CFS Chosen as Partner For National Resource Center
include:
• How social and emotional outcomes contribute to young children’s school success;
• Early risk factors in child, family, and community, which threaten social and emotional development;
• Parent and caregiver relationships that promote social and emotional development;
• Teaching practices that establish climates for learning;
• Importance of early screening and ongoing assessment of children’s development;
• Cultural perspectives on mental health, parenting, and social competence; and,
• Supports for teaching teams serving children with significant social and emotional concerns.
CFS has just become a partner in a new four-year program to help create a national resource center that will identify and implement practices that promote children’s social and emotional competence. With funding provided by the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), the University of Illinois will serve as coordinating center. USF will partner with the University of Colorado at Denver, the University of Connecticut, Education Development Corporation and Tennessee Voices for Children as subcontractors.
TheCenter for the Social Emotional Foundations of Early Learning will provide much needed information to Head Start and Child Care parents, classroom teaching teams, family child care providers, home visitors and other staff on a variety of topics so that effective practices are more widely adopted and sustained.
Head Start and Early Head Start are comprehensive child development programs for children infant to age 5, pregnant women and their families, and have the overall goal of increasing the school readiness of young children in low-income families. The Child Care Bureau administers funds for child care subsidies and activities to improve the quality and availability of child care.
Currently, 640 Early Head Start programs provide services to approximately 50,000 children birthto age three and to pregnant women. Head Start currently serves over 850,000 low-income families and their children three to five years of age. A nationwide network of approximately 2,100 grantee and delegate agencies, serve the Early Head Start and Head Start families through a variety of programs that include center-based, home-based, and family child care partnerships.
The grant application states that “while there are data on practices that can be used to facilitate the social emotional development of children, this information has not been consistently translated into information that is useful to the consumers. This lack of user-friendly information, combined with the growing number of children with challenging behaviors and mental health problems in Child Care and Head Start programs highlights the need for systemic training efforts related to social emotional development.”
In order to address the outcome of promoting the social emotional development of all young children, several key activities will be implemented, and include:
• Conducting literature reviews of evidence-based practices;
• Disseminating “what works” briefs on evidence-based practices;
• identifying the training needs of Head Start and Child Care providers and training and technical assistance providers;
• Developing training materials on evidence-based practices;
• Establishing “Partners in Excellence” in working with Head Start and Child Care training and technical assistance providers in guiding local programs to implement evidence-based practices; and,
• Establishing partnerships with major professional organizations to ensure dissemination of the information developed by the center.
The Department of Child and Family Studies (CFS) is a department of the Louis de la Parte Florida Mental Health Institute, University of South Florida. The faculty and staff of CFS are committed to enhancing the development, mental health and well-being of children and families through leadership in integrating research, theory & practice.For additional information, Lise Fox can be reached at (813) 974-6100.