Early Childhood Links

Advocacy

Home Visiting
Parent Education and Support
Policy and Systems
Research, Model Programs, and Best Practices

 

Advocacy

• Children's Defense Fund's research, public education campaigns, budget and policy advocacy, and coalition building have contributed to millions of children gaining immunizations; health care; child care; Head Start; a right to education; adoptions; a chance to escape poverty; and protections in our child welfare, mental health, and juvenile justice systems. More than 400 CDF publications have educated millions about child conditions and what can be done individually and collectively to change things.  This website offers information on topics including: meeting children's needs; preventing poverty; advocating for children; engaging the faith community; as well as state and national data and facts related to education, jobless rates, poverty, youth crime & violence, and census data.
  http://www.childrensdefense.org

Home Visiting

The Future of Children Winter 1993 

http://wwwfutureofchildren.org/pubications/figures-tables

The Future of Children Spring/Summer 1999  

http://www.princeton.edu/futureofchildren/publications/figures-tables

Healthy Families America

http://www.healthyfamiliesamerica.org/home/index.shtml

NPC Research    

http://www.npcresearch.com/

Oregon Commission Children and Families 

http://www.oregon.gov/OCCF/Mission/BestPrac/besthv/mibesthv.shtml

Parent Education and Support

• Brazelton TOUCHPOINTS Center offers a series of links to noteworthy sites which may provide helpful, professional assistance on childcare and parenting questions.
  http://www.touchpoints.org

• Birth To Three has brought new parents together since 1978 to share their parenting experiences, increase their knowledge of early childhood development, learn about community resources, and develop support networks among themselves.
  http://www.birthto3.org

• The Early Childhood Institute (ECI) sponsors comprehensive and challenging research in order to help ensure that America's young children are successful in school and beyond -- and to enhance their quality of life and that of their families.  The design of the page encourages collaboration at all levels -- families, educators, communities, policymakers -- in an effort to assist all children.
  http://www.ed.gov/offices/OERI/ECI/index.html

Policy and Systems

National Conference of State Legislatures is a bipartisan organization that serves the legislators and staffs of the nation's 50 states, providing research, technical assistance and opportunities for policymakers to exchange ideas on the most pressing state issues. To help legislators support families in their communities, NCSL tracks state and federal policies and programs in six areas: human services reform, early childhood care and education, child support, child welfare, family law, welfare reform and youth programs.
http://www.ncsl.org/programs/cyf/hswelfare.htm

The National Center for Children in Poverty (NCCP) is a nonprofit, nonpartisan research and policy organization at Columbia University, whose mission is to identify and promote strategies that prevent child poverty in the United States and that improve the lives of low-income children and families. Concentrating on the links between family economic security and child development, we research policies that promote three goals: Economically secure families; Children entering school ready to succeed; Stable, nurturing families.  Find research, facts and tools around; Economic Security, Early Child Care and Learning; Family Stability; Demographics.
http://www.nccp.org

The Research Forum, at the National Center for Children in Poverty, is updated daily and features a searchable database of summaries of large- and small-scale research projects, key topics pages, resources pages, and lists of recent publications related to these issues.  Content is available includes current and past Forum newsletters and a database of more than 300 projects
policy explanations, such as welfare reform reauthorization.
www.researchforum.org

Research, Model Programs, and Best Practices
The Oregon Commission on Children and Families' (OCCF) Best Practices information is intended to build on the many years of good work the Oregon Commission System has devoted to outcome evaluation and accountability.  Information is structured using specific topic areas including: Childhood Care & Education; Home Visiting; Child/Youth Crime Prevention; Teen Pregnancy Prevention; Alcohol & Drug Abuse; Parent Education & Support; Early Literacy; Health/Mental Health; and Positive Youth Development.  These topic areas are divided into several sections: Essential Components; Demonstrated and Model Programs; Useful Web Sites; and Research Resources.
http://www.oregon.gov/OCCF/Mission/BestPrac/mibest.shtml

School of the 21st Century (21C), based at Yale University, develops, researches, networks, and supervises a revolutionary educational model that links communities, families, and schools. There are currently over 1300 schools across the continental United States that are participating in the 21C program.
http://yale.edu/bushcenter/21C

Harvard Family Research Project's (HFRP) research can be placed under two categories of study: family-school-community partnership and strategy consulting and evaluation.  Specific projects include: Out-of-School Time Learning, Family Involvement Network of Educators, Home Visit Forum, and Early Childhood Evaluation Project.
http://www.hfrp.org/

The Future of Children provides research and analysis to promote effective policies and programs for children by providing policymakers, service providers, and the media with timely, objective information based on the best available research.  The Future of Children Journal offers comprehensive, cross-disciplinary articles focusing on issues related to children.  Topics include foster care, welfare reform, domestic violence, home visiting, child care, health care and school-linked services.
http://www.futureofchildren.org

The Center for the Study of Social Policy's  mission is to promote policies and practices that improve the living conditions and opportunities of low-income and other disadvantaged persons.
The center's major work is organized into three related areas of general activity consistent with its mission - 1) Support to Practitioners: Technical Assistance Resource Center, Peer Technical Assistance, and International Learning;  2) Community Building: Community Decision Making, Community Child Protection, and Strengthening Families Through Early Care and Education; and 3) Policy and System Reform: Non-Adversarial Child Welfare Reform, Policy Matters, Human Resource Management Reform, and financing.
http://www.cssp.org

Child & Family Policy Center (CFPC) produces a variety of reports, case studies, concept papers, and technical assistance tools related to Community Based Collaboration, Service Integration, and Comprehensive Services; Outcomes, Evaluation and Accountability; Early Childhood Systems and School Readiness; Frontline Practice; Investment-Based Budgeting and Return-On-Investment Analysis; Child Welfare, Outcomes, Contracting and Managed Care; and Welfare Reform and Workforce Development.
http://www.cfpciowa.org/