Using Mental Health Strategies to Move the Early Childhood Agenda and Promote School Readiness

This issue brief highlights emerging strategies to promote the emotional wellness of young children and their families, including those most at risk; to enhance the skills of the families and other caregivers who nurture and support young children; and to ensure that those who need specialized services get them. It describes a number of initiatives developed across the nation, with an emphasis on two Starting Points sites, San Francisco and Vermont

Testimony of Jane Knitzer, Ed.D.

Testimony delivered to the House Ways and Means Committee, U.S. Congress, Hearing on Economic and Societal Costs of Poverty, January 24, 2007

Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems That Spend Smarter: Maximizing Resources to Serve Vulnerable Children

This first Project THRIVE Issue Brief looks through the lens of State Early Childhood Comprehensive Systems (ECCS) grant projects to identify ways in which they can promote smarter spending for vulnerable young children as states plan for and implement new, more integrated systems. It has a special focus on promoting social and emotional health and well-being, which is a critical precursor to both later health and school readiness. This analysis will help state officials, community leaders, and advocates take action to ensure the healthy development of children and their families. It builds on the NCCP report: Spending Smarter: A Funding Guide for Policymakers and Advocates to Promote Social and Emotional Health and School Readiness, which describes strategies to maximize existing funding streams by building on federal programs, and a companion report: Resources to Promote Social and Emotional Health and School Readiness in Young Children and Families—A Community Guide, which describes targeted interventions that can help parents and other early care providers, such as home visitors and teachers, be more effective in promoting healthy relationships and reducing challenging behavior in infants, toddlers, and preschoolers

Map and Track: State Initiatives to Encourage Responsible Fatherhood, 1999 Edition

“What makes an absent, uninvolved father change his behavior and take on his paternal responsibilities—physically, emotionally, and financially?” This question, asked by David Cohen in the introduction to this report, is a complex one. His analysis, drawing on social science “tipping point theory,” which is used to explain the spread of epidemics as well as social ideas, suggests that peer pressure, religious leaders, community programs, and corporate culture all play a role. So, too, do larger social norms. And so, too, do state policies and practices. Through them, states have the opportunity to help define social expectations about fatherhood and develop policies and strategies that can benefit not just fathers, but most importantly, their children. Recognizing this, in 1997, the National Center for Children in Poverty, with funding from the Annie E. Casey Foundation, produced Map and Track: State Initiatives to Encourage Responsible Fatherhood. At that time, every state, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico had at least one policy or program initiative to promote and encourage responsible fatherhood. It is now two years later. Evidence from the larger society suggests that there is a cultural change in the way fathers are viewed and view themselves. The people expressing the new view vary widely, from rappers who sing about the joys and responsibilities of fatherhood to employees of corporations who admit to struggling to balance work and family life. Given these larger social changes, this edition of Map and Track Fathers explores how the states are responding. The 1999 edition of Map and Track Fathers addresses four questions that are central to developing an understanding of state strategies to promote responsible fatherhood: • To what extent are state policies and practices responsive to the complex demographic picture of fatherhood that is emerging? • What specific strategies are states developing to promote responsible fatherhood, and how do these strategies vary from state to state and from those used two years ago? • To what extent are states providing leadership in developing policies and practices that promote responsible fatherhood, from an economic, social, and psychological perspective? • What are the lessons from the current status of state efforts to promote responsible fatherhood for future state efforts

Promoting Effective Early Learning: What Every Policymaker and Educator Should Know

This brief provides a blueprint for state and local policymakers, early learning administrators, teachers, families, community leaders, and researchers to use effective preschool curricula and teaching strategies to help low-income young children close the achievement gap in early literacy and math to be ready for kindergarten like their more affluent peers. It is part of a series of publications from the Pathways to Early School Success project of NCCP that addresses the question: "What will it take to ensure that young low-income children succeed in the early school years?" The brief and the more in-depth report—Effective Preschool Curricula and Teaching Strategies—are both based on a meeting that NCCP convened bringing together distinguished researchers, as well as a careful review of recently funded research. Other issue briefs in the Pathways project have focused on the importance of strategies to promote social and emotional competence in infants, toddlers and preschoolers: Helping the Most Vulnerable Infants, Toddlers, and Their Families, and Resources to Promote Social and Emotional Health and School Readiness in Young Children and Families—A Community Guid

Spending Smarter: A Funding Guide for Policymakers and Advocates to Promote Social and Emotional Health and School Readiness

This document is part of a policy series intended to improve social, emotional, and learning outcomes for young children. Building on NCCP's work over the past several years (see Promoting the Emotional Well-Being of Children and Families series, at www.nccp.org), Spending Smarter describes effective programs, highlights policy opportunities, and offers fiscal strategies to promote the emotional health of young children and their families. The analyses in this series will help state officials, community leaders, and advocates take action to ensure the healthy development of children and their families. Spending Smarter focuses on strategies to maximize existing funding streams by building on federal programs. The companion document, Resources to Promote Social and Emotional Health and School Readiness in Young Children and Families—A Community Guide, describes targeted interventions that can help parents and other early care providers, such as home visitors and teachers, be more effective in promoting healthy relationships and reducing challenging behavior in infants, toddlers, and preschoolers

Resources to Promote Social and Emotional Health and School Readiness in Young Children and Families: A Community Guide

This document is part of a policy series intended to improve social, emotional, and learning outcomes for young children. Building on NCCP's work over the past several years (see Promoting the Emotional Well-Being of Children and Families series, at www.nccp.org), Resources to Promote Social and Emotional Health and School Readiness in Young Children and Families—A Community Guide builds on NCCP's earlier work to describe effective programs, highlight policy opportunities, and offer fiscal strategies to promote the emotional health of young children and their families. The analyses in this series will help state officials, community leaders, and advocates take action to ensure the healthy development of children and their families. This report describes targeted interventions that can help parents and other early care providers, such as home visitors and teachers, be more effective in promoting healthy relationships and reducing challenging behavior in infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. The companion document, Spending Smarter: A Funding Guide for Policymakers and Advocates to Promote Social and Emotional Health and School Readiness, focuses on strategies to maximize existing funding streams by building on federal programs

Project Description: Promoting Social Inclusion and Respectfor Diversity in Early Childhood

This is a description of NCCP's two-year action research project that addresses a central challenge: What do we know about strategies for promoting social inclusion and respect for diversity (SI & RD) in early childhood education environments

State Early Childhood Policies: Executive Summary

Early childhood is a time of great opportunity. State policymakers recognize this and some are trying to use resources strategically to promote healthy development and school readiness in young children. This report, based on findings from NCCP's Improving the Odds for Young Children project, highlights key findings from NCCP's database of state policy choices that provides a unique picture of early childhood policies across the states. The report summarizes emerging patterns and can be used to stimulate a dialogue, both within the states and nationally, about how to make more strategic, coherent investments in young children

Helping the Most Vulnerable Infants, Toddlers, and Their Families

This document builds on NCCP's work over the past several years to describe effective programs, highlight policy opportunities, and offer fiscal strategies to promote the emotional health and school success of young children and their families. (See Promoting the Emotional Well-Being of Children and Families series, at www.nccp.org and also Promoting the Well-Being of Infants, Toddlers, and Their Families: Innovative Community and State Strategies, at www.nccp.org/it_index.html.) These analyses will help policymakers, community leaders, and advocates take action to ensure the healthy development of children and their families