI Enhanced Learning and Early Childhood Education Journal, explore the complexities of integrating AI into learning environments, finding that while it can enhance students’ learning and comprehension, it also presents ethical...

02 December, 2025 /

Start Early
November 12, 2025
By Diana Rauner
For 25 years, Educare Chicago has set the standard for high-quality early childhood education. What began as one school is now a national network serving thousands of children and families. Start Early celebrates this milestone and the lasting impact of Educare’s model of excellence, innovation and community partnership. Twenty-five years ago, Educare Chicago opened its doors with a simple yet powerful belief: that every child no matter their background or ZIP code deserves access to quality...

02 December, 2025 /

invisiblepeople.tv
By Cynthia Griffith
November 15, 2025
As Artificial Intelligence Accelerates Job Loss and Rental Inflation, Our Most Vulnerable Populations Are Left Grappling with a Widening Economic Chasm Artificial intelligence continues to evolve with little oversight, shifting the tides of poverty and power. We see it in price-setting rent algorithms, pervasive misinformation, mass unemployment fueled by automation, and tech advancements that deepen wealth inequality and entrench dependence on a broken system. Is AI on track to push more of humanity into homelessness by replacing...

15 November, 2025 /

trendwatching.com
November 7, 2025
In the UK, McDonald's has stripped its iconic Happy Meal box back to basics — launching a limited-edition blank design that invites children to draw how they're feeling. Running through mid-November across the UK and Ireland, the initiative will distribute nearly four million white boxes and crayons, transforming a familiar fast-food staple into a creative outlet for emotional expression. Developed in partnership with BBC Children in Need, the campaign responds to research revealing that 42% of children aged 5-10...

08 November, 2025 /

The Atlantic
October 23, 2025
By John McWhorter
My tween-age daughters make me proud in countless ways, but I am still adjusting to the fact that they are not bookworms. I’m pretty sure that two generations ago, they would have been more like I was: always with their nose in some volume, looking up only to cross the street or to guide a fork on their plates. But today, even in our book-crammed home, where their father is often in a cozy reading...

28 October, 2025 /

Brookings
September 19, 2025
By Ellen Roche, Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, Rachel Romeo, Dana Suskind, and Kris Perry
The human brain is primed for social interaction. In the first few years of life, thousands of daily interactions shape lifelong social and cognitive systems that prepare us to live and work with other humans, and to engage in symbolic thinking through systems like numeracy and language. Decades of developmental cognitive and neuroscience research have made it clear that young humans cannot develop optimally without daily, real-time...

20 October, 2025 /

Project Zero
There are numerous education research entities around the world, but none, to our knowledge, has systematically assessed its long-term effects on education practice. Carried out over three years by Ellen Winner, a long-time senior researcher at Project Zero, Project Zero and its Impact is based on in-depth interviews with over 200 educators—from every continent except Antarctica—many of whom report having been deeply changed in their teaching philosophy and practice by their encounters with PZ. Dive into the report today to...

14 October, 2025 /

Unesco
September 26, 2025
By Howard Gardner and Mara Krechevsky
Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping the way we learn, teach and make sense of the world around us – but it is doing so unequally. While one-third of humanity remains offline, access to the most cutting-edge AI models is reserved for those with subscriptions, infrastructure and linguistic advantage. These disparities not only restrict who can use AI, but also determine which knowledge, values and languages dominate the systems that increasingly influence education. This anthology...

02 October, 2025 /

International Documentary Association
September 24, 2025
Today, the Berkeley Film Foundation (BFF) announces that it has awarded a total of more than $350,000 in its 2025 grant cycle to 29 independent filmmakers, including 5 student filmmakers, who live, work, or attend school in the East Bay cities of Richmond, El Cerrito, Berkeley, Albany, Emeryville, or Oakland. Since its founding in 2009, BFF has awarded almost $3.3 million to 338 film projects that continuously push creative boundaries and inspire change. The amount awarded...

25 September, 2025 /

Start Early
September 24, 2025
This year marks 25 years since Start Early’s Educare Chicago program pioneered the promise to transform the lives of families and young children in our most under-served communities through comprehensive, quality early learning and care. To help us celebrate, you’re invited to join us virtually on Friday, October 3 for Educare Chicago’s 25th Anniversary Symposium to reflect on the evolution of early childhood over the last quarter of a century and to explore what’s ahead. In addition...

24 September, 2025 /

NBC News
September 10, 2025
By Adam Edelman
New Mexico will become the first state in the country to begin offering free universal child care, Democratic Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham announced. The move amounts to an expansion of an existing program that went into effect three years ago that has aided thousands of families in the state. “Child care is essential to family stability, workforce participation, and New Mexico’s future prosperity,” Lujan Grisham said in a statement announcing the expanded program Monday. “By investing in...

15 September, 2025 /

Better Magazine
August 4, 2025
By Howard Gardner and Mara Krechevsky
“There is a vast difference between knowing the right thing to do and actually doing the right thing,” Nobel-winning economist Thomas Schelling once said. The evidence is unequivocal: early childhood education is one of the most impactful investments a society can make. Ninety percent of brain development occurs before the age of five, and decades of interdisciplinary research demonstrate the profound, long-term benefits of high-quality early learning — not only for individual children...

02 September, 2025 /

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...

29 August, 2025 /

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...

06 August, 2025 /

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...

05 August, 2025 /

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...

29 July, 2025 /

RAPID | Stanford Center on Early Childhood
Summer 25
What is the state of family hardship in 2025? A panel of experts involved in collecting and using these important family data looked at how material hardship, instability, and emotional distress are shaping the lives of caregivers and young children. ...

24 July, 2025 /

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...

18 July, 2025 /

Brookings
By Isabelle Hau and Rebecca Winthrop
July 2, 2025
We are living through a paradox that may define our era. Humans are wired to connect, yet we’ve never been more isolated. At the same time, artificial intelligence (AI) is growing more responsive, conversational, and emotionally attuned by the day. Perhaps because of this, we are increasingly turning to machines for what we’re not getting from each other: companionship. In a recent Harvard Business Review article, researchers reported that the top use cases of...

02 July, 2025 /

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 /

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...

26 May, 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 /
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