Early Childhood Engagement

Focusing on the Early Years

The research is abundantly clear – access to high quality early childhood education is linked to successful outcomes in education and in life. Our goal at The Hunt Institute is to establish the important notion that to be successful in reaching state education goals, leaders must include early learning strategies as a key part of their education agendas.

Engaging Policymakers Around the Needs of America’s Young Learners

The Hunt Institute’s leadership in the early childhood policy space is expanding rapidly, with early learning content infused across all core programming. In addition, The Institute offers state-specific technical assistance to a growing list of states.

The Hunt Institute provides the nation’s only specialized support to legislative early childhood caucus, committee, and workgroup leaders.

Through our breadth of programming, we have the opportunity to influence leaders in nearly every state, educating them about compelling brain development research, engaging in discussions about effective state and local early childhood strategies, and encouraging collaboration across states, initiatives, and programs.

What the Research Says

90% of a child’s brain development occurs before kindergarten entry at age five.

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Technical Assistance

Technical Assistance

 

Since 2018 The Hunt Institute has expanded our state-specific early childhood technical assistance to include participation in annual Early Childhood Leadership Summits. The Institute supported 14 state teams (comprised by gubernatorial staff, state lawmakers and key early childhood system leaders) during 2019-2020, which increased to 27 by the end of 2020. Tangible outcomes of this model include a statewide newborn home visiting program in Oregon, a $3.34 million Preschool Development Grant in Idaho, and the creation and support of new early childhood legislative caucuses in North Carolina, Michigan, and Arkansas – just to name a few.

View the Latest Summit Materials:

 

 

 

 

"Caucus Caucus"

"Caucus Caucus"

 

Responding to an expressed desire from state legislators for cross-state collaboration in support of newly-established early childhood legislative caucuses, in late 2019 The Hunt Institute created the Early Childhood “Caucus Caucus,” a multi-state, peer-to-peer learning community comprised by early childhood caucus, committee, and workgroup leaders from across the nation. With regular participation of lawmakers from Arkansas, Colorado, Hawaii, Maine, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, North Carolina, Oregon, Texas, and Wisconsin, we are excited to continue engaging this group of policymakers to drive early childhood reform in their states.

Specialized State Support

Specialized State Support

 

The Hunt Institute provides leadership transition and other supports to incoming state early childhood system leaders, with recent work concluded in New Mexico and in Alabama in early 2021.

Transition committees generally involve the seating and facilitation of a cross-section of key stakeholders and the development of written transition plans designed to support the work of the incoming leader.

2023 Early Childhood Landscape Narratives

2023 Early Childhood Landscape Narratives

 

The Hunt Institute curates annual updates to its state early childhood data landscapes. Culled from a wide variety of public sources, the data landscapes are designed to put relevant information on early childhood demographics, program access, and program quality at policymakers’ fingertips. Click on your state below to view the 2023 Early Childhood Data Narrative.