eNotes
January 23, 2015In this Issue:
- State Pre-K Funding: 2014-15 Fiscal Year Source: Education Commission of the States - January 20, 2015
- Child Maltreatment 2013 - 24th Annual Report Source: Children's Bureau - January 15, 2015
- "Article of the Year" on Early Childhood Teacher Education Now Available Free Online Source: Journal of Early Childhood Teacher Education - January 21, 2015
- How Head Start Grantees Set and Use School Readiness Goals Source: Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation - January 20, 2015
- Data Use for Continuous Quality Improvement: What the Head Start Field Can Learn from Other Disciplines Source: Urban Institute - January 22, 2015
1. State Pre-K Funding: 2014-15 Fiscal Year
The Education Commission of the States (ECS) recently published State Pre-K Funding: 2014-15 Fiscal Year (January 2015), an analysis of 2014-15 pre-k appropriations by the 50 states. The report finds that 28 states plus the District of Columbia increased their investments in pre-K and state investments in pre-K rose by 12% nationally. California led the nation with a 79% funding increase. The report includes:
- A national overview of state funding for pre-K.
- A state-by-state breakdown of total pre-K funding, and funding by program.
- Highlights of 2014 measures taken by four states: California, Hawaii, Indiana and Maryland.
2. Child Maltreatment 2013 - 24th Annual Report
The Children's Bureau recently published Child Maltreatment 2013 (January 2015), its 24th annual report on data collected from the states' child protective services (CPS) agencies via the National Child Abuse and Neglect Data System. The FFY 2013 report shows that the national estimate of unique child abuse and neglect victims was 679,000, a 3.8% decrease from 2009. The youngest children continue to be the most vulnerable; 27.3% of victims were younger than 3 years of age and 19.7% were 3-5 years of age. The FFY 2013 victimization rate was slightly higher for girls (50.9%) than for boys (48.7%). African-American children had the highest rates of victimization at 14.6 per 1,000 children in the population of the same race or ethnicity. See Past Child Maltreatment Reports here.
3. "Article of the Year" on Early Childhood Teacher Education Now Available Free Online
The Journal of Early Childhood Teacher Education recently made its "Article of the Year" for 2013 freely available online. Research on Early Childhood Teacher Education: Evidence from Three Domains and Recommendations for Moving Forward (March 2013), by Diane M. Horma, Marilou Hysonb, and Pamela J. Winton, examines the current research base in early childhood teacher education across three domains: addressing the needs of young children with disabilities and their families; understanding and working effectively with infants and toddlers; and, building young children's competence and interest in mathematics. The authors find that much of the current research that exists is descriptive and focused on small samples of children in a few innovative programs. They discuss the characteristics, key features, and significant gaps in the research, and identify the kinds of studies that are most needed to enhance the impact of early childhood teacher education. See also, the related 2-page FPG Snapshot, The Impact of Early Childhood Teacher Education: How to Answer the Unanswerable Question (February 2013), for a brief summary of the article.
4. How Head Start Grantees Set and Use School Readiness Goals
A new report, How Head Start Grantees Set and Use School Readiness Goals (January 2015), describes findings from a research study looking at how local Head Start and Early Head Start grantees set school readiness goals, how they collect and analyze data to track progress towards goals, and how they use these data for program improvement. It is based on data that was collected during the 2013-2014 school year from 73 Head Start and Early Head Start grantees. See also, the accompanying brief, which provides highlights from the study. Both were published by the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation (OPRE) in the Administration for Children and Families (ACF), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
5. Data Use for Continuous Quality Improvement: What the Head Start Field Can Learn from Other Disciplines
The Urban Institute has published a new report, Data Use for Continuous Quality Improvement: What the Head Start Field Can Learn from Other Disciplines - A Literature Review and Conceptual Framework (January 2015), which is meant to provide a starting place for examining data use for quality improvement in Head Start programs. The report summarizes research on the processes, facilitators, and impediments to data use for continuous quality improvement; develops a conceptual framework representing the elements of data use for continuous quality improvement; and provides linkages between the disciplines from which the literature was drawn and the Head Start field. It was sponsored by the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation (OPRE), Administration for Children and Families. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.