Getting to Know Your personal Contacts: Part II

While exploring the Harvard University’s Global Children’s Initiative” website, the first piece of information I explored in the context of global equity in early childhood education was a video webcast titled “Early Childhood Program Effectiveness”. Ph.D. Yoshikawa of Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education presented the concept of the “Three Tiered Approach” as the solution to ensuring that all children regardless of their backgrounds experience healthy development. Tier 1 covers the basics, a safe environment, consistency of care with responsible, nurturing caregivers. This type of care (quality care) has been proven to sustain healthy brains and bodies. Tier 2 not only provides quality early childhood education for children, but provides educational and financial support systems for parents. Tier 3, encompasses being responsive to the needs of children and families experiencing toxic stress by providing specialized services for child maltreatment, substance abuse, and mental health issues. The insight I gained from the “Three Tiered Approach” is that creating equity in early childhood education calls for multiple strategies (as opposed to the cookie cutter programs we now have in place)  to address the diverse needs of children and families.

The second bit of information I discovered came from the resources section that linked me to the Pathways Magazine (2011).  The article that really caught my attention was “Race to the Bottom” (Ravitch, 2011). Like the NCLB initiative the “Race to the Top” initiative is outcome driven with punitive consequences of firing teachers and closing schools. This type of intimidation only creates a culture of dishonesty in our educational system as administrators and school faculty fabricate test scores in order to receive funds and or remain open. Ravitch (2011) contests, that it is our nation’s poorest children who are hurt the most as they enter school lagging behind children from more affluent families. Poor communities yield poor performance schools which perpetuates the cycle of not receiving the finances and resources needed to improve the quality of education in poor communities. As children are passed on from one grade to the next, the discovery is made after graduating that they have not been adequately prepared to be successful in college. Students coming from this type of system often have to take remedial classes upon entering college. In contrast, Ravitch, (2011) states that high performance nations place emphasis on providing a rich-well balanced curriculum as opposed to our test only performance driven approach. The insight I have gained from reading this article is that fear driven initiatives such as the Race to the Top initiative are ineffective in creating equality in our early childhood educational systems, especially among the poor.

Thirdly, I explored Global Children’s Initiative. The Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University invited early childhood experts from various parts of the world to set the agenda for Harvard’s initial entry into to international research on child development. Historically the center has always conducted studies only in the United States. But to get a global perspective, the center recruited 25 academic scholars in the early childhood field to attend a conference. Despite challenges such as imposing western ideas on to other cultures, this is a good place to start for the purpose of gathering research based data that can be applied in creating equality for children worldwide. 

                                                                                                                                                References 

Center on the Developing Child. (Harvard University). (2011). Early childhood program effectiveness [video webcast]. Retrieved from (http://developingchild.harvard.edu/initiatives/global_initiative/)

Ravitch, D., (2011) Race to the bottom. Pathways (29-32) Retrieved from The Stanford Center for the Study of Poverty and Inequality website: www.stanford.edu

Center on the Developing Child. (Harvard University). (2011). Global Research Conference Retrieved from (http://developingchild.harvard.edu/initiatives/global_initiative/)