Race to the Top Early Learning Challenge

Purpose of the grant

Purpose is to improve program quality and services coordination for infants, young children and their families to maximize infants and young children’s learning and development, starting during pregnancy

Grant Snapshot

Dec 31, 2013 through Dec 31, 2017

Pregnancy to EightResult of 2 years of work of four

state agencies and NJ Council for Young Children

One of 6 states to receive the grant (NJ, VT, KY, GA, PA, MI)

Grant award: $44.3 million

Department of Education

Division of EC Education (P-3)

Head Start Collaboration

Teacher Credentials & Licensing

IDEA Part B(Preschool Special

Education)

Office of Special Ed

Federal Title I and other Federal

Programs

Regional Achievement Centers

County Offices

Migrant, Homeless Ed

Office of Bilingual Ed

Department of Human Services

Subsidized child care

Wraparound care

First Steps

Child Care Resource and Referral Agencies

Family Worker Outreach

TANF

SNAP (food stamps)

NJ Medicaid

NJ Family Care

PINJ (Workforce Registry)

Department of Children & Families

Child Welfare

Child Care Licensing

Home Visiting Program

Strengthening Families through Early

Care & Education

Family Success Centers

Family Day CareProvider Registration

(voluntary)

NJ Children’s Trust Fund

Federal Community Based Child Abuse Prevention Funds

Department of Health

IDEA Part C (Early Intervention)

Special Child Health Services

Home Visiting Program

Maternal and Child Health Services

Immunizations

Childhood Lead Poisoning

Indoor Environments Program

Shaping NJ

Current Structure of State Early Childhood Services

The Early Learning Challenge will help Build Our System

Who’s Involved

Department of EducationDepartment of Human ServicesDepartment of Children and FamiliesDepartment of HealthThe Inter Department Planning GroupThe Early Learning CommissionThe NJ Council for Young ChildrenHead Start Collaboration OfficeStakeholder Groups

04/21/23

At the heart of the grant is the identification and implementation of common standards across all of our agencies through Grow NJ Kids, our Quality Rating Improvement System

Grow NJ Kids drives the improvement process

Like a “Consumer Reports” of home, center and school-based care and education programs for birth to five.

Grow NJ Kids

Road map to achieving quality for early learning and care providers

Sequenced levels of evidence-based practices in health, family and community engagement, early learning and assessment, workforce development and administrative practices

Assistance and resources to help sites progress through the 5 levels

Incentives for participation

Rating processes

Evaluation of efficacy of the system

Outreach to ensure provider and family participation

The grant will allow us to:

Finalize the school/center based tool

Develop and test the Family Child Care tool, and begin rollout

Rollout will be cross sector

Our targets

Programs Children

Total Sites Included by end of Grant

Center-based sites serving children receiving subsidy 25,584 492

Family Child Care sites serving children receiving subsidy 720 180Head Start and Early Head Start (outside State Preschool sites) 6,000 125

State Preschool sites (incl. 619) 25,428 489

ECPA/ELLI  (incl. 619) 9,728 152Public and approved private schools for children with special needs 672 21Programs funded by 619 (non Abbott/non ECPA/ELLI) 4,480 140

Non-High Needs Programs 10,584 189

83,196 1,788

Our mission is to go from this

To this

04/21/2314

Or this

To this

04/21/23

The Projects

Create A Sustainable Early Childhood Training and Professional Development System

Establish an Early Learning & Development Training Academy with 3 regional locations (at IHEs)

What is it? Training hubs with endorsed/certified trainers in required tools, measures, and curricula in Grow NJ Kids

Purpose? To provide training and support to the Quality Improvement Specialists and will be a resource for all early childhood programs in the state

Align Early Childhood PD Systems

Finalize the revisions of New Jersey’s Core Knowledge and Competency Framework & Career Lattice;

Meet targets for professional development and higher education institutions and agencies that do not yet use the Framework by working with the Higher Education Commission;

Conduct mid grant and end of grant higher education inventories to track progress

Set up the Grow NJ Kids Incentive System

Develop Grow NJ Kids Rating System

Create an Early Learning Improvement Consortium (ELIC) to draw in at least 3 colleges/universities to begin conducting the ratings

Validate Grow NJ Kids

MOU to validate the system to answer 4 questions:

Do our indicators differentiate quality?Is our technical assistance effective in moving

sites up through the levels?Are higher levels associated with better

outcomes?Are we using the ratings protocol reliably?

Promote Family Engagement & Health

Expand central intake hubs to six additional counties (one stop shop for connection to services)

Establish county-level parent-led Councils for Young Children in all 21 counties

Increase the number of infants and young children screened for social-emotional and developmental concerns

Begin 3-year campaign to promote Grow NJ Kids and make public aware of program standards

Publicize Grow NJ Kids for Target Families

04/21/23

Create infrastructure to link data across state systems

Expand current Workforce Registry

Support Licensing Data System

Support the development and connection of early childhood data systems

Extend support to kindergarten-3rd Grade

Pilot technology-based curricula designed to boost children’s mastery of math and literacy skills;

Create guidelines for 1-3;

Create modules for implementation;

Build capacity of teachers and leaders in k-3 settings by focusing on optimizing instruction, using data from child assessments and measures of instruction;

Establish steering committee to create an evaluation component

Implement a Kindergarten Entry Assessment

Complete a phased-in voluntary statewide implementation of the KEA between September 2014 and September 2019 (not grant funded)

Integrate and align the standards from birth to eight

Articulate and align New Jersey’s birth to three and preschool standards with the K-3 standards

Include early learning standards (infant/toddler and preschool) in regulatory documents- licensing, Child Care, home visiting, Early Intervention, Family Child Care

Create self-paced training modules

Train cross sector

Coordinate programs and funding across state

agencies

Data systems to track and support programs, children,

families and workforce

High Quality

Early Experiences

Healthy, Happy, Ready Kids

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What will happen if we are successful