Linking Professional Development to Classroom Quality Across ECE Settings: Exploring the Role of Teacher Well-Being

• In Event: Leveraging Developmental Insights to Address the Cross-Sector Consequences of COVID-19 for Early Educators

Abstract

Although high-quality early care and education (ECE) experiences can both provide children with long-lasting developmental benefits and support young families (Bassok & Loeb, 2015), much ECE in the United States is not of sufficient quality to promote development (Burchinal, 2018; Burchinal et al., 2002). Given that early educators are the crux of quality, one strategy garnering increasing policy attention is the provision of professional development (PD), or on-the-job training experiences designed to improve teachers’ caregiving and classroom practice (Hamre et al., 2017).

Several studies suggest that PD can be effective in increasing quality and promoting development (Egert et al., 2020; Markussen-Brown et al., 2017); yet others highlight challenges that may arise when PD interventions are brought to scale (Piasta et al., 2017, 2020). Such challenges may be exacerbated in child care centers, where ecological factors such as teacher compensation and on-the-job supports differ from other formal settings (e.g., state pre-k, Head Start). In turn, these educators have low levels of emotional and financial wellbeing, and leave at high rates (Bassok et al., 2019, 2021)—which may make PD an inefficient investment. To date, however, little is known about the relationship between PD and classroom quality in child care settings, and whether or not factors such as emotional or financial wellbeing moderate the link between PD and quality.

The present study explores these questions using administrative and survey data from 441 Louisiana teachers. All teachers working in publicly-funded, formal ECE settings (state pre-k, Head Start, and subsidized child care) in two large Louisiana parishes were invited to take a survey in fall 2018, with ~80% responding. Surveys provided information about teachers’ PD experiences in the past year and their wellbeing (depressive symptoms and food insecurity). Surveys were linked to statewide administrative data on classroom quality (Classroom Assessment Scoring System, CLASS).

To answer our questions, we first regressed CLASS scores on teacher PD, overall and by setting type (state pre-k and child care only, due to small Head Start samples).To test for moderation by teacher wellbeing, we next interacted PD with indicators for depression and food insecurity, in overall and by-setting regressions. All models included sociodemographic controls and lagged CLASS scores; standard errors were clustered by site.

Findings suggest that PD was related to classroom quality in school-based pre-k but not child care (Table 1). We found no consistent evidence that teacher depression or food insecurity moderated the relationship between PD and outcomes (Table 2). Next steps include testing for mediation by teacher wellbeing, as well as exploring the role of wages and other on-the-job supports, such as site leadership, in PD efficacy.

Findings suggest that efforts to use PD to improve quality should consider the unique context of child care, and how the struggles these teachers face may influence both their practice and their experiences with professional learning. Future research should focus on how to provide effective PD at-scale; otherwise state and federal PD investments-- such as those in the Child Care and Development Block Grant-- are likely to be inefficient.

Authors

• Melanie Seyarto, University of California - Los Angeles
  Presenting Author

• Anna Markowitz, University of California - Los Angeles