 Good afternoon, everybody. Hello there, thanks for being here today. I'm Lisa Guernsey, I'm the deputy director for education policy here at New America, and I also direct our learning technologies project. And we're really thrilled to have you all here with us. Thanks for coming out this afternoon. I wanna also give special thanks to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation for supporting the research behind the report that we're gonna be talking about today, and to the Alliance for Early Success, which is helping to support the event today. So for those of you who are watching online, and I know there's a good, almost 100 of you online right now, so thank you for being with us. And those who'd like to participate in the conversation via Twitter, we're gonna use the hashtag ECE Online Degrees. So Early Child Education Online Degrees, ECE Online Degrees. And to those of you who may be interested in this broad topic of our Early Childhood workforce and how we may transform it, we will be having another event February 26th. So mark your calendars for that. We'll be back here in this space and you'll be able to continue the dialogue then. So as many of you know, New America strives to explain and uncover the implications, the challenges and the opportunities inherent in a time of tremendous technological change. And for those of you who follow our education work, you may also know that we focus on equity for underserved students while also taking a broad view. We examine learning environments in public education systems of all kinds and we start with our littlest ones and bridge that all the way up into adulthood. So today's event in the release of this report are a perfect example of how we use these broad lenses to provide what we think is a fuller picture of what is happening for today's learners. And today's learners we're talking about our children and our adults, our adult learners as well. And a fuller picture of what really is going to need to change across systems. So today we are bridging the world of early childhood, care and education, we're bridging that with the world of higher education and with the world of online learning. So these, in and of themselves, these are quite complicated spaces, right? And yet as you'll hear in today's remarks and in our panel discussion, it really is becoming imperative that education leaders start to recognize how systemic improvements may only be possible with cross sector understanding and reform across all of these worlds. So over the past year, our policy analyst, Shayna Cook, has delved into these worlds with the help of colleagues across our teams here at New America. Shayna is a former teacher. She worked in Washington, DC here as an elementary school teacher and in Maryland as a teacher in an early learning center. So she has a practitioner's eye for what matters on the ground. But she also has an analyst's ability to dig under the surface and help to uncover what policies are affecting the way our teachers are working and the way our children are learning. So for this project, Shayna convened an advisory group of experts in early childhood, credentialing, higher education and online degree programs. And she conducted extensive interviews across those fields. She has also conducted data analysis on higher education institutions using iPeds, the integrated post-secondary education data system, the data from that. And she also filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the US Department of Education to fill in some holes and to better understand what is known and what is not. As you'll see, her report shows how far our systems need to go before we will be able to even see a more complete picture of what is happening for our pre-K teachers today and what opportunities are available to them for both face to face and online learning. Her report lays out important context. It shows the reality of what it means to be a teacher in today's early childhood workforce where compensation is unfairly low and where affordable pathways for attaining new training and credentials are difficult to find and challenging to traverse. So without further delay, let me turn the podium over to Shayna and she can tell you what she's found. Shayna, thank you. Before I get started today, I'd like to thank you all for coming. And I would like to thank one person in particular, Kelly Dwyer, if you could just stand up, forgive a wave. Kelly provided a lot of research support for the papers. I just wanna thank her. So we know that teaching young children takes well-honed skills and knowledge that is not just about babysitting. Policymakers and leaders in the early childhood field have been pushing to professionalize and better define the workforce. Federal, state, and local leaders across the country are working to steadily raise credential requirements for lead teachers to a bachelor's degree, particularly in pre-K. Today, 35 state-funded public pre-K programs require lead teachers to hold a bachelor's degree. And many of those states require a major or specialization in early childhood education. And Head Start requires that 50% of lead teachers in center-based programs hold a bachelor's degree. As of 2012, almost half of center-based pre-K teachers had a bachelor's degree or higher. And over three quarters of Head Start lead teachers had a bachelor's degree, according to the National Survey of Early Care and Education. However, this new credential has equity implications, which mostly focus on accessibility to affordable, high-quality degree programs for all early childhood teachers. So that those who are already serving children aren't pushed out of the workforce. Policymakers cannot simply raise credential requirements. There are often unintended consequences that harm early childhood teachers directly and children indirectly, if policymakers set unrealistic deadlines and raise the qualifications required without setting up supportive programs. This table is from worthy work, still unlivable wages, a landmark report on the state of the workforce. It shows low wages and salaries that early childhood teachers earn. It shows the low wages and salaries that early childhood teachers earn for their invaluable work. One of the first difficulties teachers encounter when looking for a bachelor's degree program is figuring out how to pay for it. Four-year degree programs cost $43,000 total on average. And I would just like to note that online programs aren't always necessarily cheaper than in-person programs. And so that's something to really keep in mind. Through this report entitled, When Degree Programs for Pre-K Teachers Go Online, Challenges and Opportunities, we sought to determine if online degree programs helped to provide greater accessibility to high quality programs for early childhood teachers who were already in the classroom. Some of you may question how an online program for teachers of young children would even work. In the report, we address some of the common misperceptions about online learning, such as the inability to improve teacher practice online. And the professors that we interviewed said that online learning is a feasible option for early childhood teachers when the programs are designed properly and allow for professors to implement high quality coursework. Our findings show how online degrees can provide pre-K teachers with greater access to programs, but they also point to the need for better higher education data and to the need to provide financial support so that teachers can afford to enroll without going into debt. Individuals in the early childhood workforce who go back to school to attain higher credentials are commonly referred to as non-traditional students. This applies to all types of fields, but in early childhood, I'll say these students often commute and often juggle family obligations and taking care of their own children with their employment obligations and their duty to their students. Online degree programs have emerged. Online degree programs have emerged as one pathway that could possibly create a more flexible and accessible route for teachers to obtain a degree. Since teachers can complete the coursework from anywhere which eliminates the time and money spent on commuting and makes programs accessible for those who aren't living near an institution, for instance, those teachers who are in rural communities. The report also shows that many challenges remain before online degree programs are seen as viable pathways for lead educators. While promising approaches are emerging, education leaders and policymakers will need to be more alert to the barriers that current and future pre-K teachers face and work to improve data in higher education. So there were seven key takeaways that emerged from our analysis. Some of these insights apply to in-person, hybrid and online programs, and some are particularly important for developers of online programs or policymakers interested in online programs. First recommendation, early childhood teachers must overcome significant financial barriers to benefit economically from a bachelor's degree. Without scholarship and grant programs along with improved compensation, teachers will continue to have difficulty acquiring a bachelor's degree. Institutions may choose not to offer early childhood degree programs because they fear too many of their students will default on their loans. Policymakers in higher education and early childhood education must address these challenges to ensure that everyone in the field has access to bachelor's degree programs. One program that is making great strides in helping teachers access high quality programs is the Teach Early Childhood Scholarship program which is highlighted in the report and covers a high percentage of teachers' cost of attendance. We'll dive into this more during our panel discussion a little bit later when we highlight how Ball State University partnered with Teach. We also need more comprehensive higher education data and research, which is needed to better understand the online degree landscape as well as to distinguish between quality and subpar programs. For example, you may be wondering how many online degree programs for early childhood education there are. Based on the available data, we were unable to accurately say how many programs there are. One way to ensure that we have better data is to use a student-level data network. And this is particularly important to highlight as the Higher Education Act is really getting up for, is coming up for a reauthorization and that's being debated right now on the Hill. This network would hold higher education data that is stripped of personally identifiable information to help professors, administrators, policymakers, and researchers understand program, institutional, state, or national trends in college outcomes. With better data, particularly in early childhood education, we will be able to understand how long it takes to complete an online degree program. We'll be able to see how many early childhood teachers are defaulting on their loans and we'll be able to really understand how particular demographics of students are faring in these programs. Early childhood teachers need advisors who can help them navigate the many pathways to a bachelor's degree. We all know that there are advisors in higher education institutions, but we really want to highlight that we need advising even before the student makes a decision about which program to enroll in. Many teachers need more information on how to maneuver through the higher education system. It's very complex and many of these students are just interacting with higher education system for the first time and they need support. Advisors can help teachers to better understand their financial aid options so they don't rack up large amounts of debt and they can provide information about high quality programs. When we were doing the research for this report, we did a simple Google search and the amount of programs that came up were overwhelming and it was really hard to figure out which programs would possibly be a good fit. And we also need advisors to provide early childhood teachers with emotional support along the way. We need new approaches to monitoring and evaluating the quality of early childhood programs. So we need the accrediting bodies to aim for full transparency to avoid conflicts of interest. And then this is true in all fields as well, but in early childhood because this is such a population that really needs a lot of support, they need as much transparency as possible to be able to make the best decisions. Teachers should be easily able to navigate websites to discover whether programs are accredited. So we had some trouble when we were doing the research for this report. When we went on different programs websites, you would see a lot of different badges marking some types of accreditation and there were lots of different types of accreditation. So you obviously have different online distance learning accreditation, early childhood accreditation, accreditation at the school level. And so we get into that in the report as well, but just navigating that for me was difficult. And so I can't even imagine how difficult that is to navigate for some of our teachers. Programs must be tailored to meet the needs of the workforce in order to leverage its current skills and expertise. The workforce is already teaching young children. Successful programs will need to recognize and build upon these skills in order to help teachers improve their practice and learn more effective ways to work with their students. Policy makers also must be sensitive to the fact that when they change the requirements for the lead teacher role to a bachelor's degree, the workforce needs time to obtain this new credential. Many teachers will continue working while they work toward their degree and will likely need more than four years to graduate. Early childhood educators need access to broadband service and up-to-date computers, not just smartphones to be successful in online programs. Promising programs have emerged in the form of Early edU, the Early edU Alliance, which you will hear a little bit more about later, and other non-traditional programs that take advantage of online tools. Along with the concerted effort to help educators find these programs, they need access to the internet and updated hardware and software. And finally, more research is needed about the nature of online degree programs in the early childhood context. Government and philanthropies should invest in pilot projects that gather data on effective methods, as well as on the ground reporting on how pre-K teachers are finding and completing their degrees. Results from those studies are needed to build consensus on how to design, disseminate, and teach online programs that help teachers provide even more high-quality experiences in their pre-K classrooms. Online bachelor's degree programs have the potential to help build the skills and core competencies of lead early childhood educators. If policymakers and program developers help teachers to overcome the many barriers to accessing affordable, high-quality degrees. This report is the first step toward understanding those barriers and working to overcome them. So now I'd like to introduce our panel. I would like to introduce Michael Allison-Shandler, who will be moderating our panel discussion. Michael is a reporter for the Washington Post. She writes about family and gender issues. In recent years, she has also covered education. The Ohio native has lived on both coasts. She has a graduate degree from the University of Berkeley School of Journalism and now lives in the District of Columbia with her husband and two children. So let's all welcome Michael for the stage. Thank you so much, Shayna, and thanks for everyone for coming today. I'm really excited about this discussion and the research that Shayna is doing. As she said, I write about gender and family issues and recently asked who covered education in D.C. And so this particular issue is very relevant in D.C. where there is universal preschool and they actually set a requirement, I don't know, many years ago, a decade ago perhaps, that the lead teachers in their preschool programs should have a bachelor's degree. So they've been on a course to accomplish that over that time and I think by December, they estimate that everybody who is a lead teacher in either a traditional public or a charter school in that program will have a bachelor's degree. And then more recently, they're trying to make strides in professionalizing the child care workforce for infants and toddlers. So they set a requirement for lead teachers in center-based programs that are licensed should also have an associate's degree. And that has set off just a big debate about how to accomplish that, in particular because the pay remains so low and there are a lot of challenges for this largely female and very poor workforce to go back to school. So we're gonna explore in some more detail some of the challenges to this and also look at some promising models. If you all wanna come up and then I'll introduce you all, then we'll sit and talk. Great. So Shayna Cook is gonna talk a little bit more about her research on our panel. We also have, let's see, Gail Joseph and she is a professor and director of the Early Childhood and Family Studies program at the University of Washington. And she's also founding director of Early EDU Alliance which is working to train and educate early childhood professionals across the country. We also have Katie Benson in blue. She is a program director for the Early Childhood Online bachelor's degree completer program at Ball State University in Indiana. She is also an instructor for early childhood education, elementary education and special education courses both online and on campus. And prior to this, Katie also was a kindergarten teacher and she taught kindergarten through second grade in Columbus, Indiana. And then Karen Bales is with us today and she is an alumna of the Early Childhood Online completer program at Ball State. She is a lead preschool teacher at Blue River Valley Elementary School in Newcastle, Indiana. She has been in this position for almost 20 years and she has earned her CDA and associate's degree and ultimately, well and not ultimately, she's earned a bachelor's degree through this completer program and she is currently pursuing her master's. So we look forward to hearing from all of you. I'm gonna have a seat. So to start with, before we get into some of these models and some of these possible solutions, I would love to hear you explore a little bit more about the barriers to what it means to put degree requirements on this workforce that previously, what has been required of maybe a high school diploma, in some cases a CDA. So what are some of the biggest challenges? And Shane, did you wanna kind of summarize what some of them are and then, right. So as we talked, or as I talked about a little bit later in which we highlight in the report, there are significant financial barriers. We know that early childhood educators particularly, we focus particularly on pre-K teachers in this report. We obviously care about teachers who are working with children zero to three. But we honed in on pre-K teachers because they actually were making closest to what a kindergarten teacher might make, but even that is significantly lower. And so there are many financial barriers to getting a bachelor's degree that you have to overcome at first without having a grant or scholarship program. So that was one of the main barriers we highlight in the report. There are also familial barriers. You have many family obligations as a teacher. You might have young children yourself or your own children that need care. And when you're earning a low wage, it's hard to find care for those students or for your own children and go back to school. And so we really thought about what are the challenges that non-traditional students face and how can an online program possibly help this particular demographic, which would be early childhood educators. Can you talk about what Early Edu Alliance is? It's sort of roots in the Head Start University and how you have developed to address some of these main barriers. So initially the idea for Early Edu Alliance came from a national grant that we had from the Office of Head Start. And back then we called it Head Start University. We were charged with doing many things for Head Start programs. And one of them was helping Head Start teachers attain the bachelor's degrees that were required, as Shayna pointed out. And really what has emerged and what we've developed is we gathered the leading experts from across the country to develop complete comprehensive competency-based coursework that really aligns with what it is we think high quality early childhood teachers need to know and be able to do to serve children and optimize child outcomes. So we've developed comprehensive courses that are available to institutions of higher education across the country at this moment for free because of some significant funding we have from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. And so what is unique about those courses is not only do they reflect the latest science on how to optimize child outcomes, but we also use what we call the intentional teaching framework that's written about by Bridget Hamer and her colleagues. And the idea of the intentional teaching framework is that within all of these courses we work really hard to reconcile this long standing bifurcation of theory and practice. So sometimes in our early childhood programs we learn a lot of theory, but we don't learn a lot about what are those evidence-based practices? What do you need to do tomorrow in your preschool classroom to optimize child outcomes? So we work really hard to reconcile those with the intentional teaching framework which you can really think about as no. So we want students to know what the theory is but we also want them to know what the evidence-based practices are. We want them to be reliable observers of those so we call that C. So we want them to know and then we want them to see. So not only do we provide lots of examples in the coursework of what it looks like to do those practices, but we also use some little knowledge checks where students who are early childhood educators might view a video or several videos of teachers in action and we want them to be able to reliably tell us what are the evidence-based practices that are happening or not. Because the next thing we're gonna ask them to do is to reflect on their own practice. So we've created this technology where they can upload videos of themselves currently teaching. Then they learn some new practices and we ask them to go back and look at those videos and say, was I doing that, right? Or was there an opportunity for me to do that? So and then after that reflection, they have an opportunity to try it again so we call that do. And then we want them to, and then they look at their videos again and make some improvements until the last part is improved. So no see, do, reflect and improve is integrated into all of these courses. At the University of Washington where I'm located, we have a bachelor's degree an online bachelor's degree and an on-campus degree. The online bachelor's completion degree is really kind of the, we think about it as a bit of the flagship of the early edu alliance in action but really an innovation lab where we can try out new courses and then make those available to the broader institutions of higher education. So our hope is that institutions of higher education might say, wow, you know, we've got all this great coursework but we don't have something in early math. Let's maybe use one of those courses. Maybe we've got this great coursework but we could really tweak it to use more of that intentional teaching framework or maybe we've got these great courses but we don't have a way to look at students in practice and so maybe we just want to use that coaching companion tool and all of those are made available to them. So a little bit about your reach at this time, like how many students are you serving and how many states are you working for? There's probably, again, we need better data. As Shayna points out, she's talked about it all. We need better data. So we have probably about, probably over 3,000 students are enrolled in some early edu course. We have 113, I think, members of the early edu alliance and so that might be a single faculty member or that might be an institution that is signed on to offer several courses and then based on information we've gathered from students we would estimate that we're probably, there's over 30,000 children who are benefiting because they are in classrooms where teachers are learning through early edu course content. So that's been the reach thus far. But what's also important because I think it addresses some of the additional recommendations that Shayna has made is that we bring together state teams. So we really want state teams that are thinking about the professional development for early childhood workforce, those who might have access to or be in charge of scholarship dollars, institutions of higher education to come together as state teams and say, how can we, you know, what is our current challenge and where are some opportunities? And so we have 27 of the 50 states represented in the early edu alliance thus far. Okay, thank you. So, Katie, you are, are you part of the alliance? I am not, I just learned about it recently. Okay. So tell us about the model that you have of Ball State. You know, if you could start with the history of, you know, how did you set it up and why did you structure it the way that you did? So it goes back to actually around 2010. We, Ball State, worked closely with the Indiana Association for the Education of Young Children as well as the Teach Scholarship. And there was a lot of talk about the need for a program that was accessible to our teachers that were already teaching that needed, that wanted to earn a bachelor's degree. So back in 2010, they actually started, some of our faculty members would drive to a more central location. So our university's about an hour outside of Indianapolis. They would drive down to Indianapolis and try to meet students there. That was still kind of a barrier for some, for some of the teachers because, you know, it was happening right after work. They had families of their own. They still had to drive to a location even though it may be closer. And there just wasn't a big enough amount of students to keep that going. So then the fall of 2013 is when the online bachelor's completion program started. So they were able to reach students who can log on when it's available to them. They don't have to drive anywhere. They can do it from their workplace, from home where they're still with their families after work on their own schedule. It really came with a lot of support from the Teach Scholarship. And like I said, Indiana, AUIC worked together to kind of get this bachelor's degree program going as well as help recruit, you know, get the word out there that this is an option and who we are and what the program is. I can't say that's how helpful teachers are for, you know, those who don't know much about it. You know, explain what is the Teach Scholarship? How does it work? And Karen is a recipient actually of the Teach Scholarship as well. So there are some things you have to fit in as far as how many hours you work in the field. But they support our students, I would say it's always changing a little bit, but at least half or more of the students in our program do receive Teach Scholarship. So they are getting, it can change, I'm not sure how much yours was, at least 80% of their tuition is paid each semester. They're reimbursed for books. Some of our students have release time, so they can study. Teach has been really supportive so they don't have that debt coming out when they finish their bachelor's. It's been taken care of, so. And I could just add that in terms of online programs, Teach also supports teachers in getting access to the internet and paying for hardware as well. So that's another thing that the Teach contributes. I think, is it offered in most states or? 20, 23 states. Okay, so in 23 states, opera teach scholarships and they're usually funded partly by the government and partly by the workplace. So I think the employer kind of has to buy in and also give time, sometimes off, and then agree to some incremental pay raises. Let's hear how that experience was for you. Well, it was a wonderful experience for me because it was an opportunity that was just, wow. Maybe go ahead and start at the beginning. So you started teaching 20 years ago, is that right? And what was your education at that time and how did you decide to pursue higher education? Actually, I had really just attended college when I was younger and I didn't stay in and I was able to go to work at my children's, my own children's school, opening up the door to work in the preschool. And at that time, there were really no requirements educationally then, but I kind of, I guess, went up the ladder of success. I thought, oh, there's a CDA for courses. I got that just like my bio said and actually, I worked for several years just with the associate degree, but I just wanted, I just personally wanted more. Everybody, I'm sure, has a different story of what they're doing, whether it's the, you know, maybe the centers want you to work with the bachelors like you indicated or something like that, but I actually was just sharing this with Katie just yesterday. One day, I, we still were taking the newspaper, you know, the actual paper and I opened it up and there was an article, early childhood completer program starting at Ball State. I live about 20 miles from Ball State seeing that it was gonna be online. And I had done online courses at Ivy Tech State College. I thought, wow, this is something I'm interested in. I also had received each scholarship when I was attending Ivy Tech State College also. So I had, I was able to call and ask them about this program and they were going to be able to support, you know, through the scholarship and everything and their scholarship is 80% is paid for at the time I was taken. I think it is 90% now. Employer picked up 10% and then you also paid 10% of the amount of money there. But also it was not only just tuition, it is also for books, the same way it was at the time 80%, you know, they paid for the books too. So it's- So how much did you pay out of pocket for your associates and bachelors degrees? Based, you know, thinking about what it is, just 10%, you know, not very much. What is the course that both state costs? Just the one course, three credit hours? Most of our students are part-time because they're working full-time. It's a per credit hour rate. So it's ranged over the year, but two to $300 per hour. Probably it'd be what it would be, yeah. How long did it take you to go through? Well, they started this in 2013 and I actually just graduated July 2016. So it took me, you know, taking just two courses at a time, working full-time, you know, that amount of time to get through, to do the completer program, yes. It took, I also did it the same way doing my associate degree also. So it took me six years to do that, just two courses at a time and, you know, just like she indicated, working full-time and having a family and trying to do the schoolwork, you know, takes a little bit longer. How have you got it? Talk about sort of the value of that program to you and how you feel like you've been able to bring it into your work. You are a professional and has been doing this for a long time, you know, there is still a lot of people who think, hey, you know, they don't need it, you know. For me, it was like validation of things that I was doing in the classroom, almost supportive because, you know, I would do an assignment from one of these incredible professors, you know, that had signed and it was not only a learning experience, but it was like, hey, that's why, you know, just the light bulb moment. That's why I'm doing this and it just was, you know, validation over and over in the actual classroom of the experiences I was having. But, so you were already good, but you felt like it made you know why you were so good. Yes, it was like, you know, it's okay, I know why I'm doing this now and I have like the, you know, the terminology or whatever, you could back up what's done. So in a sense for me, it was a lot of support to be able to take these courses, even though it does take a lot of time balancing, you know, I can remember sitting, doing a lot of work and my husband would come in and say, are you about finished? And I would say, oh, just a little bit longer, you know, just trying to get it all done, but I guess I really haven't ever realized that too much. So, till just this moment, how much support it has given me, you know, in my actual work, it really has. And were you doing these courses primarily online or what was your message? Yes. I completed, I did the complete course totally online. And that was done through a lot of different means, like sometimes there's different programs that different professors would use, like when I did my practicum, I actually set up my laptop and we did a program called Athena, where, you know, we had to be watched while we were doing it in the classroom. And so, I really wasn't real tech savvy when I started doing these courses, but I know a little bit more now. And it's been more of an education than just actually, you know, just the experiences of the classroom work. I wanted to ask you, Gail, if you could talk about what is the demand that you've seen for online versus sort of in-person classroom, whether it's on the state sort of level or from teachers themselves, what do you think is the demand? So I think that, sorry, I guess I can, I don't have the data right at my fingertips, but I would just think from the University of Washington, we have an onsite and an online degree program. They're both about the same enrollment, so there's a demand for online and onsite. And then I think from the early edU Alliance that it is, that there might be a slightly more demand for the online courses, because the courses could be used in-person or online. So, but I don't know the figures nationally, the demand for online. We do know that it is incredibly well received when there's a working professional who might even be within driving distance of the University, but for some of the same reasons in terms of when the courses are offered, the barriers have even just navigating parking on campus, you know, if you're in early learning, you, even if your hours end at six, you don't really leave until the last parent picks up their child from the early learning program, which might not always be right. So we do know that it's a great relief to working professionals who want to stay working in their field, in their own programs, which we would love for them to be able to do. The online becomes such a great, a tremendous opportunity for them because we see that our students, when they take their online courses, they're delivered asynchronously, so they can log on at any point to watch the lectures and complete their assignments. There's certain deadlines, so other than that, they can do it all independently. And we see that our students log on between eight p.m. and one a.m. in the morning. I mean, that's when they have time to do their coursework, and that's not when even evening courses are usually offered at a university. So in that way, I think that online really has this tremendous opportunity to allow early childhood teachers to continue working in their own programs, in their own communities, with the children and families that they know and love, and further their own education, and at the same time have assignments that help them the next day, either learn the terminology of what they're already doing or learn something new that works. And so it helps the children too. So we kind of think about it as a two-generacy strategy. Great. And Shayna, in your report, you look forth some of the myths and realities around sort of online learning for early childhood educators and what did you find? So we looked at a study actually from Bridget Hamring from the University of Virginia. And we also looked at a lot of research from Chip Donahue, who's at the Erickson Institute. He also was on the advisory group, and so was Bridget. And we also interviewed professors who were teaching online courses just to help us better understand how these would even work. So one thing that we know about early childhood teachers is that they really thrive on building relationships, with their students, relationships with each other. And one of the myths that we came up across was that you can't really have relationships in an online course. And a lot of the professors, including Gail, helped to debunk that. And early childhood teachers themselves were able to build better relationships with each other because you can still have a cohort model online. And some of the professors even said that they had better relationships with their online students than some of their in-person students because you're able to let everyone talk and no one can really hide on an online course because you have to respond to those prompts and videotape yourself and we all have to see. And so there's just different functionalities that are better online. So that was one of the things that we focused on. And then just in terms of looking at some of the research, we were able to say that if a program is high quality and giving high quality course content online, you are able to improve teacher practice and they've done a lot of different studies around this. And so there was a myth that in-person is inherently better than online, which is not necessarily true. And we also just don't have, I hate to go back to this again, but we just don't have enough data to say which programs are high quality and which programs aren't. And so we need better data to be able to make that leap. Some institutions of higher education are following up with their students and seeing where their students are and how they're performing and they're able to capture that information for themselves. But we need that information on a larger scale to really understand the full landscape. And so those are some of the things I'd highlight. Well first, Karen, what was it like for you, both experiences? Was your associate's degree in a traditional sort of in-class kind of thing? It started that way, but they also started doing online courses, so it was a combination of both. What do you think are sort of the strengths of either? What do you like about the online experience? What do you not like about it? I love the online experience. I loved it because like you said, you could lobby in it one o'clock in the morning if you needed to. But you do get to know people, like you said, through videotaping or writing. I also completed mine. It was actually the first cohort of all states. And so you make connections with the other students in your class. And you learn a lot from them by reading things on discussion board topics and stuff. You learn so much from them and you make connections with them also. So I would say, I would prefer online over the classroom just because it worked for me already working full-time and having a family, you know, just living your life. It just was wonderful. And I've had a great experience with all state universities. And she was my advisor. And she was wonderful. And I really, we don't really know each other other than just her being my advisor, but a lot of support from the advising and also a lot of support from the teacher scholarship. Every time you completed your coursework, they wanted you to send a copy of their grades and everything. And they just, you know, if you needed anything, they were there to counsel you, you know. So I can't say enough for Ball State as far as the advising. Also the teachers and professors, the instructors and also the teacher scholarship staff was all just great. And so at Ball State, Katie, have you encountered sort of issues with digital divides, you know, prospective students not having the technology that they need? And also this issue, I guess for pre, I wonder if Pre-K teachers if it plays out in the same way, but like of meeting a lot of remedial remediation before they can take the, or are these mostly students who are coming in already with associate's degree? Yeah. So it's our technology because I don't always know everything is going on unless they tell me, obviously. But most of the time they've had access to what they needed. Some of our students that maybe didn't have access at their own home, they've been able to have access at their workplaces. So they will do their assignments and have access and have the computer there at their workplace. Some of them would do it during release time during the day or at lunch. And thinking about the students going through in a cohort, some of the students actually worked in the same workplaces together, so that they have the support together and they could work on things together in the technology pieces at their workplace. Of the remedial forces, you're asking, yes, this is the Ball State program is a computer program. So they come in with their early childhood and their associate's degree complete before they take essentially their second half of their backwards online with us. So the remedial pieces would take place at our community college. And is that an issue that the EDU Alliance is looking at? Well, I think it's certainly an issue that we hear about in terms of articulation and getting credits and getting through some courses that can be more difficult for folks to complete the math requirements. It comes up a lot. And we know not from our own work, but we know there's other examples out there where community colleges have worked hard to contextualize a math course within the context of early childhood education. And so it becomes more relevant and that students are more successful in that way. So I think that, you know, so there's some great examples out there of how to help students get through those courses. I can't say enough about how important the good advising is. You highlighted that, and you're highlighting that. That somebody that can tell you, you know, if you keep taking classes that start with a zero, you're not getting credits that are counting towards your AA degree. If you take a certain AA degree, it might not transfer over to the bachelor's degree. So that is really important that we have that great pre-advising in terms of even which program to go into, but the advising along the way. And one of the things that we've done at the University of Washington has had this idea of a retention coach. And I know a lot of online programs have something like that where they can monitor the analytics of students to do kind of in real time advising and support. So it's been a week. We noticed you haven't logged in at 1 a.m. or otherwise. You know, how can we help you? How can we provide that support? Because I think about when I was a head start teacher and it was so physically and emotionally demanding. I can't imagine at the end of the day then saying, oh, now let me log on and take that online course. And so having that additional support and advising and cheerleading to get you through it's important. And I wanted to talk about the technology piece too because we saw that that was, we had a lot of students when we first started an online program that were current educators and were coming back to school, often non-traditional students as we would call them, often first generation college students and their families and they weren't worried. What we would hear is that they weren't worried about the coursework itself. They felt pretty confident because they had experience in the field that they could do that. They were really concerned about the technology piece. And so online programs who think through this, such as Ball State, do a really nice job of onboarding students where they might say, they might recommend a certain technology bundle that could then, they could get a scholarship for or apply financially towards, but use this type of computer, use this type of browser, use this type of program and use this type of camera for the coaching companions, what we use or Athena, whatever it is. Because if you can kind of specify, then you can provide a lot of support at the beginning. So you can say, oh, here's all these tutorials for how to do this. All the professors can know how to provide that tier one technology support for a student because they're all using the same computer, they're all using the same. So there's ways to kind of help support that technology piece because again, it's almost like an additional curriculum or experience that you get is learning how to use the technology in addition. It's a bonus. Yeah, it really is, it really is. I really think that the technology piece can be is transformational in its own way, right? And do you want to elaborate on that at all, Katie, and like how you sort of on board, students to the experience of online learning. We have a orientation piece that they do, of course, online that hopefully has kind of an introduction to what they would need and the kind of support that's available. So we have other online programs at our university. So we have a really strong, we call it the help desk and I use it myself. But it's available 24 seven with technology, even not just using a program, but even if there's a glitch trying to get, we all have the glitches where you think you know how to do it and you go to do it and it's not working. So our students can call the help desk at any time. They can look at your computer, take it over if you need to, so you're not trying to describe what's happening and help the students in that way as well as each of our instructors within the courses. So as the courses were designed, making sure there's support. If we want you to use whatever it be, that's Athena or a Prezi or something like that, that that support is built in as this is what the assignment's gonna be and this is what you're gonna need to do and this is how you use that. Here's some videos on how to watch, here's some information. Let's have a discussion board if you have questions about how to use it. Usually you may have the same problems as somebody else is having that problem. And for Gail and Shayna maybe and whoever wants to chime in, you know what outside of Agile Alliance, Ball State, what else across the country are we seeing in terms of higher ed institutions trying to create programs that can be successful, where students can be successful in getting their early ed degrees. So in the report we highlighted Ball State University and Early Agile Alliance, but there were a lot of other programs that we didn't get a chance to highlight that we're hoping to possibly highlight in later blogs. But, which I can't think of right off the top of my head right now, but a lot of folks are entering this space and are interested in how to do it right. And they're looking at other programs and they're determining and they're creating other alliances and networks that will really help solve this issue. So there is quite a bit of movement in this space for sure. So I mean it seems like so quickly money is the sticking point, you know, all of this. So what are your recommendations around that? How can, you know, I think you mentioned that a lot of universities are reluctant to even have early ed BA programs because students have shown to default on their loans, some programs have closed down, what to do? Yeah, I mean, they're, you know, the National Association for the Education of Young Children has created a database of higher education institutions and they've highlighted, you know, which programs are, you know, high quality. And so that's really the first step, really understanding and choosing programs that are of high quality because there are programs that aren't of high quality, which we couldn't really get into in the report because we need better data to definitively say that. But I think we all know that there are some bad actors out there. And so that's just the first step. And then, you know, we really emphasize highlighting the Teach Early Childhood Scholarship because we think that this is, you know, a really good program. It's providing the funding for students to go to school. It's pairing that with salary and wage increases. And so those are some important things to do and for policymakers to think about. So programs like creating more programs like that or, you know, expanding those types of programs. And then it all goes back to advising as well, helping educators know, you know, which programs to take, how to maneuver through the higher education system as either a first generation student or more than likely a non-traditional student. And so those are some of the things. And then, you know, we really talked about or we addressed in the final recommendation, I believe, that philanthropy and government really need to really make some strides in this space, particularly if we are gonna raise requirements for teachers. We really need to make sure we're thinking that through and we're creating supportive systems for those teachers to be successful. And so that every teacher has access, so that we're not pushing folks out of the field who are really making a difference for our students. So that's something that we highlight as well. Okay. I would say that there's some, some, I think, interesting possibilities to, I think one of the things that, you know, Head Start grantees programs could actually use some of their money to help support. The employers could help support the tuition. But I think that one of the sticking points sometimes is when you put one of your teachers through a bachelor's degree program and you don't see the benefits in the classroom, right? So that is that kind of the, like what's the relevancy and the effectiveness of the program. So I think that one of the things is that as programs improve their quality, their offering coursework that is relevant and effective, that you can see it. You can see that the next day you're trying a new skill when you're reading with young children, you can see that you've increased the number of open-ended questions. You see that better classroom management. When you see those types of things, then I think that employers might be more excited to help pay the tuition because that, those are professional development dollars that they don't have to spend in another way, which is doing in-service workshops almost remediate or compensate for what they've been getting in their higher ed program. So we hear that a lot is that the hesitancy is because the program seems so unrelated to what it is that they need to know and be able to do. So I think as we increase the quality, as we look to the transforming the workforce report, the recommendations four and five around higher education are really specific and I think helpful in helping programs, higher education programs rethink what they're doing. And I think one other aspect of students continuing in their higher education and finishing and completing is really around the resiliency and the wellness of the educator of being able to manage stress, being able to kind of keep their goals in front of them. And so one of the things that we have in the Early I Do Alliance, which is a course that's available again for anyone, is an entire course on the resiliency and wellness of the educator. And in our program, it's the first course that they take because it helps them think about managing stress, it helps them clarify what their goals are, what their values are. It helps them think about how to find that support system for themselves in their daily life, but also in this amazing thing that you're gonna do, which is complete a bachelor's degree in addition to working full-time and perhaps being a parent. So we find that that's something that, it's still an empirical question, the value out of that, but we certainly hear from students that they love the course, helps them, they reference it throughout the rest of their degree program. And then I would say one other thing about kind of the staving off the cost is not only is making sure that the course works relevant and effective, because then an employer is actually paying for a professor to provide job-invented coaching if you think about it that way. But the other thing is that there's some innovative ways that states have been offering coursework. So we have a couple states in the Early Edu Alliance that offer the courses online for everyone. So it's a continuing education opportunity for everyone. And then students that are degree-seeking could see if they could use that course that they've been taking online as part of the state professional development and get credit for it at a reduced cost at a local institution of higher education. So one way that you could think about is also reducing some of the cost. I have one or maybe two more questions. I wanted to open it up to you all. I actually, Gail, I was hoping you could explore just a little bit. I mean, Head Start did this, right? I mean, they went out and they, 75% of lead teachers and centers do have their bachelor's. So how did they set that goal and achieve it or pass it, I guess? Well, so that was mandated in, I think in 97, reauthorization. It's been a while. Yeah. Was it 97 or two? Well, it was in, I think in, it's been a while. And so they had the requirement of 50% of the teachers. So they set that standard and programs have been meeting it. I think what we wanna do is make sure, is to think about and dig into the data about how they've met it, who now have bachelor's degrees in the programs, is that across the country? Are there certain pockets? Are there certain states where they could use a little bit more support? So I think that we're excited that they met that requirement. They're excited that they met that requirement. I think we also wanna look at that data and say, who has the bachelor's degrees in their programs? Who are there certain pockets where they might still need some support? So, but they did set up Head Start University. They funded us to do that work, but they also did set up a policy. And do we know if this was achieved through turnover or part and part or in half or in, I think that's the question still is to explore that data a little bit more. Well, I'd love to open it up to you all. And if you have any questions, please let us know who you are and just remember to phrase it as a question, because we'd love to hear from as many people as possible. And, oh, there's microphone in front of me. If you just wave your hand, somebody will come around with a microphone so we can hear you. Thank you. I want to thank this new America and Lisa and Shayna and their colleagues for taking on so much early childhood. It's a real pleasure for those of us who've been in the field for many years. And I also wanted to thank Michael for her articles and the post as we work with those in the early learning collaborative. I want, what? Oh, I'm sorry. My name is Edna Rock. I'm a resident of the district and have been in the field for probably over 15 years. And I can document that. The most wonderful sentence I heard this morning was when Karen said an answer to Michael's question, how did this influence, that is doing the online work influencers. She said, I know what I am doing. I know why I am doing it. That is, if every teacher can say that, we'd be fine. Another question I want, when an assistant teacher, I'm assuming that's where you were when you started all this. When an assistant teacher begins to enroll in one of these programs, does the program, either of Ball State or Washington or others, do some kind of orientation with the director and the lead teachers who may be a little wary, skeptical, whatever, do they know what she's going into? Yeah, I just wanna make sure that you wanna rephrase the question as you understood it. At the time that I started when I originally got my CDA from the get-go, I had a wonderful director that was already had a master's degree in early childhood and special education. And she was very supportive. And hell, go ahead. She talked to this cute boy, so you know, go ahead and very encouraging for me to go ahead. She actually left the school and went someplace else, but she was very instrumental in just being that key person that you need to do these things. And then the ones that are there now, they've been very supportive of me continuing my education at the school, not maybe that they always understand early childhood in a public school system. I mean, you know, but they're still very supportive. Just trying to speak to that. We do, in Indiana, we do not have public-funded preschool. So a lot of the people in our program are already directors, are already lead teachers, are assistant teachers. They're working in other parts of the field. They're home, they have their own homes, childcare centers, ministries. So it's a wide range of people coming together, it's not just the sisters. My name's Ira Sokowicz. I'm the CEO of Learning Game Studios. I make mobile learning games for adult education. And I've been working with a lot of community colleges, but while this is focused on BAs, I heard, and rightfully so, that a lot of the folks coming into your institutions are unaware of how to navigate FAFSA or where to get career counseling. And I know that a lot of the larger institutions that are now moving to both in-person and online education still have career counseling and all the other requisite services. Is there a particular additional emphasis here? Or are the people coming into your programs just not yet aware of what those institutions offer already? I'm curious why there's such a high emphasis on it here as opposed to anybody else who's moving from an AA to a BA or similar program. Particularly if they had an AA, they should have been getting that counseling at their community college to begin with. So in early childhood education, I would just say that the system is very bifurcated and fractured. So there's not always a very clear path to getting that bachelor's degree. There's different requirements for different positions with even in the same community based on the setting in which a teacher is teaching. So you might be a public pre-K teacher and you might have certain set of requirements and you might be a pre-K teacher in a center community-based program and have another set of requirements. And because those pathways are not clear and there are various requirements for folks who have the same title and are in the same role, but are in different settings. The system is ripe for folks to really be confused or unclear as to the pathway forward. And for different organizations to pray on students as well who are unclear about that. And then you add in the teacher certification versus completer programs that don't have certification. It just really complicates the issue even more than in the K-12 space, in the early ed space just because of the various different definitions of folks and requirements for folks with the same title. And so it's a very complicated system because of that. So I would say you're right. You know, the college advising that component is available but we need another layer of advising in early childhood to just help folks really navigate that space. Thank you, when you say something about moving from AA to... A lot of our students are non-traditional. I have a lot of students who have not been in school for 20 to 30 years. They received their associate's degree many years ago. They've been in the field teaching and now they've either been told to or decide on their own to get a bachelor's and they have not been in any kind of higher ed space in a lot of years. So they have a lot of fears and a lot of questions about how to navigate that as well. And I would add that the associate degree can be tricky because in early childhood it might be a technical degree that doesn't require a lot of the general education requirements. So if somebody comes to the University of Washington and they have an AA in early childhood that is more of a technical degree or vocational degree, we only would probably transfer about 20 of those credits. So they would need to probably take another year of credits back at the community college to then come to the bachelor's degree. So then they're paying for five to six years for a four-year degree to make $27,000 a year. So that's one of the other issues is not only the different requirements, but it's tricky because if you go to a community college and say, I want to do early childhood, they might put you on a track that's not going to allow you to easily transfer or articulate into a bachelor's completely degree. Well, then Empire Maths and Services Group, have you found in either in your practice or in your research any programs that are really tackling the issue of access to technology really well? I taught in two different head start centers in Chicago and I know that a lot of my co-teachers who wanted to go back to school, that was a huge barrier, either not close enough to a library. We definitely were not allowed to use our computers at school and also I know a lot of my colleagues as well are center directors. Definitely didn't have the funds or weren't super supportive about paying the 10% or paying any part of that. That's a significant barrier. I mean, we often talk about lack of access to internet and broadband for students in childcare centers, but teachers also are lacking that access. And, you know, we, you know, I mentioned the teacher early childhood scholarship who helped a little bit with that for teachers, but I don't know if Lisa, you want to jump in or if there's any other programs that you know of that really impact that. What would you add one thing to your point about the facilities, and I'd be curious too, maybe this was in your experience in Chicago, there's such a range. So you may have early childhood centers, early learning centers that have some internet access, maybe one room has a computer that's still like ten years old and is connected through an ethernet and nobody's, you know, figured out even how to kind of set up the Wi-Fi, honestly, and there's no, and there's not much emphasis on this for good and bad reasons because in the early childhood classrooms there's such an emphasis on, you know, developmentally appropriate practice and really focusing on the children. And so it, what's happened is many facilities kind of in a way have been left behind by some of the digital transformations that have happened in other workplaces. You're not seeing that there's Wi-Fi, that people have abilities to kind of bring a laptop in and then kind of get online if they even have a laptop in the first place, which is, you know, that's a highly expensive piece of equipment that many of these teachers could not possibly afford. So the e-rate program is something that we've covered a bit here at New America, Lindsay T.P., who's here, one of our analysts, wrote about this a couple of years ago, and we need to ensure that that program will never want, we need to ensure it continues because that's even a question in some cases now, but certainly to recognize that it should be extended to learning environments that are not just our public schools, that our early learning centers are also learning environments that could use the subsidies from e-rate to help allow internet access in those spaces so that our teachers have the ability to plug in, get online when they're at work. So that's another piece of the puzzle for sure. And you all may have some additional. Well, I have that microphone. Can I take a moment for one more maybe question for all of you? And it's for Katie and Karen. I'm just thinking about what it's like for, say, a teacher right now in a child care center who knows that coming down the line they're going to need to get a bachelor's or they've been, you know, told, you know, be ready maybe in six years. Who knows, you know, it's coming. They're interested. They really want to have that ability. So they go online because where else are they going to find, you know, maybe they're in the library. Do they go online to kind of search around? Maybe they ask their center director. But again, as we've heard here, it's quite variable. Even our center directors may not be 100% on top of these issues, understandably. So they try to just get started. And maybe they find the Ball State program or they find the Early Ed U program, but they're not in Indiana or they're not in Washington. Are there some things that those pre-K teachers, those child care teachers should really be thinking about when it comes to state requirements, transferability. I've just often wondered whether there's also some catches there. And Shane, I know we have not delved into this deeply yet because hopefully they'll come in some subsequent pieces. But if there are some new concerns that may have to do with, you know, gosh, if you're in Oregon and you get a degree from an institution that's in Indiana, is that going to affect your ability to teach in Oregon? That has to do with the licensure versus non-licensure piece. I don't know if I probably didn't make it clear at the beginning. Our online bachelor's program is a non-licensure program. So teachers get a bachelor's degree in early childhood education. They also have a minor in early childhood special education. They do not have an Indiana state teaching license. When the program was created, they looked into that and there were a lot of barriers not only between the states, even within Indiana. You never know what licensing is going to do over the years and our license actually changed at that moment and went to cover through third grade, our early childhood license. And we knew that these students that we'd be serving this population would not be able to take a semester off of work to go to a elementary school K-3 level to do a full semester of student teaching. And that was the main reason we became non-licensure. So as far as it depends on the state requirements, what you would need, like, there's such a range. But if it's something that does not need a teaching license, that's not affected with the sub-plain bachelor's degree. I don't know if that answers your question or makes sense. You know, have you seen a lot of, like, differences and what that was required for that? That was a beautiful example. It really comes down to the licensure because an early childhood degree, a bachelor's degree non-licensure is portable and transferable as long as it's, you know, a regionally credited university. But it really comes down to, like, what is that teacher certification in that state? Do they have some agreements that they would accept that? You know, like, I know that Washington, Alaska, and, you know, there's some states that allow you to kind of use a different state teaching requirement. But that's where it becomes, the portability issue becomes big. And that advising issue. The advising issue. Hi, I'm Susan Scolifani, an education consultant. I have a question about this issue of non-licensure. How difficult is it for the people to go ahead and complete the licensure on their own? Because obviously the salary differential for people with a state license is very significant and more than pays for the program time and money that they've spent. So is there a way to move from your programs to those? Or are you strictly working with people who want to remain in the non-licensed environment? Actually Karen is doing this right now. It's very new at Ball State. We just started in the spring an opportunity for students to get an Indiana State teaching license. It's an elementary education. So it's in our state that covers K to 6. And she's able to do it almost completely online. I think she said she's met on a Saturday twice through the whole program to complete her, and she'll complete that license this spring, coming spring. So she's moving up the ladder. And then as well, if they've completed our online bachelors in early childhood and they complete the elementary ed license, they can also take the licensing exams in early childhood and add that birth certificate to their license. So when she's done, she's moved from her CDA up the ladder through the bachelors. She's now doing her licensing in both L.Ed and early childhood. She's going to go ahead and finish her master's with a couple more courses as well. And to answer your question, I am paying for right now, myself, and we don't make a lot of money and everything, but I think if I have the licensure, it will open up a lot more opportunities for me, as well as the master's. So I think it's worth coming up with the money. We'll make sacrifices however we can to be able to do it and so I'm encouraged that way to continue it. But it is a lot of money. And I do, I actually am taking January and it's just going to be for 10 weeks, so typically the semester is 16. I'm not sure how it's 10 weeks long, so for 10 weeks I'll be not getting any pay, but it'll be okay. So I think that's something we should try and address. Is there really a body of empirical research that says taking time off and student teaching in another place is making you a better teacher than if you could stay and get some even... In your own classroom. Yeah, in your own classroom. I'm actually going to be across the hall from my own classroom. I'll still be checking on the kids I have this year. Hi, I'm Abby Lieberman and I'm at Policy Analysis at New America also. I just have a quick comment, not a question. This has been a wonderful conversation. The panel got quickly into Head Start and talking about the BA requirement and I just wanted to note if people are interested in that data, Bellwether Education Partners released a report, I believe it was in March, that looks at the Head Start workforce over the last 10 years since the BA requirement. It doesn't really dig into online degree programs as far as I remember, but it does have some interesting information about gaps and who's been able to achieve it, the effect on turnover and compensation. So just encourage you if you are interested to check out that resource as well. Hi, my name is Katie Emerson-Hoss and I'm the Outreach and Implementation Manager for Early Ed U Alliance. And I just want to clarify in response to your question about that local... So how does that work locally, right? So the Early Ed U Alliance really morphed from Head Start University to this idea of an alliance where we built these courses and we deliver them to local institutions and states so that they can figure out how they can take relevant and effective coursework and make it fit within their system. So students who might be taking Early Ed U Alliance courses are taking them at the University of Cincinnati or at Des Moines Area Community College because those institutions have decided to offer those coursework because we needed to address that very issue that we can't just create this university that then students are going to go through and still get back to New Jersey and have to take another year worth of courses so that we really want to provide those resources so states and institutions can figure out local solutions to their problems. Do we have time for me to do one more question if we have one? No, I want to thank everybody for coming. Thank you so much to Shayna. Thank you for bringing everybody together.