Studying Child Care and Early Education: Data for Secondary Analysis_

• In Event: 2-011 - Interactive Poster Session and Reception

Abstract

What are the experiences of young children who participate in the Head Start program and their families? How do their outcomes change over time? How are their outcomes influenced by socio-demographic characteristics, their families, and the quality of their educational and care settings? What are the experiences of the early childhood workforce? These, and many other questions, can be addressed by datasets that are freely available to researchers. This poster will describe potential research questions that can be answered with data from studies like The Head Start Family and Child Experiences Study (6 cohorts, beginning in 1997), The National Survey of Early Care and Education, and other studies that have enormous potential for secondary analysis. Some of the features of these datasets include longitudinal design (for looking at changes and patterns over time); representative sampling (allowing for generalizability); oversampling, large n’s, and rare populations (enabling subgroup analysis); and valid and reliable measures. The poster will describe these features, and how to find further documentation, reports and publications based on the data.

Author

• Susan Jekielek, Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan
  Presenting Author