Educare as a Model of Multisite, Collaborative, Policy-Relevant Research

• In Event: The Future of Child Development Laboratory Programs: A Multisite Applied Developmental Science Research Consortium?

Abstract

The purpose of this paper is to address two key issues embraced by Educare: (1) common data collection across multiple sites, and (2) use of data to impact program and policy. Educare’s “lessons learned” will be shared to support the formation of the ADS Lab School Consortium.

Perspective: University lab schools have generated knowledge to inform practice in early childhood education since their inception. However, individual lab schools typically work in isolation and are often restricted in their sample sizes and demographics, thus limiting generalizability of findings and impacts in the policy arena. The growing network of Educare Schools can serve as a model of how multiple sites can collaborate to negotiate a common set of child and classroom measures; common protocols for training and assessment administration; common timelines; and common approaches to data management and analysis. This collaboration results in large and diverse databases that support policy-relevant analyses.

Educare is a comprehensive early childhood education program model that serves young children, birth to age 5, and their families who live in poverty. The model was developed by the Ounce of Prevention Fund who, in collaboration with the Irving Harris Foundation, opened the first Educare in Chicago in 2000. In 2013, a total of 15 Educare Schools are in operation across the US in communities as diverse as Tulsa, Seattle, Miami-Dade, Washington DC, and Central Maine. For a listing of all Educare sites and more information about Educare, see www.educareschools.org.

Educare describes itself as a program, place, partnership, and platform for change. Specifically, “local public-private Partnerships create and support an Educare school (the Place) following the Educare model (the Program) that serves as a Platform for broader policy and systems change” (Yazejian, Bryant, & Kennel, 2013). The Educare program model consists of “core features” including: Full-day, full-year services; reflective supervision; small class size and high staff/child ratios; continuity of care; on-site family support; an interdisciplinary approach; high staff qualifications with ongoing professional development; strong curricular focus on language and literacy, social-emotional development, numeracy, and the arts; and data collection, analysis, and use.

The implementation of this last feature—data collection, analysis, and use to track child progress and to inform program improvement—distinguishes Educare from other early education programs. Each Educare site forms a partnership with an evaluator, typically from a local university, to conduct the required Educare Implementation Study. This partnership is called the Research Program Partnership (RPP) and is charged to implement a reciprocal data feedback and utilization cycle (Stein, Freel, Hanson, Pacchiano, & Eiland-Williford, 2013) to inform program improvement. Thus, like quality lab schools, the voices of practitioners and researchers are evident; and similar to the tenets of ADS the problems of practice inform data collection and research. Data are aggregated across sites to perform analyses with large numbers of diverse children. This large-sample, “practical” research has caught the attention of policy-makers and funders.

Significance: Lessons from Educare can inform the ADS Consortium and other research involving multiple sites and personnel striving to inform practice and policy.

Author

• Diane M. Horm, University of Oklahoma