 Good afternoon and welcome. I'm Laura Born-Fren, Director of Early and Elementary Education Policy here at New America. Thank you for joining us today for this slightly different conversation than we were planning. But we're happy to have all of you online and have a few people, a few presenters and our second panel in the room. We're here to have conversations today about some of the most challenging and entangled issues facing the early childhood education field. Preparation and education, compensation and status, workforce, diversity and inclusivity. As we envision early childhood education's future and as we envision how best to value and advance the EC workforce, we must resolve these entangled issues, which we identified as the thorny knot in the series that led to this event. Stacy will tell you more about that and how it came to be in a few minutes. And as we do have these conversations and resolve these issues, I've concluded that equity and the educators themselves must be front and center and so must quality early education opportunities for our youngest children. Everyone in this room and listening online knows that early childhood educators play a critical role in learning and development of children. These educators also provide an invaluable service to families and their communities. Consequently, their work is complex and requires specialized knowledge and skills. Plus, as I think we all agree, they deserve to be compensated at least on par with their peers in elementary education. Advancing the early childhood education field is not simple though, and it's not limited to requiring degrees and increasing pay. Across those in the field, there are multiple ideas for how to move forward and many aspirations for early childhood educators future. As yet, we do not have a clear path forward, but efforts are underway to change this. As part of the initiative stakeholder group, I want to take this opportunity to congratulate our friends from any way see in the power to profession task force, some of whom I think are online with us today. Many of you may be aware that at an event yesterday, the task force released its unifying framework for the early childhood education field after three years of consensus building work and stakeholder engagement. If you have not yet seen that framework, I encourage you to go to any YC's website. For our conversations today, we want to go beyond descriptions of the thorny knot. As one panelist said while we were planning for this event, we have spent a great deal of time admiring the problem. So today, we want to look forward. We want to talk about real solutions, and we want to identify the next most important step for valuing and advancing early childhood educators. There are important important voices missing from today's conversation. I want to acknowledge and own that upfront. I am proud to say the same is not true for the compendium that you can find online. We have some copies in the room. There are some physical copies of these, which which will be just distributing. You know, we hope to be able to do that and you can find it online. But multiple questions that the panels will discuss later today will be about who is missing and how authentically and meaningfully to include them. Due to increasing travel restrictions put into place by entities across the country, we've had to transform this event into this online conversation, but there are still multiple ways for you to engage. You can ask questions through the Zoom webinar platform, feel free to add them as you have them, and then our moderator will raise your questions with panelists at the end of each discussion. We'll be having two panel discussions today. And for those of you who would also like to participate in the conversation via Twitter, please use the hashtag false choices right there in front of you on on the screen and we invite you to engage on Twitter. If you're interested in other topics related to early education, please check out our early and elementary ed policy homepage at newamerica.org slash early ed. For all our blog posts, policy papers and other content. We've had a busy first quarter so in my unbiased opinion there's lots of great things to find there. Some of you may not be as familiar with new America, our organization is dedicated to renewing the promise of America and strives to explain and uncover the implications, both the challenges and opportunities inherent in a time of dramatic technological and social change. In our education policy program we focus on equity for students who are underserved by their schools and society at large, while also taking a broad view, examining learning environments and public education systems of all kinds, starting with those serving our littlest ones and continuing up through adulthood. In our early elementary and early and elementary education work, we work to ensure that all children have access to a system of high quality early learning experiences birth through third grade that prepare them to thrive in school and in life. And now I have the pleasure of introducing our moderator for the first panel and my partner on the Moving Beyond False Choices for Early Childhood Educators Compendium, Stacey G. Goffin, principal at Goffin Strategy Group. Stacey, please take it from here. Thank you Laura. Hi everyone, thanks so very much for everyone who's here both in person and online and also for everyone's adaptability. I really want to make sure before beginning that we all acknowledge Laura as well as the team at New America for the amazing effort that they have done in the last like 2448 hours to transition from what was structured as a very different kind of event to the one that we're going to get to enjoy today. So again, I really want to say thank you and then I'd like to could if I would or if I could I would make eye contact with all the team members who are here who've really made a tremendous difference. I want to say thank you for that. So I'm just going to give a setup for the panel discussion, the first panel discussion, and I'm going to begin by talking. Well, I hope I am. Hold on one second. Oh, goody our first technology technology issue hold on one second everyone. Try again. Okay. Okay, yeah, first slide please. Yeah, I wondered about that too actually. All right so I'm just going to start talking and then hopefully the slides are going to follow. So my, the first thing I want to make sure for those who may not be familiar is providing a bit of an overview of this 18 month series. And for what it's worth I think when we started engaging with this we thought it would just be maybe six months. And then it expanded thank you very much into an overview of the first 18 months so we're one slide. There you go. And as many of you are aware but perhaps not all what we attempted to do was to really engage with the complexities of what as Laura indicated we call the thorny not for early childhood educators. And what I would note for us please is that it says for early childhood educators not early childhood education and I think that's often a switch that we don't tune into. And the thorny not is comprised of three threads education and preparation compensation and status and then the fields diversity and inclusivity, which in for the purposes of the series was defined as birth to five. So the series goals next slide please was to really try to get to bring new voices to bear that would help us to disentangle the thorny not and it's three strands, and we tried to begin to do that work was by soliciting diverse perspectives to first prompt introspection. Secondly, to inspire new thinking, and thirdly to try to explore new possibilities for rethinking the relationship among the three strands. So the next click. The stimulus for this was actually Albert Watts post that was titled increasing early childhood teachers education compensation and diversity. And Albert remind me that came out like three of three years ago maybe. Yeah. 2017. And I think it's worth noting here is that Albert who was a neighbor at the time before I left DC to move to Colorado. After reading his post I went to ask him if he would be okay if I would choose to provide an independent individual response. And he said, sure, that would be fine. And then as I started giving it more thought though, I realized like wait a minute, rather than just offering one opinion there was this incredible opportunity in terms of the issues that his post presented to actually explore deeply and to do so as a field which is something I feel very strongly about is that we need to be engaging far more of us in these conversations and we need to be engaging across the diversity and range of roles that exist at all levels and programmatic areas of the field. And so Albert generously said sure go for it and pretty importantly in this instance so did Laura and new America. And so that's what then led to the ability for us to do this. So why the compendium and the next slide please why the compendium is because and then you can put up the first first kind of click because it's annotated. So the there were 32 posts and those posts were all equally substantive and thought provoking. And importantly, we believe they helped actually refashion a debate that for far too long has been polarizing the early childhood education field, and the energy was clearly present for extending the conversation. So when we began planning for the compendium, we went through all of the post and then identified five themes from the series so the next slide please. And the five themes were first one was degrees in education. The next was higher education. Third was race, class and gender. The fourth was early childhood educators and the fifth was in family child care. And that should not be seen as suggesting that any one of those things was more important than the other. We've simply presented to them to you in the same sequence as they are evident and discussed in the compendium itself. So next slide. So what we then did was to identify new authors who would bring different perspectives to each of those theme topics. And importantly, whether individuals who were again is kind of diverse as possible in terms of bringing different voices to the conversation. And each of these questions, what we were considered next questions that needed to be presented to us as a result of what we what was revealed for us, if you will, in terms of the post that were present in each of those topical areas. So the first one and again in order of presentation in the compendium is by Rebecca canter and Christie cowers their topic is degree or was degrees and education and the forward thinking question for them was, do degrees and education matter for early childhood educators. Why or why not. And again, each of these authors as I'm going through them wrote introductions to the theme topic. So when you have a chance to look at the compendium and how it's organized, you see these new introductions as well as then the original posts that informed these new authors and relationship to their question they were asked. And the second question, which was addressed by Marjorie costal Nick was the theme topic of higher education, and her question it was, Why does higher education need to be what, so I'm going to try that again. What does higher education need to do differently to regain its stature as a gateway to the ECE profession. Thank you was addressed by Linda Hassan Anderson and her theme topic was race, class and gender, and her question. What is the role of race, class and gender and resolving ECE's thorny knot. The fourth was addressed by Sophia Jackson topic was family childcare, and the question was, Where does family childcare fit in the early childhood education system. The fifth question by which was addressed by Ariel Ford was specific to the topic of early childhood educators. And her question is, Why do early childhood educators voices matter in conversations about the fields thorny knot. And then to kind of book and if you will we have two essays and opening and closing essay. The first one was written by Albert Watt, and it explores the question of what does equity and progress look like for children and their early childhood educators. And then the closing essay, if you will, written by Laura, it tackles the question of what's needed for early childhood education to take a big step forward. So I want you to just be aware please that all of these new the intros and the essay so all these new contributions, all are framed around questions to which we don't yet have answers and for ones that we're arguing it's time to begin to articulate what those answers might be. So let me now segue to today event. So the first discussion that I'll be moderating continues on the pathway, if you will, of asking provocative questions. And we have questions, new questions that will be asked of each of the authors. And to the extent possible we're encouraging panelists to not only not only answer the questions that are asked of them, but to also to engage with each other. In terms of Q&A from the audience and Q&A from the audience in this instance refers not only to those of you who are in the room, but also to those of you who are online and so again to repeat the instructions that Laura offered earlier. You can do that at any time and you have two options. You can do it through the Zoom chat or you can tweet at newamerica.ed at the hashtag false choices. So either of those and then those questions will be passed to me to share with everybody and to ask for answers again from our panelists. And then we will go into a second panel discussion, and that's going to be moderated by Amanda Garcia and that, excuse me, Amaya, sorry, sorry Amaya, and I should know that so well because my granddaughter's name is Maya so all I have to do is add a little to say Amaya. By Amaya Garcia and that includes two essay authors and to our delight to practitioners who very last moment agreed to alter their schedule so they could also be here this morning so we're just delighted by that. And they will be introduced by Amaya when we get to that point of the conversation. So, we are now ready to enter into the first panel. And let me introduce who our panelists are. And I think you have a next slide which also will show everybody's names. Okay. All right. So, so people can begin to hear voices. So panel members perhaps when I say your names you might just kind of say hi to everybody and wave to those of us who aren't in there in the room with you. So, and this is just listening them now by alphabetical order so Linda Hassan Anderson. Welcome from the Pacific Northwest. And Linda is the president CEO of in I a and associates, Inc. and the interim chief program officer for the Center for Equity and Inclusion in Portland, Oregon. And again, I thank all of y'all for joining us in this unique way this morning. Secondly, though I get to actually just turn to my left and look to Ariel Ford. Good morning. Excuse me. I've got allergy voice. Good morning. And Ariel is the director of early learning for the city of Chattanooga. Then we have Sophia Jackson, Sophia. Hello everyone. And Sophia is the early childhood systems director at the North Carolina partnership for children. And I should know for all y'all when you go again to as we keep doing this show and tell the compendium then you'll find by everyone's bios inside here so we're not giving you those introductions because we know you'll find this information in here. Rebecca canner, Rebecca. Good morning. And Rebecca is Dean of the School of Education and Human Development at the University of Colorado Denver. And then we have Christie cowers. Good morning. And Christie is director of the National P3 Center at the University of Colorado Denver and right, Christie you're also an associate clinical professor at the university as well. That's correct. And then last but definitely not least we have Marjorie Gestolnik. Low from the middle. Marjorie is a professor at the University of Nebraska Lincoln. So here we go guys. And as I start with asking these questions. Sometimes I will be asking them of specific panel members. Other times I will be asking them of everyone individually on the panel because we want to make sure we get the benefit of all of their thinking. I want to acknowledge up front, though, that facilitating and man and time management are a lot more difficult in this context than if we were all together and so inviting the panelists to be attentive to their time but also to seek apologies in advance if for chance I'm thinking like oh my gosh this is going to go on and on and inadvertently cut you off sooner than I should so apologies in that regard. Okay, so first question is for you, Linda. And everyone, the panelists had these questions in advance so they had an opportunity to prepare they're not being caught off guard. The series title Linda as you well know is moving beyond false choices for early childhood educators versus early childhood education, and numerous authors, including those of you on the panel have highlighted the need to differently engage early childhood educators. How might you have approached your introduction differently. If you had been asked to also try and channel practitioners voices. So, I think that's a really important question. I definitely reflected on the voices of practitioners, because they're often referenced, but not centered or amplified. I'm going to reframe my response just a little differently I would actually be unwilling to channel their voices as I strongly believe that they have agency to present their own points of view, when included. If I approached the invitation differently I would have specifically thought more deeply about inclusion, I would have certainly considered whether it would work to invite a practitioner to really be the primary author, or to the very beginning of the section with me. I'd also be really interested in making certain that the section was translated into multiple languages and that we thought about multiple formats for delivery. That way we would have provided broader access to the materials, particularly to those that are going to be most impacted by the conversation. In hindsight, I consider it the power dynamics of the invitation as I received it. When I accepted it from New America, and really didn't deeply consider any alternatives to simply saying yes, I'd be willing to be an author. Thanks. Is there anyone else on the panel who would like to add to Linda's response that then I'm going to. Okay, Rebecca, thank you that I've asked people to help me to see literally see when there's a question coming up because the screen is at such a distance that I don't see it as well so Rebecca chime in. Right, so we just wanted to chime in that. To the extent some of us did incorporate providers views in our blog we, we have the great fortune of having colleagues that have done extensive survey work with the early care and education workforce here in the state of Colorado. And we actually tapped into the survey findings around what the or the ECE workforce here in Colorado wants and would hope for in terms of a degrees and education and we did include the those perspectives in our blog so I think there's a range of probably how we engage in voices and to what extent. And I think in policy conversations we probably need to be savvy about the methods and timing for engaging voices. Thanks Christie. Anyone else. Okay so Ariel. It's been suggested that individuals in positions such as yours may inadvertently be preventing early childhood educators from being like leaders on behalf of their own work. What do you think needs to change if realigning the fields present power structure is a priority as suggested by blog series authors as well as many of the introductions. Thank you Stacy I was a little sad that you shared that we got these questions up from saying kind of. That's kind of a big I mean it's a big question to ask and I think a big question to wrestle with that as I have been wrestling with it. One of the things came about for me and the first is that we as kind of intermediary leaders or positional people with positional authority. Have a lot of responsibility to do some internal digging and to think about, you know, when I hear people in positions like mine and, and when I catch myself. I'm trying phrases that maybe I hope are not in my heart but I say them out loud and so there is some truth to that about about the field you know and I'm using kind of maybe some air quotes around that. So how are we as these positional people with positional authority uncovering our internalized depression so how are we understanding how misogyny and internalized white supremacy and ableism and and on and on how are those. So that Gordy and not creating a set of conditions that we are imposing on, and how we set ourselves up separate from the field, and how we assume that we have the right to speak on behalf of the field. And so I think there's a piece that we have to do internally and with one another where, when we are in the room and confronted with someone who says, Well, you know the field they're just not educated enough. And we hear that I mean I and then the field knows that so nobody is immune from knowing when they are being oppressed, or being thought lower than, and that's an unacceptable thing for us to continue. So that's thing one I think is that we have to do that hard internal and it's, it's messy and it's unglamorous and it's ugly and I don't think we can ignore it, or I think we've ignored it too long maybe. And then I think the second is following maybe in line with the themes of the of the compendium is that we need to take that same honest and rigorous look at our systems and really kind of take a cold light of morning view and think about how are the systems that we've set up from licensing to QIS to higher ed to, you know, to how we onboard staff and teacher or educators, how are all of their systems designed to make invisible the voice of educators. So they are designed to make invisible. I mean they are separate from it is done to. And so that is something that I think we also need to do internally with ourselves. It is not educators fault that that happened. So I think it's a little unwise for us to ask them to engage in fixing something we've broken, at least initially. And then the third thing I think is then we have to have engage in the work of fixing it. And we have to prepare for responsiveness. So how many times will have we held focus groups, or had surveys, and we get responses, and we don't do what teachers tell us to do. Every day. Right. So, so those are the kind of three things that I think sequentially maybe even need to have them. Thanks. Okay, and we promise you these were going to be provocative remember and invite us to think forward so appreciate both of the responses we've gotten thus far. And the next question, which is kind of a two part or I'm going to be asking of each panelist. And so Marjorie if I may I'm going to look to you first and that may be more look maybe more of a, what I'm looking for kind of an abstraction or symbolic there. So starting with you. What of each other's ideas did you find most intriguing or thought provoking and relate to that after reading each other's introductions. What questions do you have of each other. So I'll repeat that since we had a unexpected interruption there. So each other's ideas that you find most intriguing or thought provoking. And after reading each other's introductions, what question might you have of one of your fellow panelists. Okay, well, everybody had thought provoking things so I actually have a list here for everyone I want. Every person, but I'd like to start actually with Linda, and the whole notion of looking inward. And her one of her premises is that we need to shift from blaming to much more internal reflection and taking responsibility. When you think about it that relates to everything so far that we've talked about organizational structure, higher education, community leadership, funding sources, regulatory groups. How do we begin that shift really beyond just talking. How do we actually have people shift to a much more internal introspection some sense of, we have a hand in the problem, as opposed to, we got to fix those people because boy they're a mess. So I would ask Linda, how do we begin that. Wow. Great question. I could come out of retirement wealthy if I had a clear answer to that. But certainly, for me the starting point and I think your question points in the right direction that individuals have to actually be willing to take a step back and I definitely want to acknowledge and I saw that in everyone's writing that that introspection that being willing to say maybe we have some hand in the solution as opposed to looking externally I think is a great starting point. I think each one of us has a life journey that's very very different. And so to assume that all of us are starting from the same point is probably a false assumption as well. Certainly as a person of color, a lot of my reflections are very very different than many of the people that hold power and leadership in the country. And so I think that being willing to take that hard internal look. Secondly, to create some shared agreements and shared language about how are we talking about our desire to go forward. Because I think to this point, a lot of the language has been externally focused and how do we help them figure out what the next steps are. And that's as far as I could go in terms of my own personal reflection on that that particular issue, but I'm pretty excited that more and more people are in the conversation of who am I in the matter of the solution as opposed to why can't other people fix this problem. Thanks. So Marjorie, would you just pick the one, one of the others that you'd like to lift up for us. In Sophia in your essay access is a key idea that you lift up. And you talk about things like childcare deserts and communities. You talk about IBA groups and family environments. As worthy of attention support and investment. And my question to you is, if access is an issue. How do we open the door. How do we make that access possible that first step possible. Sophia hold on. Sophia hold on one half a sec please. Marjorie tell us for so all of us know what IBA refers to please. Okay, this was in your essay. Do you want to talk about the vocabulary just a little bit. Sophia. I mean I can but I think you can too. I'm happy to build on what you share but I'd like you to take a stab at it because I'm just interested to hear your perspective on it. Well, I saw that family coordinated community childcare family childcare is FCC and IBA independent business associations and independent groups. Thanks for that. Making sure to talk about shared language earlier that we had that shared language for you, Sophia go for it. Okay. So, hi everyone again, and thank you Marjorie for the question. The ideas of access that I put forth in my article really challenges us to think about the access for children and family and access to opportunities for rich learning environment. One of the conversation that we're talking about is raising the quality, and I put forth ideas for how we can improve the access to opportunities learning environment that will ultimately give us more access if you will for the quality conversation. So when I, some of the ideas that I think would specifically help increase access is central to my, my article and introduction, and that is listing up prioritizing centering and increasing our collective value around childcare, family childcare as an option. So one really quick thing that I think that we could do to work with family childcare providers increase the, the respect that is attached to the field and increase opportunities is to really think about how we support the business development of those that are interested in getting into the field. So the business roundtables or the family childcare network, those are methods or strategies that will help create strong learning environments for the adults that we need, and that need support in stepping into a very unique field and industry. Thanks. So Christy, I'm going to now move to you and ask the same question do you want me to repeat it. No, are you going to have for Rebecca and me answered independently or do you want us to do this together. You may. Since we wrote the same article. That's why I'm asking, right. Well, I still see you as having distinctive voices and so the intent was for y'all to do it individually but if you prefer to do it together that's okay. No, it's no that's fine. So, so some of my reflections that we've throughout all of the essays are around these notions of inclusivity and whose voice matters. And I think one of the questions that Ariel just responded to, and I have a little bit of a different perspective in that I feel like we need to be thinking about the ECE workforce, more broadly, not just the teachers, not just the educators who are inside the classrooms, but we do have a large cadre of policy leaders Ariel mentions these in her essay intermediaries, who probably need their own training leadership attention. Policy advocacy skills policy development skills that can be enacted in inclusive equity focused ways. I think my sort of question to, to all of our co authors would be to sort of reflect on the extent to which we elevate only the early childhood teachers voice in these conversations, versus also finding ways to elevate the policy savvy and the equity based policy savvy of some of these intermediaries in the workforce as well. And you'd like to direct a question to in that regard or is that just kind of a minute. I would not allow for everybody so there's someone in particular that you would like to direct that question to us, I can, I can direct it to Ariel to start since as I said in her essay she actually talks about the intermediaries perhaps being part of the problem. Thank you for giving me much chance to talk some more so I think, you know, I think it's potentially both and my concern when we start to add people to the list of needs is that the void the, the, the centering of educators is diluted. And we have done that for my entire career. And so I actually would take a hard stand and say no, that is not our first stab at this that we elevate educators that we provide spaces where they give us instruction as policymakers and influencers. And then we, we do what they tell us to do. And if at that point, there is an understanding that we as those intermediaries need more education or supports, then, then we go from there. But as an initial stance I say no that we focus on educators that we center them. And I might build on that. I'm sorry that Rebecca is that your voice. No, that was severe. Okay. All right. And then Rebecca you're next. Okay. I just want to agree with Ariel's position. We started off the conversation talking about centering voice. And I often find that the conversation can be limited or stopped at bringing voices in or incorporating perspectives. One of the opportunities I think is equally important is fostering agency. And I think that's what Ariel is talking about that not only how do we increase the voice but also expand early childhood educators, family childcare providers, childcare center directors, how do we increase their agency to step into the policy conversation. You could not see Ariel nodding her head and the affirmative. I will just bring that forward. Can I quickly just tie those two thoughts together. Go for it. So I don't disagree with either of those positions, but I, I want to keep pushing though that I feel like when we talk about increasing voice and agency and education, we tend to focus on the skills behavior knowledge competencies that are effective inside classrooms. I want to argue that if we're going to increase agency, we also have to be thinking about the skills behavior knowledge competencies that do make people effective policy advocates, policy developers, policy influencers, and that might be those might be skill sets that are not chosen by everyone in the early childhood workforce but we do need to be finding those people to raise up and bring deeper into the field. So I do think it's about the end. I think that's what Ariel said. Thanks. And so I have to say for those of you who know me, do you know how hard it is for me not to join this conversation. Okay, Rebecca. Thank you, Stacy. I want to return to first to Linda's comment about looking inward and reflecting as individuals and suggest that we also need to look inward and reflect as organizations and as sectors. It's not just to call the higher ed world. We're not, we're not an organization, but we're a sector of the bigger landscape, and also reflect on our responsibility and our histories, because we really the kite, for example, there's a, we talk great deal about fragmentation. And no, and that fragmentation is not the responsibility of individuals. It's really we've all contributed as part as individuals within organizations and within sectors. We have this layering that we do in the field. Those of us who've been in the field for a long time can attest to the many, many layers of work that keep piling one on top of the other and we with a really a kind of tendency to not give up as we layer something new. So the fragmentation we have in the layers we have are really our responsibility and trying to figure out how we deconstruct that is going to be organizational at the organization level as well and at the sector level as well. So we are individuals and we're individuals inside contexts that are responsible and need to spend a little time reflecting as well. Should I pause there in case Linda wants to respond to that. Thanks, I was actually raising my hand in the, in the chat room. And I just had a note making sure I saw it. Yeah, so thank you because I think that this is definitely a both and conversation like there is systems level work that we absolutely have to take on. And while I do think that we've got many different groups with different sets of skills and agendas that a novel way to consider approaching on tying this thorny knot might be a cohort that has policymakers that has practitioners that has multiple voices together. Really deconstructing, like how do we get here, and then conceptualizing what might be the way forward. And I think part of what happens when you use that kind of approach is that you also have to have some affinity spaces right so that you will you give the practitioners an opportunity to come together. You can give the policy people a chance to come together separately if you will, but then you bring everyone together inside of a common goal. So I do think it's a both and I think that there's a work that individual groups need to do. But I think at the end of the day we're talking about transformation of systems, which means that there's going to need to be some overlap at some point in time. And an area wants to chime in to. I don't disagree with that what I would urge us a caution I would urge us to consider is that in those in those shared spaces, there, there are power differentials and that educators. How are educators being encouraged to see themselves as powerful in those spaces when we have never allowed them to have power in those spaces before. So that's just an adaptive piece that we would have to navigate through and create some structures for. That would be my only addition to that thought. Yeah. Yeah, my second thought was was going to be a reflection on what Sophia said, in her piece, which is just to note for a moment the irony that access, which has been at the center. Of our conversation about childcare for many, many decades is also at the center of the problem for educators in terms of making progress toward a degree. So my lens is going to be both in the essay and in this conversation is is really going to be about higher education. An incredible moment I think we're in as an industry higher ed as an industry to shift what access looks like for early childhood educators and many communities of potential students and learners. We're in a, we're in a moment of change in higher ed that is making my head spin and I bet many people in positions like mine have are spinning as well because things are changing so rapidly, but there's great opportunity in the change that's happening to really shift what access looks like in in we're here because we care about early childhood educators access for early childhood educators to at the end of a long day, given the salary and compensation constraints and everything else is something about very seriously and I think as higher educators we have an opportunity to change the design of what our programs look like around issues of access. Marjorie I think you have a hand up. I do. For just a moment. I was thinking about this whole conversation. And, you know, who is the target audience who who are we working with. And while I agree that it's very important that we keep our eye on the educator and the wraparound support that they need within the field. I would go back to Sophia's notion that part of access is developing allies, people who don't realize they can become allies, people who don't recognize that for instance family childcare providers have a small business, and that they need the help of the business community. Things like that. So on the one hand, I think we have to keep our eye on the field, but we also have to help the field figure out some ways, and that includes us to increase the allies that surround that field and see that investing in the field is to their own self interest. So I realize I might be taking this down a different little different path, but I think that all of this is part of that thorny not because it is complex. So Sophia I'm going to use that as an opportunity to ask you the question of what did you find in others ideas that were particularly intriguing and thought provoking. You know, I think before addressing a specific part of the content compendium that was intriguing. I am intrigued overall by the intersectionality of the conversation. The idea that we're looking at education preparation compensation and diversity race class and gender. I believe that all of our essays really highlight just how complex this this is and I love this question, the statement from Ariel earlier how did we get here. And how do we sort of untie the thorny not so I think the tone of this entire conversation is intriguing to me. Specifically from the content compendium of Marjorie, your piece left me thinking a lot about truly the intersectionality that we need to exist in higher ed, in order to address some of the ideas that I put forth in my piece. So you title your article what does higher ed need to do to regain a stature as a gateway to the ECE profession. I really liked that higher ed was sort of put forth as a key player or major actor in helping to untangle this not higher ed is often in field that can define certain reputation of fields and if we engage higher ed in untangling this not not for my perspective I believe we could begin positioning family childcare as a enticing field of learning and track of a degree attainment that can be found within higher ed so there's a lot of power that exists within higher ed and I found just that question and thinking about my piece I found that intriguing. My question is you state well before the question you state colleges of education and human development education human services already exist nationwide. That is absolutely right. I'll put a rhetorical question out there. What other fields of professions need to be included in that and to your point. Where do we get additional allies so not to you thank you for pointing that out. My question is you asked a provocative question here how can higher ed address ECE more coherently across professional divides within the act within within the academy. My question is what do we know about what causes those divides and where have you seen successful work across professional divides within higher ed. Just a small question. That's what we're here for. Well, to be honest I think it's about territory divides come about because of territory access to resources power status within the institution. And how we allocate status in the institution. We allocate status through funding. We allocate status through awards through university wide initiatives. There's lots of ways that higher ed get status. Well, we're seeing a major shift in higher ed. We're moving away from the single investigator model. We're moving away from totally independent programs and we're starting to see that there is benefit in working together. Both in terms of our productivity if we counted in research dollars if we counted in attracting students if we counted in being able to have an impact in the community. The more interdisciplinary we are the more effective we are and the whole notion of a collective approach is becoming much more valued in places like the National Science Foundation NIH etc. So one the bubbling the percolating that needs to happen for greater interdisciplinary work is there. But the big thing we have to do and I'll talk about this a little bit later also in the conversation is we have to stop saying fit my model. We have to say instead of saying oh you're welcome to come in and be like me. We need to be saying in higher ed. What is the vision. What is it that we're trying to build what is it we're trying to achieve and how can we do it together. Not you give up your identity you come on over will open the door a little for you know it has to be a restructuring. I'm going to segue now to Ariel I was just doing a time check guys that's what was going on so Ariel. Yes, you have your turn. Some of the ideas that really sparked my interest Linda you were inspiring to me with ideas of you know follow the money which I could kind of hear you just saying with like this intensity. And then the question of and I think this is one that we need to wrestle with this as a field and probably don't have the time today but is any solution acceptable. I think that's a really deeply important question for us to ask. I also love thinking about educators wanting degrees and having data to show that because there's kind of a false narrative around educators wanting, you know, a behavior workshop. And that is not my lived experience is that educators are like, yes, please, I do want a degree it has to meet my needs it has to be accessible. But please don't make me take another literacy class, you know, so I'm being a little flip, but the question I really wanted to ask is to Sophia and it's, I love that the, I am a product of family child care. And so I, my question is, what do you think that we as a field more broadly and you spoke to this around higher ed but what do we as a field more broadly need to do to support family child care as a part of the field. I think the onus is on us. Yes. I say, establish the value, a collective sense of valuing family child care as critical. You know, I come from Illinois, I'm in North Carolina now, but in Illinois, I have been a part of so many conversations that equally position family childcare as a solution in our field with center base with school base. And, but when I look across the nation and within certain states, the, the conversation or the value placed on family childcare. I would argue just isn't there. I would argue we need to significantly reestablish that family childcare as a critical part of our sector. I think that once we, and let me acknowledge there, one could argue, well, value is placed because we have QRIS systems for family childcare. And what, what I'd like to push back on that and say, yes, we have these, these infrastructures. But what do we really believe about the importance of family childcare? Do we believe that home based learning environments are a critical option for our youngest learners? So, and I believe once, once we start there, once we really start looking at the decline in numbers and really seeing it as a crisis. I think that will then a range of solutions and strategies will will come from that. Thank you. And Linda, I'm going to let you close out this particular question and guys, I am starting now to watch time because we want to make sure we have enough time for the Q&A and I remind folks who are online that you can be sending those questions at any time and you have two options for doing that. You can do it through the chat box or you can do it through Twitter. Wow. Okay, one question. I think I'm going to address it to Marjorie. And I love all that you said about higher ed and what you envision and the potential for kind of reinvention at this point in time. My curiosity is about how higher ed could be in a position to scale to actually impact the sizable and urgent need that we have in the field. Well, that's a good question. I think part of it is recognizing that we could be working across disciplinary boundaries and in doing so that increases our capacity to work with the workforce. So instead of each college of education and human science having to have its own business people, we could work across with colleges of business. We could work with colleges that look at small business and look at the labor force in that way. We are notorious for teaching our own child development courses for teaching our own all of those kinds of things where it would be possible for us to collaborate with other areas of psychology, for instance, on campus. But it isn't just again, I'll just take whatever you've got to deliver. It is that disciplines in higher ed need to be talking to each other about how they really create rich ecosystems that students can participate in to have a really robust understanding of the fields that they are approaching. I'm not trying to make that sound too esoteric, but that's really how I think it would work is we would look beyond ourselves, look beyond petitioning the provost to give us 10 new positions. I have to be careful. I was a former dean. I was one of those people asking for those positions and instead looking at my colleagues, other colleges, other programs and saying how could we work on this together. Becca, would you like to build on that in any way or offer a different kind of response? Yeah, I'm Marjorie. I absolutely agree with everything that you just said and all the things that you said in the context of this compendium, but I'm also going to push us in higher ed to think about giving up some of our long health positions about transferability of credit, for example, from associate degree programs into bachelor's programs or from one higher ed institution to the other and suggest that we really need to be as absolutely flexible and self-sacrificing as institutions as we can be in order to let people build degree, as opposed to earning a degree, to make progress in their degree pathway. I recently sat with a young woman who had 60 credits from five institutions and we were trying to figure out how she could come into hours and make progress toward a bachelor's. You know, in the old days, decades ago, we would have accepted some portion of what she had and asked her to retake things so that her degree came from us, positions like that. And today I want to say, I said to this person, we're not going to ask you to retake anything. We're going to find, we're going to align what you've taken inside of our program and help you continue to make progress. I think those are the kinds of changes I think we have to be ready to make as well. And I would agree. I knew you would. So moving now to a next question, which is also going to be invited of the group as a whole. So y'all have put forth a lot of ideas, not only in your intros, but I think in this conversation we're having in the present about what needs to change if we're going to disentangle the thorny knot for early childhood educators. So what do you see, though, as core elements of the field that need to be retained or said differently? What do we need to avoid losing? And typically when this question gets asked, people will very quickly move to the question of diversity and, you know, our passions around equity. So I'm going to ask y'all to make that an assumption and think about what might be one or two others that we want to avoid losing. That's one way of saying it or make sure that we hold tightly onto and not let go. And I think now I'll just kind of keep reversing the order here and we'll look to you, Christy, to kick us off. So I think the one piece that we don't want to lose as a field is the mixed delivery system. And one of my concerns with, with sort of always talking about compensation that's equitable to public school teachers. While I like the premise of that, we have to make sure that that doesn't steer us toward a public school only delivered system of early care and education. And so I think we need to strive to find ways to make sure that we preserve family choice, we preserve community based centers and family childcare homes in all of this effort. All right, so let's look to you Linda. I'd like to see us hold on to our commitment to meeting the unique and individual needs of practitioners. We are really clear from a perspective of child development that meeting individual unique needs of children matter. And then I think we lose sight of that when we start thinking about meeting the needs of practitioners. So I want to make certain that that would be one of those non negotiables that we view the individual practitioner and their unique gifts as well as their unique needs as a focal point for scaffolding their growth and their learning. So before moving on to one of the next of y'all and thanks, Linda for that there's a question that's directed to you. I think Rebecca, but Marjorie might also include you as well. And so now I'm reading the question and thanks to whomever is online who just submitted this. I'd like to say how much I agree about Rebecca think it was Rebecca but maybe Marjorie as well just now and in terms of talking about how higher ad should refrain from asking others to fit into their mold, and rather to be willing to embrace the vision and to fit the needs of the diverse field. And the question is, how do we do this. So Rebecca will start with you and then Marjorie, in case I, I misheard voices switch to you. And then I'll return back to the original question. And that's allergies. I promise I promise. Yeah, so we're piloting lots of, we're piloting many versions of our, our pathway, our program here at CU Denver to see how, how far we can go to meet the diverse needs in the field. For example, one of the more interesting things that we're doing that I'm excited about is what is what we're calling a place based model. So we're working with three large community based care and education systems in the area to put together a cohort that will meet at the end of the day on site in one of those three, three places, where we will have a care for the participants where we will literally bring our program to the cohort so that they don't have to travel downtown to our campus. One of the things that in a recent survey was named as a barrier. We are, excuse me, we're going to treat our program. Our courses have been aligned with the early childhood competencies of the state of Colorado. So we're going to work from a competency point of view, assessing the members of the cohort and working really in a very customized way with each member, not staying within the confines of a traditional course but working on a set of competencies that we agree and negotiate with the members of the cohort to work on. All of the assignments and everything we do will be about their practice in their classrooms. So the idea is in place based is not only to bring the program to their place of work, but to customize the content of the program to their to their work very literally so if we're learning about assessment we're going to assess the children in their classrooms together. And then we'll back it out monthly to talk about assessment more broadly and to read about assessment and so forth. So the idea is to simultaneously reflect on and build your practice while you are earning credits toward your bachelor's. The idea is to take down the barriers that have been named access child care cost confidence as a student in a recent workforce studying Colorado and try to overcome those barriers by bringing excuse me this place based idea to a cohort. That's one of several different models that we're piloting and each model is designed to really think about the needs that we've heard from the field in different ways so we fundamentally do not believe that an off the rack one size fits all program is viable to Marjorie's image you know the come come we have this nice program for you is is not going to create more access and create more support. So we're trying in that particular model of the place based model the ideas to build practice and our degrees simultaneously and other models the goals are some are somewhat different but across across the pilots. We're trying to find the design that will be most successful. So Rebecca I know this is a question that really tasks into some passion. I'm obligated time wise though to. On and Marjorie are you OK if I return to the original question or OK so this is to remind us all that it's about what do we need to want to retain and to avoid losing. And I think Rebecca maybe now's a good time though to let you answer that question very quickly about what is it that you think it's really important for us to retain to slash to avoid losing about all these changes that are being proposed and again I do have to ask us all to be attentive to brevity and conciseness of our answers. Sure. Well I I I'm trying to think if I have anything novel to add I certainly agree with the mixed delivery system I think it's critical. I think this is a slightly different take on I'm going to answer it in a slightly different way. I think that we have invested as a field in a great deal of coaching and professional learning. And I think that my my position is that we need to find ways to connect the coaching and professional learning to credit toward a degree not to necessarily give up on it lifelong career long learning is important in all fields but to create that it's another way that higher ed is going to have to bend and flex but also the professional development world and the coaching world will have to bend and flex to make that connection. So I guess I'm I'm qualifying the hang let's not lose the professional learning commitments that we've always had and the coaching commitments that we've developed but rather connected more meaningfully to credit so that it all leads somewhere. Thanks so I'm now Ariel your response. So I thought about this question really differently than my colleagues and I was thinking about what made what would what made a difference in my trajectory, especially when I was an educator. And so given the assumption that the diversity is important. I might throw a little bit of a monkey wrench in that because a thing that was deeply and profoundly important to me is that this is a field that is led by diverse women. And while I desire greatly men to take up the mantle of care and to begin to engage in that work. I will not sacrifice women as leaders in the field. Until that has until men become caregivers and educators themselves so that's a completely different way of answering that question. Thank you. Exactly the kind of diversity of viewpoints that we are hopefully inviting today and throughout the compendium. And so, Sophia if you could offer us your thought and feel free to pass. These are not forced answers if you, you know, would just like to move on and then smartly so you know you're going to be the one who closes out this question for us. And we have gobs of questions piling up and to let you know it's interesting they're almost all revolving around higher ed and degrees. Yeah, so quickly, my two answers were taken I agree that we need to maintain the mixed delivery system and specifically the connection between the professional development sectors and the higher ed sectors. So I would just add that as we try to untangle this thorny not let's hold on to our creativity. There's been a lot of creative solutions that address all of our issues, or ideas that we put forth. And I think if we hold on to that and live into it more than we will continue to find the solutions to the thorny not. Thank you for optimism. Well, for me. What I would say is I don't want us to lose our partnership with families. Early childhood has a long history of partnering with families not necessarily blaming families, seeing families as partners in their child's learning and development. And I hope that no matter where we go as a field that we keep that as a central tenant of our practice. All right, so guys the last question for y'all is a whole group. So that we have sufficient time to respond to the questions that are coming from the online in particular is and each of you again to please answer it is what do you see as the most important next step for moving beyond false choices for early childhood educators and looking at my list of y'all and trying to move this all around. I think I'll look to you Ariel to kick off is number one. So, Stacey warned me that I needed to be succinct. And so I will say that this is I am going to put forward a personal commitment and so I have gotten really comfortable asking, you know, is this a diverse panel when I'm being asked to be a part of a panel is this, you know, our many voices included but I have not been good at asking if the field is going to be represented and if educators are on the panel. So my commitment now is not to be on panels or to speak about the field without the presence of the field. And you know what I'm going to actually avoid asking to define what she means by field. Thank you. Linda. So I think the next important step and maybe I'm just kind of shaping it is looking at how do we ensure that every step of the way equitable access. Whether it's to conversations, whether it's to higher education, like that equitable access access maybe being the operant word be something that we always use as a filter. Sophia. Yeah, I think the next most important step that we should do is really focused around what I mentioned earlier and like enhancing the agency of those that are center in this conversation. So specifically, I think that we should identify the family childcare providers who are leaders who are models who have demonstrated the excellence that we want in our field and convene and censor their voices and continuing the conversation about how to expand what they have created in the future. Thank you, Marjorie. Um, focus on competencies versus locale as the key to the education of the workforce and to stop treating the status quo as the starting point for creating the new constructs we need. I'm going to go back to, I think it was mentioned in the opening to the idea of partnerships, who we who we bring together to, to make those changes. And those partnerships include state government with and all of the various pieces of state government with higher education, the professional learning professional development and coaching community with higher education with state government. And of course, and all of our thoughts about who should, how we include the primary stakeholders across the field in those partnerships will be very important. But I think it's really time to address the fragmentation and to connect the dots and that that's not going to happen if we're not sitting at the same table. Thank you and Christie. Rebecca and I did not coordinate this even though we're sitting next to each other. My commitment and next step is to keep these issues front and center in the policy conversations. I hear the need to elevate voice, but I have to say while we're continuing to increase voices policymakers are marching ahead with or without us. And so I think as many of us need to show up and be responsible responsive participants in the policy process. Now. Thank you all. I'm going to look to the, to those of us who are present momentarily to ask if any of y'all have questions but first I'm going to go to one of the questions that have been received online and again, encourage those of you who are to feel free to submit your questions either via Twitter or the chat room option that you have. So this question again as I said a large almost all of them revolve in some way around degrees and higher ed, which is kind of interesting. So how do you support higher ed and whoever would like to answer then you're just going to have to speak up those of you again on the panel. How do you support higher ed to be the catalyst of agency for educators and what competencies and program requirements does higher ed, currently have that are not supporting the agency of educators, which are. I think that I saw read that again this is was a multi prompt question here. So one how do you support higher ed to be the catalyst of agency for educators I'll just start with that. And then introduce yourself by name please first name when you as you choose to answer so we can all recognize your voices. This is Christie. Come work for Rebecca Cantor. No, I mean I say that somewhat in a cheeky manner but I do think that we need to seek out the innovative voices and higher ed to paint all of higher ed as a monolithic entity that's not willing to change is really unfair. There are places doing really innovative creative things all over this country. Find them talk to them partner with them. And then come work for Rebecca. Yeah, and I have the incredible opportunity to work in an institution like see you Denver where we have where we have a culture of education and thinking about diversity over almost 60% of our undergraduate student body is diverse and some are either first gen or students of color or in some way members of marginalized communities so our whole campus is geared toward thinking about how we give to students and how we enhance and increase the opportunities for students to be successful. So it's really it's layers. It's easy to work at an institution that lets me be innovative and and think about how we flex our programs in order to enhance student success. One else want to chime into the part one of that question. Okay, Marjorie. Well, could you repeat part one of the question or absolutely and I don't think I read it very well the first time that's for sure. So, how do you support higher ed and I think that's kind of a royal way. How do we support higher ed to be the catalyst of agency for educators. I think there's two ways and I would agree with the speaker. I guess it was Christie who said, lots of really good things are happening in higher ed higher ed is not, you know, a place that hasn't changed at all it has changed. But I think there's two ways to get agency. There are many more. One is how you hire people. You hire across disciplinary boundaries. That's something we're doing at the University of Nebraska came from a college with seven departments in everything from nutrition and textiles to add psych and elementary education. Everyone of those departments has hired people in early childhood, so that they can work more collaboratively. I think a second thing that higher ed can do is to work with those intermediary decision makers department of education department of social services and Department of Labor. Those departments are likely to listen to people in higher ed. And so we can go to them and talk to them about some new ways of doing things for the future. And perhaps creating more of an ecosystem within our states in which those departments more regularly communicate across those lines. So I think those are two ways of promoting agency of early childhood workforce. And so the second part of the question, which I'm probably editing as I go here, but is there any singular competency or program requirement that any of y'all feel is actually blocking the agency of educators or potentially supporting the agency? Ariel, go forward. So one of the things that I working with in service educators would love to see more of is that early education is contextualized in with a policy lens with a kind of a cultural lens. And so rather than, you know, solely discrete skills or, you know, methods classes and development that there is also a broader contextualized contextualization and for me that would be super helpful when they leave the college classroom and enter the little people classroom and understanding their work and their role. So the next question, which continues in the kind of a similar vein in terms of looking at higher ed and degrees, but I think speaks to something that I know I get to hear a lot about is how do we continue to increase quality and early educators credentials without pushing, pushing out long term educators. And again, if you'll introduce yourself before answering the question. That'll help us all. So this is Rebecca Cantor. And I'm glad you raised that question. I saw it in the Q&A space and it's a very important one. It is another way that higher ed, at least in the circles that I'm in, is thinking about changing. So notions like credit for prior learning, credit by evaluation, credit by assessment, borrowing from other industries that are looking at apprenticeship models. All of those kinds of changes have potential I think for addressing the part of the community that is being raised here. People who are long term, long time educators in the field and have a great deal to bring in to higher ed as a basis for credit. That's where I would go. Anyone else want to build or and or add to that. Okay, Sophia I think these next two questions that I'm going to try to merge are going are primarily directed to you, which is what steps or suggestions you have to make policy changes on the state county level to implement the push for family childcare providers to begin enrolling and participating in higher ed, particularly given the compensation issue or their compensation issue. Yes. So, at the core of that very large question which I would, you know, think about often and would love to have a longer conversation about is how wages subsidy and access to higher ed to kind of all work together. And I think, you know, when we think about the wages piece of it. It's a problem for our entire sector. It's not one that's specific to family childcare. There are some solutions that have included family childcare in the conversation. But I think first, if, if we're going to really support that part of our sector of our field to have access to higher ed, I go back to the creative solutions that make it possible for family childcare to access innovative solutions. So I talk about my colleagues and friends at the McCormick Center for Early Childhood Leadership who have worked with the higher with National Lewis University to create highly subsidized learning opportunities that result in college course credit. So those creative solutions are brought to bear. It is, it's one way of managing the cost of higher ed that does impact the wages that family childcare providers take home. And I suppose by saying we all need to advocate for greater more substantive subsidy rates and subsidy access. I think that can also be part of the conversation around wages and compensation. Now look to those individuals in the room while I can see over here people who are recording questions are deciphering. Is there anyone in the room who has a question that you would like to ask a panelist. Sorry, I'm missing a hand apparently Albert's pointing. Yes, please. Hi, thank you for this rich conversation. I was really interested in how you think about early educators in relation to sort of think about early educators as like zero to five versus those sort of employed in like a public school system we sort of talked about differences in compensation benefits, etc. And whether you see there being some competition, I guess, in terms of trying to get policymakers attention and resources and whether there's the possibility of sort of broadening and strengthening the coalition by sort of bringing these groups of educators together or whether they are sort of inherently kind of competing and so there's not a way to do that be curious to get your take on that. Christy, did you hear all that. I did. I think this one was customized for you. I mean, I think. I mean, I'm trying to figure out how controversial I want to be I mean I think in, I'll go for controversial Christie, we hired you for that. But for specs, we've been our own worst enemy in in some of this work. I think back to, you know, the early 90s when some of the early childhood system building work was first sort of booming. And it was a birth to five field then and it was we did not have as much of the splintered public school versus childcare versus family childcare it felt a lot more systemic. I, I, I can't think quickly enough on my feet to diagnose all of the reasons we're in this situation we are in right now but I do feel like we in an attempt to raise quality. We have created bureaucracies, whether it be QRIS systems or new competencies and credentialing and certificate systems that benefit one of those delivery systems over another that are taking an inordinate amount of resources of human and fiscal to keep those bureaucracies and new new things churning along. So whoever asked that question I couldn't I couldn't see. I mean I think this is one of the really big systems based issues that we need to be grappling with in this field is how can we talk about us as a unified birth to five and and and and and try to move away from creating strands of work that as I said only benefit or are targeted towards one strand or another. Does anyone else who wants to chime in as I keep now I'm starting to get little notes to say we have these many minutes left so. So there's one question that ask have any of you contacted excuse me conducted research or tested the hypothesis that obtaining ECE degrees actually affects or impacts on classroom practice. And I think to the extent that I know y'all part I should add to that question or do you know a particular study that you would like for whoever submitted this question to be aware of. In other words if it's not your research is there one that's informing your efforts. Be aware of. Can research our test have either researched or tested the hypothesis that obtaining early childhood education degrees impact classroom practice and I'm interpreting that. Literally it doesn't say a degree it says ECE degrees. Anyone on the panel or frankly anyone in the room who might be able to answer that question. Go ahead. So, what I really would like to see is a comparative study of the programs they are doing like this play space coaching, opposed to the other programs. Yeah, I'm going to interrupt if I made you had you know a study because you're going to be on a panel you're going to be on a panel momentarily so hold on to that. So anyone who actually knows of a study or conducted once. Yeah, the Virginia child foundation conducted a study to learn a little bit more about means delivery. And they compare the outcomes of children that attended means delivery with the outcomes that of children that attended children that were in school based programs and they found that there's no significant differences in terms of outcomes from children that are attending these community based centers that have high quality care and education in them, regardless of the fact that they have less numbers that have degrees. I don't could everyone hear that answer. Okay, I didn't know again because of the mic and the location of the mic. Anyone else to that before I go to hold on to reading actually guys. Okay, so this is the Sorry to jump in so I wrote you know but you were holding on to it and not looking at it. This is Albert. Just want to whoever asked that question point you to I know it's a really long report but the transforming the workforce report from 2015 does review the research and the findings are decidedly mixed. But there are some and you know on both ends of that. Yeah, thanks Albert and thanks for inserting yourself. So for the, I think this is going to be the last questions I'm looking again around the time. It depends on how long the answers go. And again, is there anyone else in the room who has a question to ask because right now the online folks have definitely been privileged. Okay, and sorry that I didn't have the chance to ask all the questions that have come to me. So this last but maybe the last question. The majority of the family child care providers that this individuals agency works with our monolingual Spanish or can't knees and many of them have very little formal education coming in and often their own education stopped at middle school and their home countries, and some are almost deliterate. What are your thoughts on supporting these providers and increasing access. And again anyone who on the panel who has thoughts on this but please introduce yourself by first name before you begin. And you can tell you have a challenge because people are thinking. Okay, I'll, I'll go. Hi, yes, sorry, this is Sophia. And I would say simply really what Marjorie rents referenced earlier. If we're creating open doors for higher ed and learning. The question isn't how do you come in and be a part of what's already here. But how do we meet you where you are in order to be successful to a higher purpose and in our field. So, you know, that can that comes with a lot of specific strategies for how we actually recruit engage and sustain relationships and enrollment with students that don't have the background or experience that typically is required for higher for higher ed. Yeah, so I'll stop there. Okay, thanks Sophia. Anyone else on the panel. I'm going to bring the first panel to a close. And again apologies that not all the questions submitted got got asked. But to each of you now on the panel and again with all kinds of gratitude for your participation and thoughtful comments today, and then asking for brief responses to boot. And if it would have been possible to a lot 200 more words for each of your introductions and believe y'all who are listening in or here. We had lots of opportunities to say no this is too long because of the word limit. So if it would have been possible to add 200 more words for each of your and when I say introductions because they're introducing these theme sections, or if you were writing it now what new thinking would do you wish you had included or now with hindsight would like to have added. And I'll pause to let you get your thoughts together. Before starting with you Marjorie. Well in the introduction that I wrote the whole idea was talking about being more holistic. So our vision is holistic, but our strategies are fragmented. And alignment begins with agreeing on a vision. And often because of accreditation standards because of licensing requirements, etc. And those are all good things. They are the current drivers. So our vision of the field and what we really expect of the field should be the driver, Christie. And here if you and Rebecca want to quickly caucus that would certainly be understandable unless y'all have a different point of view. We have different, we have different points of view, they're complimentary but they're different. And we would be to, and this is a somewhat of a nice extension from what Marjorie just said, if I had 200 more words, I would have wanted to point out the intersection of higher ed reforms with the competing state policy infrastructure, and how if we didn't have competing teacher licensure and early childhood competency frameworks and that it would make the early childhood fields work easier. So I would have wanted 200 more words to really talk about the policy infrastructure and the need to align there. Thanks, Rebecca. So glad we got different views here through we get to hear. So if I had 200 words, I would have talked about design thinking as a field that has a great at a framework that has a great deal to offer higher education, because it's all about being human centered about keeping the focus on the experience of the humans in the context. They, it's about addressing wicked problems and certainly the problems we're talking about are pretty wicked. And it's not about research and evaluate trying something and jumping immediately to research and evaluation, which we've done very, we've created many cycles of that in their field, but rather trying observing and studying what's happening and refining and relaunching that that model or that that strategy and then again observing documenting and re revising and relaunching, giving giving our ideas some time to emerge and to evolve, which we tend to throw something out there, see if it sticks and it does research and evaluate if we don't get the right findings we start all over. So I think some design thinking as a way of approaching how we change fundamentally what we offer would be useful. Thanks. Sophia. And I had lots of conversations about 200 more words didn't we I was going to start my answer with that and you won't be surprised with this. If I had 200 more words, I would advance. I would try to advance two ideas that were only sort of referenced in my piece. And that is one really highlighting more and sharing more around why family childcare is a unique and important solution for our infant toddler crisis. And how repositioning family childcare is a very tangible racial equity strategy. I'm glad you got the opportunity you've been looking for. Ariel. So, if I had 200 I would want 2000 more words and but I think what I would ask is that we begin to learn what educators see as their outcomes. I think we, you know, touched on that and some of the questions from online but what what do educators feel they can say their works goals are we have given them kindergarten readiness I don't know that they would agree. And Linda as the pre prelude to my thanking everybody for their amazing contributions. Wow. And so 200 words. I definitely would want to include some very specific words from the specific voice the practitioners. I would also want to look at including what my processes look like to advance both individual and system level reflection on the notion of building competencies around equity. To really give more thought to what that systems level thinking could look like to kind of undergird the aspirational desire that we have for greater equity and greater equitable outcomes for the educators. So, to each of you, I wish you were here so I could be. We really tremendously appreciate how you adapted and accommodated this change and I'm speaking for myself I'm delighted about how this all has turned out because it was a little like dicey about that we're going to be able to make this work or not. So, and without you we certainly would not have as well as those of you who are present. And so at this point, though, then I am about to I am going to segue to a Maya, and you're going to watch some of us who are out the front kind of move ourselves so that we can make room for the next panel. The next panel will be muted temporarily as we move around it'll be probably three minutes. Thank you. I'm a Maya Garcia and I'm going to be leading the second panel and we are going to focus on responding and reflecting on the panel that came before us and then also answering some more targeted questions based on essays that Laura and Albert wrote and on the perspectives and the practices of the practitioners who have joined us a seven in Isabel. Um, so let me go ahead and introduce everyone on the panel so we have Albert what who is a senior policy director at the Alliance for early success. We have Maria Isabel by Yvonne, who's director of the ACCA Child Development Center in Annandale, Virginia. We have a Stephen Morales, who is the education director at Centronia here in Washington DC, and then Laura born friend again who is the director of the early and elementary education team here at New America. So to start us off, just asking a question to all the panelists thinking about the last panel and what from the last panel, did you find most compelling or challenged your own thinking about these issues? Well, I guess it's very exciting to see the time the early childhood is living right now all over the world. This question about if education matters. It really struck me. I think it does matter. My personal point of view is how that education is a structure and at what level because I think we need to, we need to strength all the steps of the ladder. This is not just to send the people to do bachelor degrees or associate degrees. This is also to have people to have a stronger CDI program because some of them, that's the step of the ladder they're going to get. And, and we need to really solidify to answer this question of paradigm shift from early care to early learning. Well, I agree with him and that it's exciting times for the childhood, but it's also very challenging times. We either get it right, or we don't. We're capturing the attention of policymakers we're capturing funding. Another question is how can we ensure that all this attention is driving away that it becomes an effective agency of change for improving the lives of young children in our communities. It's exciting to see that there is finally acknowledgement of the importance of the diverse workforce. I in my community have been working with people that come from many places in a program where we serve about 250 children at a time. Sometimes even a larger group we have staff members that speak 21 languages so there are challenges in bringing the profession forward there are challenges in meeting that common denominator of expertise in the field. And it's great to see so many people coming together to try to tackle those challenges in meaningful, effective ways. So I'm excited to be here today. So this is Albert. So there are a couple of things that struck me from a, you know, policy perspective, which is the sort of seat that I have in this field. One is the conversation that I think Christie's comments started about the respective roles of policy professionals like myself, advocates, policymakers, you know, policy researchers, etc. As opposed to the educators themselves in terms of advancing the profession and to what extent can can these two, you know, these, these two communities kind of play complementary roles to what extent do we need to sort of get into each other's lane a bit. And how do we navigate as I think areas that the power dynamics when that happens and so I, I'll say a few more words about that later. The other is I what I heard and I don't know if anybody put it quite like this but what I heard was that a lot of us in order to do this to move forward and advance the profession. A lot of us going to have to let go of some of our power and work, maybe against a bit of our self interest and give a little bit of a turf. So I heard that in the higher ed conversation. I heard that again with the policy professionals and how we work. And then also in just a kind of the professional development systems that we and some, I think somebody use the work for bureaucracies that we've set up in terms of coaching systems the cure is and all the resources that go into those and to what extent, you know, do we need to reallocate some of our attention resources from those things to maybe things that really advanced profession more directly. And I'll just add that I think one of the most important points that that I heard was around the important role of family child care in both addressing the, you know, crisis and infant and toddler care and how family child care can play an important role. I think also an important role in rural communities and so exploring that more and how we can support better support and build family child care providers I think was and what kind of policies need to be in place to build and support family child care I think is is something that should should continue to be elevated. Also, I think just the discussion in the first panel around higher ed was also, you know, something that's particularly important for our work and I was happy to see and also intrigued more by the by the questions that that might have been posed so by the audience around higher ed, and I'll talk a little bit more about that in my other remarks as well. So, Albert I'd like to start by asking you a question and everyone else on the panel can also feel free to respond. But in your essay or opening essay you make an important admission about that you didn't always consider or take into account the perspective of early educators and these conversations. So first kind of curious about why you had a shift in thinking and now see like the value in it, and then to quote Ariel Ford's essay, what should be done differently to authentically engage educators in these conversations. I wouldn't say exactly that I never took the first minute. I hope I did. I hadn't done that. But, but it is true that I feel like I've made a shift in over the past year and I want to start my answer to that question by quoting a couple of excerpt from the essays, one from Linda and the other from Ariel so as Linda's essay she said, those in power who in the early education field are largely individuals representing the dominant culture has owned their part in excluding and minimizing the full participation of those closest to children's lives. And then from arrows essay she wrote the reliance on intermediary leadership is an intentionally reinforcing a paternalistic system of authority in which those farthest away from the work hold the majority of power. I, those resonate with me because I see myself in the dominant culture and I see myself in the intermediate leadership. And before I talk about like what. So, so, I'm sorry. So, so I think part of the questions like me need to be asking ourselves is my voice, what's needed right now, whose voices are missing and those are the questions that I have in my head as I move forward. To the sort of concrete about what can be done about it the solutions. I want to also sort of respond to kind of the conversation I mentioned earlier that Christie started about the respective roles of possible professionals educators, I think they'll always be a role for policy people, whether it's advocates or policymakers or people like me sort of doing sort of state policy work and federal policy work to who don't have day to day contact with educators and kids and programs. I don't want to be too self serving but I think the field needs people like me, who have whose job it is to read all read and write the policy briefs you know what's going on around the states and what's working and what's not and to talk to policy because educate them and guide them etc. And, and not to say that the educator can't do any of those and they think they should do many of those things that all of those things, but it is not, we shouldn't place the burden on them they already have full time jobs. So, so I think we need to again think about how do we so this question in my mind is, again, from a positive perspective is how do I as a possible professional partner, meaningfully, authentically and on in an ongoing way with educators. And I think that takes a bit of a different muscle than what those of us who went through policy school, for example, even on the job. Exercise, we don't use that muscle very often. And so, hopefully there are some people like me out there in the audience and policymakers and advocates who are listening to this. Because I think there are lessons that that I have learned, particularly so about six months ago, our organization organized a conference that some of you were at. So these educators were at this conference in Milwaukee, where we, it's a conference about the early education professional and we intentionally invited a number, you know, a significant amount, a proportion of early child educators into the conference. And there are four things that I would say we need to do differently. One is the outreach. I mean, this, these are not not like some, you know, sort of groundbreaking things but there are things that we don't really do. So we need to do better at outreach in terms of when we have events when we have these panels when we are talking about policy solutions, reach out to educators and find them where they are, not just like say, hey, here's an event come, but we actually reached out to the Association and the NAIC, the Council for Professional Recognition, the Teach Network, and find them where they are and that requires relationships. So you, so we need to be people like me and organizations like the ones I work with need to be developing relationship with those professional associations right now so that when you want to engage them, you already have those networks. So the issue is importance of critical mass and I'm not sure we live that in this event today, but at the event that I was talking about we had, we were shooting for a third of the audience being participants, being early child educators, and we got about maybe 25% to 30%, which, and that really changed the conversation and really brought, enriched the conversation. So the proportion is important. So we went to the room, we learned a lot of lessons about, frankly, the money, the funding that was required to not only provide travel, but to, and then we were like, Oh, wait, some of them are not going to get any wages because they come to this conference for two or three days. Some of them are going to need subs and, and some of them are going to need translation so all those things cost money, and, and, and of course, and for thought, and so I think that's an important lesson for us. And finally, one thing to get them in the room and the other thing to make them sort of help them contribute in a really full, in the fullest way possible. And so, and again, we didn't do this perfectly, but we, we could have done more prepping, I think, to sort of help people understand what the questions are about and what the policy conversations are going to be, maybe provide some background knowledge and, and, and, and talk about some of those prior dynamics and, and, and form the other the rest of the participants to sort of think about like when you speak when the you know when you were if the advocate you're speaking, maybe wait until somebody else has to, you know, has the room to like raise their hand. So we can hear from the practitioner first and so all those like lessons are things that we learned and I learned that I hope that positive professionals in the audience can can take something from that and also funders because again some of this require funding that foundations may not usually fund and also takes time to to to work on these things so Does anyone else want to add anything about how to authentically engage practitioners in these conversations. Well, I mean, our new America is in a similar position as being a national organization like the, the Alliance for early success also although I would say like we're not even as connected to states in the same way and advocacy groups in the same way but I think that the point that Albert raises around like building partnerships with other organizations that are regularly, you know, interacting and and talking to professionals is is an important approach and I think something you know we go out and visit a lot of, you know, schools when we're writing about, you know, different different communities or talk to, you know, when we're writing reports on states you know help us to identify like people that we can talk to and and and understand like how different policies are actually playing out for for educators on the ground and so I think that that's a really important point I think I just wanted the main reason I hit my green was to just elevate a point that Ariel made which which kind of which stuck with me was around this like idea of serving surveying you know how many times do we or do states survey educators and you know not then include their perspective so I think this notion of like meaningful and authentic and not just you know asking their opinion on something and not doing anything about it I think the challenge for me is thinking about like how to include educator perspective and voices and experiences along the way to policy development or through implementation like how to how to value of that and bring it in and include them in a meaningful way at different points so I you don't have to jump in but I'd love to just hear like thoughts from from you all about like how did to do that like what makes sense to you so one of the things that I remember about the conference that Albert was mentioned it is that then having this feeling that we have discussed several things we have present our opinion we have present our reality and then what you know you have this idea that you've been validated by peers by by policymakers by politicians and then you go home so what was the point that how do you involve the educators and the practitioners alone all the way I mean there were wonderful ideas that were discussed at that conference my point was like why don't we create a new comedian we try something of this out why we don't create pilot program you know you guys are working in higher ed you're doing professional development we can all get connected and let's give us a year let's try a couple things out and we report next year and we say oh this is working this is no working sometimes I feel like policy get impose and and would it look like a great idea in theory it doesn't work many times in the practice and a beautiful example is inclusion you know we can talk a lot of about inclusion and a special education but when it was launched for the first time inclusion is not just about to have a variety of children in the same classroom you require is it you know implementation and wrap around services and professional development and it's great and it will work and everybody will benefit if everything is in place but you just say oh this job will be included and you put it in that classroom with that teacher it doesn't guarantee success so yes it harms so all this discussion and all this wonderful ideas my whole point is why we don't try it out you know why we don't create this committees and we do piloting programs and we keep working and so the practitioners and administrators and the policymaker are working collaborative along the way in all the steps and then we can really see how we can perfect this something or how we can add it in a way that at the level that we're going to implement it it will work or what kind of adaptation it will need depending on the population that you're working with well I really believe that education has been traditionally very vertical things come from the top down and we obey and if we want to get these right we need to change that culture and we need to make it more horizontal I have learned that in improving the quality of the work that we do in our organization I've learned that every time that something was not going right I had to not just come up with my best answer I needed to go down to the floor and see what was happening and listen to the teachers and see what was going on with the children and hear my patterns because sometimes I come with very smart ways of addressing a little problem okay I notice that there's more accidents taking place from 9 to 930 okay we're only going to serve breakfast until 830 great solution right because that's the time when it really quite doesn't work like that only when I hear the feedback of the people that I work do I start to realize that the mistakes that I make from overlooking or overseeing or simplifying over simplifying the solutions to a problem whatever however big or small that program problem might be I really agree with everybody here in the fact that I believe early childhood is a very complex vocational and relational field. It requires building relationships for us to get it right and we need to engage with people that are in the frontline building those relationships in the first place. We talk about advancement in education and obtaining degrees I'm going to wear my employer hat and I'm going to tell you that I have hired people that have master's degrees in early childhood I've put them with a good salary because they had their title under their arm in a classroom with two year olds and they have lasted there for two weeks in a very traumatic experience to them and to everybody else. I really think that in order to be successful in what we want to accomplish we need to truly shift the paradigm of education and understand early childhood as it is and embrace it as it is. We cannot just have teachers going to college to obtain a degree we need to call it just to understand what early childhood is all about and to put together a cohesive effective platform so that educators can advance in their education and improve the skills. I really believe that a lot of the principles that we use in early childhood also should be applied to early childhood and I'm going to name one development of the appropriate practice. We talk about meeting children where they are. If we want to be successful at this we also need to meet teachers where they are. Now the question is do we know where they are? Do we know who they are? Do we know what they have? What they don't have and what they really need? It's almost like going back to the muscle hierarchy of needs you know. We're demanding teachers to be up there but we're not giving them the baseline to be able to meet their basic needs. I mean scientifically it's been demonstrated that if you want to achieve and get them to be there then all of the base needs to be covered and currently that's not covered. Are we ready to cover that? Do we have the funding available to make that happen? I was once hired to bring NAEYC accreditation to a program that was here not far from here. I'm not going to say where but anyway. And the moment that my board of directors realized I mean everybody wanted to have an NAEYC accreditation in that program but they were not really willing to make the investment that was required to get there. And I am a very stubborn person so I said well we're going to have NAEYC because I said that I was being hired to do this and I'm going to do this anyway. And I made it happen and the next day I received a letter of NAEYC saying your program is accredited. I also submitted my resignation and moved on because that's how I felt. I felt burned out by having to meet a goal without having the supports in place to make that happen. Now we have to be very careful because we need early childhood. We need this workforce. We cannot put more weight to their shoulders without giving the support they need. Talking about inclusion and talking about policies. The block grant states that every child that has a diagnosed disability should have double rate coming from the subsidy. Right now in my program in Virginia we have 40% of the children in our program who have either an IEP or IFSP. Don't ask me why I have such a high number because it's probably because one of the few programs that still welcome these children through the door and we're willing to and I have amazing incredible fascinating early childhood providers that are just as stubborn as I am when it comes to meeting the needs of children in our community. But we only get the reimbursement as of yesterday for two of those children as of today for four of those children. So policies can be in place. But how are we going to ensure that those policies are trickling down and are being effective and the funding is going where it's needed. We need you there. And how are you going to know that if we don't have the conversation. If we don't have these parallel relationship being built that I don't know. So that's where I think this whole nut is. What do we really want to do and what resources do we really need to have in place to make that happen. So kind of building on that you talk about the base what's needed at the base level to support educators and then we kind of go above the base. So can we actually talk about what are those base levels of supports and what do we need on top of that to truly make an impact in the ways that have been discussed today. So I think like I think before when we talk about degrees and talk about certifications. We need to support every step of the ladder 120 hours of course work is not enough in order to be working with children and that's what is required for a CDA. We provide CDA one of the things that we did in 2014 was bump it up 30 hours so our CDA is 150 hours even though the council only require 120. Why because any educator right now who work in an urban setting is going to be facing do a language bilingualism is special needs and so many other things that need to be prepared for. So what you have is a CDA and Ballora Washington is really wanted to do this bad just things for CDA and she has this idea that we keep talking and I really hope it does. You need this kind of expertise. So support the ladder at every level because the field change. I mean we are assessing all our pre K students with class all our class on with class. It is that it's great. They talk about interaction but it's basic and brain research. What do we know our educators know how to scaffold brain research and bring it into the classroom. You know connecting theory with practice is one of the biggest problems that we have at any kind of level right now. And that's that's one of the biggest issue. I think we did a lot of interview with many centers and I was asking simple questions and I say what do you do circle time and everybody was talking to me about well because we need to you know make the child feel welcome and we're all friends and we're going to start a new day and and then I say OK forget about the social emotional component because we've been doing that right for years. Now if we think a language in cognition what are we doing circle time for and nobody was able to answer me. You know how circle time will benefit that. I mean why do we have a block area. Why do we have a dramatic play area. Our educator needs this kind of this kind of technical language that all the other field has so they can feel proud of themselves and they don't say oh she's able to play pick a ball. She said well she understand conservation of competency and that's really important when she develops abstraction later. You know that's the kind of connections that we need to make. So the field is changing. There's a lot of brain research now as a part of our field. That's what the whole war is looking at early childhood as this solution for problems. However I don't think that we're teaching training programs has taken that research and make it look like what does it look like in the classroom. How child development look in the making with a child in front of your eyes and how do you connect this theory to practice. How do we take this assessment and this report we receive is connected to instruction so it's actually help us to improve the practice and it's not just a report that says a bunch of things that doesn't allow me to improve because right now I don't even have the name of the teacher of the classroom that was assessed. So it's completely useless. I receive all these kind of indicators that I cannot use to target professional development. So I think a teaching training programs need to be this trend at every step of the ladder. I think that there's a lot of content. They need to be added in terms of brain research special need and do a language and bilingualism and I truly believe that programs like that were talking before. That's what I say I would like to see a comparative study. You know they're doing this apprenticeship and they're doing this place program when the students are learning in in the actual center and they're seeing it and reporting that is that really make a difference because for my experience and 20 years and professional development. The problem is how I connect this what I learned and I take it into the classroom and how to really put this into practice. So if we're making if we want to have reflective practitioners then we need to have programs they really aim for reflective practitioners that are structured in a way the teachers will reflect. And in the other hand the counterpart of that is that you need administrators are instructional leaders. I mean it's wonderful to have universal free game. But if your principal or your school is a middle school teacher who doesn't understand anything about early childhood, then it's not the right person to lead that path. So we do a lot of administrations but you need an instructional leader that will be able to foster intentional planning in that center and really scaffold how this assessment how these indicators of quality are translated into a real classroom. Well, I believe I strongly believe in something that Mr. Rogers said long time ago, and I put it him yesterday and I'm going to quote him again today, because it's a safe thing to do in early childhood. He said, look for the helpers in your communities right. I think that I have been very, very lucky to learn to work in a place like. And why is that it's because I earlier mentioned this is a relational field. It's easy to try to find the one person that will come with the one solution. But if we're looking for that one solution in one place and we're not going to be effective because the solutions need to come from different places from different people in different scenarios in different places. I was invited to participate in Virginia in the task force work group to assess the needs of the state and just in Virginia not to mention the entire country. There's just so much diversity there. And what's my reality is not the reality of the program in that operates in a house and it's not the reality of a program that is adjacent to school. We have different realities, but we also have different opportunities and different resources. It's like almost we have to do as what analysis to understand where we are and what each program needs and and of course that's not feasible, but what it's feasible is to create models. That would allow administrators that will allow the communities to start building the infrastructure that is needed to improve the field across the board. What my teachers needed to embark in this adventure of obtaining a bachelor's degree was to advancing their English skills first was to have a computer. Was not to have to pay for the printing of their homework because they don't have the funds to do it. So in my program, if a teacher is studying and they use their break time to print their homework, nobody's going to go to them and say, Hey, why is it that you're printing 50 pages in color. My teachers needed help with an increase of a salary so that they can pay for the transportation from and to the school and then I realized I could also call Nova and now we're doing classes in the program for them. So they don't have to go anywhere. They don't have to spend extra time. We provide childcare if it's needed. We need to meet them where they are and how that looks might be fair from place to place. But who's there making those decisions and facilitating that path. Though we really want to do it. I mean, I've also been losing my teachers as they have graduated because now I don't have the funding to pay their salaries and now they're going and working for the school system. And I give them a hug and I cry with them. They don't want to leave. I don't want them to leave, but they're leaving because they have to maintain their families at home. And that's just the reality of it. So we talk about protecting mixed delivery. Yeah, how are we going to do it if we don't get a good stream mind of funding coming to us. Again, it's a complex issue, but it will only be resolved if we all have the drive to make this path and to bring it one step at a time. I really think that I have yet to meet one early childhood provider that doesn't want to advance in their career and in their profession. They're willing to sacrifice more than anybody else I've seen in my entire life and I'm proud to be an early childhood provider because I see that happening in the places where I've worked time and time and time again. I've seen the effort of these immigrant people like me that come to this country and have to learn a second language in order to access information in order to communicate with each other in order. And you know, people say, you're crazy. How many hours you'll be in this place and say, Well, what a normally to a person would take them five hours of work. It takes eight hours of my work to do because I have to, you know, reshift and think and edit three times everything that I read or write so that I get it right. And recognizing this effort is important. It's equally important to recognize the value that that all these diversity brings to the table. And to understand that I don't need one educator to do the same that the other educator does. You know, the skill sets that are needed to successfully run a classroom demand different kind of people and and and you cannot pretend that just one degree is going to solve everything or just one kind of person is going to be the early childhood educator we need to understand that we early childhood educators are diverse within our diversity. No, and to get those groups right those groups of teachers that are working in a classroom for not eight hours, not six hours from for eight to 11 hours at a time. You know, we need to give them the supports that they need. They need a counselor. Yeah, available to them Monday through Friday because they have children that have needs and parents that have needs Monday through Friday. And we need to troubleshoot that so that they can have the mental health to have these wonderful minimum, meaningful interactions that we're measuring with class. By the way, I'm certified with infant solvers. Yeah, me too. And I'm a trainer for athlete trainer for class as well. I believe in these tools. I believe in measurements. I believe in accountability. But everything begins with that relationship. And when I lose a teacher. I'm a higher somebody else that has a degree. It takes about six months for that teacher to start to begin to even think that the teacher is starting to perform at the level that the teacher who left is coming into. So, you know, I'm highly interested in seeing and excited about seeing all the progress that our field is making in the last few years with the final acknowledgement that what happens in the first five years of life in these children matters. We all have understood the importance of making it right at this time in age. We also know the impact in the economy when we do this job right. So why is it that we continue to put the burden in the shoulders of the people that are contributing the most to our nation? Isn't it about time that we just pay the bill? And when I say I pay the bill, I'm not talking only about the government or the tax contributors. I'm talking about corporate America. I'm talking about businesses. I'm talking if you want to get this right. You need to bring everybody to the table and everybody needs to take the responsibility that they have. And it's the only way we're going to get this done. This can be a great opportunity for higher education systems to obtain more funding. All this talk about early childhood, how is that going to translate to our educators? I am talking too much. I get driven away. So Laura, going to your closing essay for the compendium. You write that a knot cannot be undone until you pay attention to all ends of its threads. Is it possible to examine all of the ends simultaneously? And if not, what do we prioritize doing first? Well, I think just from some of the conversation that we've heard both earlier, but just right now, we have to pay attention to all ends simultaneously. But I don't think that means that we can pull on them all at the same time. That'll just end up making things tighter. But we do have to give them attention and consideration. And so that means if we start pulling on this degrees and education side without also paying attention to the compensations and status side or diversity and inclusion side, then we're just not going to get anywhere. And so I think when we think about where to focus first as we're looking at the full knot, this idea of a long-term vision I think is really important and an understanding of where do we really want to end up? Where does the field really want to end up? And that means looking beyond what's in place today and what's achievable today, but really where is that end that we want to be? And so as we think about that long-term vision and I can be part of helping to set it, but it's not my job and nor should it be to say what that vision should be. But I think we have to question as that's being developed like what actions might be being taken now that are actually potentially leading to stalled progress or taking the field further away from what that ideal could be. And so after the transforming the workforce report came came out, you know, all of this flurry of work back in 2015 now all the flurry of work started happening at the state level, the national level, even at the local level. And but I raised that point because there's another report that came out. It's this transforming the financing report that came out in 2017 and give ourselves a plug. We're releasing a guidebook to help people kind of think through how to use that better, which will come out at the end of this month. But I haven't seen the same kind of activity around the transforming the financing report that we did around the workforce. Not not the same flurry and excitement, but that I would say that the financing is the funding is really an important piece. There's not enough money in the system. There's not enough federal investment. If we look at just the, you know, that the spending just at the federal level in relationship to GDP like early childhood investment is just this little tiny like barely barely a mark on the pie chart and state and local investment isn't, you know, where it needs to be either and high quality early childhood education and meaning a diverse well prepared well compensated workforce when we say high quality early childhood education. It needs to be recognized and valued in the same way. And I would say even more so than the other areas of spending that that we're making. And so I think that vision and the financing behind it have to be, you know, close first and second, you know, pieces to focus on and then the third is this higher ed and preparation. And I think there's a lot of work that needs to be there be done there. There's a lot of innovation to think about delivery. We heard a lot of conversation to reflect again, like, earlier on. You know, some innovations in higher ed that could be taking place questions for me is like, how do we make sure that that those kinds of things happen and more than just the University of Colorado and Denver or the University of Nebraska. How can we learn from those places that can be transferable to other institutions of higher ed at the four year level at the end of the two year level, and, and become stackable with these other, you know, CDA but other ideas of micro credentials and things that are being talked about in the field. And just to tease again, like some things we're doing, we're, we're looking at our new America early and elementary ed team, some different kinds of innovations across the country and hope to have a, and we'll have a brief out later. That looks at the barriers that institutions face to better serving and preparing and supporting early childhood educators and the, you know, which is really the larger non traditional workforce that they, you know, are, you know, share a lot of similarities. And so what, what, what are those barriers. What are institution, what are the institutions that are doing some things differently and then what are the levers at the institutional level state level community level federal level that can make that happen in more places. So I think we do have some questions from the audience so. But before that, if we could just anyone in the room has any question that they would like to ask of this panel. Please go ahead and raise your hand. Yes, sir. I'm Robert to work I came from Philadelphia, and I have no degrees. And, well, not real degrees like from higher institutions but I have many degrees of experience and accomplishments, etc, etc. And my real job in life as I do something for roughing anybody ever heard of roughing. And, and I study directly with Dr Roth, and I'm pioneering roughing babies and children, which makes a significant difference in their neurological development. As anybody heard of the Institute for the achievement of human potential in Philadelphia. I have a one week course call how to give your baby encyclopedic knowledge, and I took that long time ago. And I like to say it this way I'm not the nicest person, the most wild person, but I'm the only person that's been able to get that program in a public school in Philadelphia for three years. And so I really appreciate being here. I appreciate the work you're doing the heart you have the, and I'm glad to see that I'm not the only person struggling to make a difference with what's actually happening on the street. Over the last 23 years, without any significant funding or staff, I've managed to distribute close to 18,000 low cost refurbished computers to people that can afford to buy new ones. And so I have direct access to people who are at the lowest level of life, and I'm struggling to find ways to reach them. And this conversation has to reach them in a way that's not reaching them now. My questions is, have you ever thought of using technology conferences, a national program of early childhood education, a channel called national early childhood education channel where parents could tune in and begin to be engaged in this conversation. Anybody thought about that one. I mean, there's I'm not sure if it's, it's totally focused on the topic but I'll just, you know, there's definitely a number of technology sort of project actually Lisa you should talk about this. You know, projects in early childhood education that leverages the piloted technology to support families and parents to better support their kids at home and in the community. There's also a variety of online strategies that help prepare early early childhood educators to become more competent in their work so I there is quite a bit of work in this area I would I would think but not maybe at the systems level but definitely, you know, in terms of other sectors. So taking a question from the online audience. Do you have any ideas of how to push policymakers to give the supports on a systemic level. One of the things that I learned about these was in Milwaukee, when we were listening from one of the legislators and he gave us advice, and the advice of going with a unified voice with clear specific objectives to be qualified. Because this is such a complex issue that when we start talking to legislators about the issues and the challenges that we face they go like, forget about it. It's too much. I'm not going to do anything that I'm not going to get anything done. So, coming up with a tool list of what our priorities are unifying the voice around those priorities and being very strategic about what is presented and what voices we bring to the table. I think it's crucial. I'll just add to that. I think we the field. We need to do a better job at communicating the problem that we're talking about I don't because people are not going to address a fine solutions and invest in things that they don't feel like it's a problem. So, there's been a lot more recognition about the importance of the first five years in our society and even among policymakers, but I don't know that that has translated to then the importance of providing rigorous professional preparation and supports to the early education profession. Because I think that a lot of people still think that, you know, if you can play peek-a-boo, and you can pay bill blocks and you can teach them letters, you can do this job. And it's not about the fact that peek-a-boo actually gets you to subtraction, which is great. So the policymakers have to understand why the investment is necessary, why is it not okay that, you know, the educators are getting paid 10 to $12 an hour and then we're losing them to, you know, target another industry and then when they get the BA they get to, you know, go to public school. So I think the communication of making the case, I think we're still not quite there as far as the early charge of education profession is concerned. I agree with Maria Isabel in the sense of we have to find some consensus in certain things that we've been discussing for years and we still don't agree on it, such as school readiness, that we all interpreted differently. And is that the ending line for us, that the child need to be ready for school and we don't have the same vision of what it means to be ready, then we have a problem because we don't have a clear outcome that we're aiming for. So definitely unify voice and more consensus in these terms that we are advocating for and I think it's important if the teachers in this case and the practitioners need to have this technical language. I think it's important when I talk to my CDA students I say, you are the people who's going to wire the brain of a child. Can you think in something more important than that. And then I pushed them and I pushed them every time to use some technical language because I wanted to empower them that when those talk to the parents and talk to anybody else, they're able to articulate this in a way that people will listen to them. You know, if we keep articulating this in a sense, oh yes we play with this and that but we don't make those connections that go farther and say, you know, doing all of this has this impact later on in life, and it's going to cost you this much. And we're talking about, you know, how you're going to avoid high school dropout and lowering their cancer rate incarceration rate and so many other things we have to be able to articulate that properly. So, policy makers understand, you know, what is the voice what is the message and what are you asking for. So here's another question from the online audience. What is the balance between hearing and amplifying the voices for ECE practitioners and putting the burden of advocacy and changing institutionalized structures on them. I don't know if any other childhood provider that is omnipresent yet we have to invest in ourselves and engaging in advocacy is investment. I believe for as much as it is not easy to be at the table when conversations are taking place. We need to realize as a field that if we're not at the table, we will have to leave with what is at the table. And if that's not as then who I believe that there are helpers in the world that can facilitate that process. You guys have been an instrumental support for the voices in our field and I encourage you to continue to do so. The work that you all are doing. It's extremely important, but you cannot do it without us. And I was very sad and yesterday and excited it was a happy day for me, but it was a happy day when we are celebrating the power of the profession. There are only two early childhood providers that I could identify as providers in the in the audience. I know that from their houses from their workplaces, they were joining the conversation, but they were not there. So making the investment to be there is important and we leaders, I mean, directors, administrators, we need to recognize that as a strategy for advancement in our profession and and give it the power that it requires. I'm not a historian, but it seems to me that in our history we've had many struggles and fought a lot of fights where people without power and people who are, you know, poor and, you know, whatever circumstance they're in have joined in a movement to make progress for themselves and for the for the country in general. And so while I used the word burden earlier while it is a burden to for us to expect that early childhood care to pay $10 an hour also go to the state capital and like talk to the elected officials and all that. And it does happen when they are given support and when there is organizing involved, right. So their organizations, not so much the policy organizations, but they are community organizations whose whose work is to spend every day every minute in the community talking about educators, parents, families, and helping them impart. And I've heard that people should not use the word empower because that's assumed that they don't have any power but I don't remember what the alternative phase is. But you get my point that and to to to work with them as leaders in advocacy and so I think in our organization the Alliance for success we've been thinking a lot about how do we as an organization and also the organization work with around states that are quite enlarge, you know, grass tops organization how do we partner with community organizers so that we don't we're not we're not going to be the ones who have their relationships to like, sort of engage with educators and parents directly perhaps, but that there are intermediate organizations that we can work with so that there is so that so that when we are doing our policy work that we can work alongside other organizations who have those relationships who can who can connect us with the grassroots and work more partnership on some of our policy and advocacy work. There's also a little bit of an onus on organizations like New America and who are, you know, out writing on policies that we might say are good practices at the state level or even at the local level of asking questions about like, well, how educators, you know, perspectives or how it's working how is this actually going to work what kinds of professional developments or other things are being put into place with this other requirement like asking questions about how perspectives and educator voices being included in these new policy proposals that are put forward. So that's that's a role that I think is important for organizations like ours. So I think we have time for one last question. And this one is also from online audience. How realistic is it to continue asking ECE practitioners to engage in a continuous and ongoing professional growth, including reflective practice. When they aren't currently receiving the support needed in terms of finances and material supports to sustain their own well being. It's not realistic. It's that very simple answer. I mean, we all suffer of we invest so much in our teachers we, we have a fellowship program we take people, we help them to complete the CDA we provide coaching we do all this kind of things. They're now in a school and I'm pretty sure that most of them when they receive their degree if I know able to raise their salary they're going to go to a place that the salary is right. You are working in this situation like okay let me keep you for two years and then you know that you're going to have to exchange and you will have a totally new cohort of people coming which is tremendously costly. Not just financially but in terms of time and energy, you know, to prepare them to get there, and then you ended up losing it so if we don't, if we don't improve the compensation issue. I think this is not realistic, you know, we have here this requirements and DC that people by the end of the year only to have a CDA doesn't look like too much, you know, but but so many people to spend two evenings of their week. You know, after six p.m. go to study from six to nine and complete this whole process. It's a lot that how that much make when that is finished 50 cents an hour 25 cents an hour. And you offer them three more dollars an hour for that. No, that's the reality. So I have this wonderful fellowship program is all they finish and they come so proudly show me their certificate. And I have a terrible be a shame that I have to say well I can raise your salary 50 cents. I do my math and I see okay after I take taxes and all of this, what did that really means to you. You know how I have knowledge in, you know, one in the financial but in the other way it's like a, how much I value this what kind of value are giving that that you are a wonderful professional that wiring that child brain and I pay you for that 50 more cents an hour. You know, that's the kind of judgment away so it's no sustainable. I mean you want to spend all of this and this, and then they will leave to the school system or to public schools to whoever can pay them more. I could not echo that more. And there is just one thing that I will add. It amazes me that are people that are thinking human beings, making an informed decision. The investment of going to school to obtain a degree in early childhood when they know that doesn't mean anything. Why they don't go into nursing. Why they don't go into other fields for heaven's sake early childhood doesn't give you the money. So, we are kind of masochists here. I mean, we know, and we, and let me tell you why we do it. We do it because we love the children. We do it because we believe in what we do because there is a higher purpose, higher the finances higher than personal gain higher than than comfort levels that we may achieve higher than our own family members. That's what I said it's a vocational field. It's not only a complex, it's a relational, but it's a vocational field because only people that I know that have the vocation to be where they are are doing what they're doing. And I'm impressed. I mean, I, I talk to my teachers that are going and they're studying and, and I dare to ask them the other day. Hey, knowing that I know everything is that show me what you're studying and they come with a notebook with biology. It was a biology class. And I'm thinking. Okay. Biology. I understand biology is important if you want to work with human beings right but what level of biology. I mean how meaningful that particular class of biology, it is for them to go back to the classroom. A lot of them are taking classes on things that are totally unrelated. And somebody came to me. Somebody in the higher educational field and said, Well, it's, you know, Isabel, there is general culture. We need to know there's things that we need to learn just because we have to learn them and I'm thinking, wait, let me get my, my. Hi, Alexa. We need to realize that we live in the world of Alexa's and we live in a world where information is there if we need it. But what we need is to develop the competencies that we need to have in place to do our job right. So one thing that can be very, very, and to the folks that were talking in the first panel, that could be very, very important is to make learning meaningful for early childhood educators. You can't feel a class of course work just because you think it's important. Do it in response to the need that we have if we want to be successful because otherwise, what we're doing is pushing people away. I mean, all the teachers that I know have been dragging that class to the end, because it's not that they don't like learning, it's because they're interested in learning things that are that matter to them. But I'm very honest. Albert, you want to, you want to close this out. Okay, so, so to answer that question again, I agree, not realistic. And, you know, one of the first things that there, I don't think there's a one next step I think it's to Laura's point earlier, I think we need to address these things collectively with no, if we learn nothing from, you know, for the past few years, is that we can just work on degrees or compensation or diversity without without paying attention to all those strands. But one of the things that I would do is about compensate, we need to find the public will and the public revenue or reallocation of some of our exchange dollars to dedicate a compensation I would just also put out there that right now today, without doing anything about where you know what kind of degrees and credentials early child educators have, we need to lift the floor, it is again not okay that early child educators get paid $10 an hour. And that's half of that that's median so that half of them are below that. And so we need to raise the floor to a living wage and however you define that standard and there are plenty of places that have helped you define that standard. And then we also need to raise the roof and. And I've seen what I've appreciated in the last few last year or so is that a number of places. I can think of like Rhode Island has done this Washington State, North Carolina has also done this DC is doing it is they've kind of been working on a salary for early child educators, and while just by having a sale doesn't mean you get the money to pay people at that scale. It is a stake in the ground about what early child educators need to have in terms of compensation at different levels of competency and degree and experience and I think by putting a second out then we know okay then we need so many so much more money into the system so that we can compensate early child educators more adequately. So, so just one thing to add on part of what what you said is is why I bring up, I brought up the larger financing piece but one thing that I would say in relationship to to compensation is that there are a lot of good. There are some initiatives to address the salary scale. I would say that there are also some initiatives around pay that I think move us farther away from increasing overall compensation around like well meaning initiatives like tax credits and wage subsidies that are helpful in the moment but not helpful for the long term compensation increases and so I think we should do more of the kinds of things that Albert mentioned some states are doing and less of some of these other ideas being tried. So that's all the time we have for today. Thanks everyone for joining the report is online and the financing report that Laura alluded to will be out later this month.