Author: Hannah Baxter

“If I had fully understood the complexity of what would go into this, I might have shelved the idea,” says John Till, chief strategy officer at The Family Partnership.

Till is talking about the Empowering Generational Greatness (EGG) Toolkit. EGG is a preschool curriculum that focuses on executive functioning skills. He has been working on it for no less than eight years.

The Family Partnership provides counseling, home visiting, and other services to families working to heal from the lasting effects of adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and toxic stress–often while navigating systemic barriers to wellbeing. 

“ACEs and toxic stress impact things like diabetes and heart disease,” says Till. “But their first impact is on the erosion of executive function and self-regulation skills in children from age three to age five, when those skills are developing the fastest.” 

The Family Partnership also operates a therapeutic preschool in south Minneapolis. Inspired by the work of the organization’s therapists, home visitors, and preschool teachers, Till wondered if the impactful interactions these professionals had with families could somehow be repackaged as a curriculum–one with positive behavior strategies that would help children with self-regulation in the short term and protect against ACEs and toxic stress in the long term.

The result is a curriculum that supports both language development and executive function through storytelling. It is called “Empowering Generational Greatness” because its goal is “helping to build these skills in the next generation and in the older generation, in the classroom and in the household, with immediate benefits and lasting lifelong benefits,” says Till.

EGG’s three pillars

The Family Partnership’s preschool classrooms were the initial proving grounds for EGG, which is based on three pillars: internal state language, storytelling, and mindfulness.

“Internal state language” describes how we feel, as well as our thought processes, desires, and perceptions. This can include emotions (“I am frustrated”) and physical sensations (“I am hungry”). It can include conveying what we perceive with our senses or what we conjure up in our imaginations (“I wish that…”). EGG includes carefully chosen children’s books that introduce internal state words and help children understand their meaning. Classroom activities reinforce their understanding; for example, children practice using internal state language with visual aids like a Feelings Wheel and the Teddy the Bear hunger rating scale. They become familiar with the internal state words “icky” and “yucky” by making slime.  

Next, children practice storytelling, relating “emotionally significant” life events, such as falling off a bike. Teachers ask questions to help children structure their story and prompt them to tell how they felt and what they thought at the time. Children also work together to tell the story of something that happened to the group.

“Internal state language allows children to have an alternative to acting out on feelings,” Till says, leading to less time spent on preschool behavior management. “Being able to tell stories allows you to put experiences into context: ‘What might I do differently next time?’ ‘Who helped me?’”

The third pillar is mindfulness activities. Mindfulness helps children recognize when distractions are putting extra demand on their executive functioning “so when things get heated there can be a reset and cooling off,” Till says. The mindfulness activities incorporated into EGG teach children skills that are practical, accessible, and fun.

Putting together the toolkit

The Family Partnership reached out to Research Associate Alyssa Meuwissen, PhD, to evaluate EGG–that is, to figure out if it works. To gauge its effectiveness, Meuwissen and Research Associate Mary McEathron, PhD, survey and interview teachers.

“We ask them about children’s language use and storytelling. We also have teachers provide a fair amount of data on children’s behavior and executive function, both before and after they implement EGG,” says Meuwissen. She and McEathron also measure children’s executive function skills directly using the Minnesota Executive Function Scale (MEFS)–again, before and after EGG.

“[The children are] all going to get better, because they’re getting older, so it’s not a pure measure of the impact,” Meuwissen cautions. “But we are seeing that benefit.” 

The CEED team also asks teachers what they think of the curriculum itself. Their feedback shaped the final product: the preschool version of EGG can be completed in 30 minutes a day, five days a week, over 30 weeks (the length of a typical school year). It is thoughtfully packaged as an easy-to-use planning guide and activity cards that can be organized on a binder ring and brought into the classroom.

“Teachers can choose what works for them and plug in activities, fit them in,” says Meuwissen, adding that teachers might choose to do two 15-minute activities at different times of day rather than focus on EGG for 30 minutes straight. The parent-facing version of EGG, meanwhile, takes 10 sessions to complete, and there is a condensed, five-session version that’s perfect for a capstone on an existing parenting class.

“We call it a Toolkit, because it’s something that integrates well with an existing curriculum,” Till says.

Better communication and self-regulation

Preschool teachers and parent educators report that they enjoy EGG–and that they are seeing positive changes. Teachers have seen “an improvement in classroom culture, in children’s ability to empathize, to express themselves, and to ask for help,” says Stephanie Goodwin, communications manager at The Family Partnership. Children have also shown a growing interest in reading.

Goodwin notes that parents have found EGG “gave them some new ways to talk to their kids,” incorporating more internal state language, for example. Teachers, too, have noticed a change in themselves. Goodwin was struck by a story shared by educators from a predominantly Latino community in San Antonio, Texas. They told her about a time when their preschool classroom was discussing a vocabulary word related to sadness.

“A little boy in the classroom spoke up and noticed in a story a connection point to something he had experienced at home when a parent raised their voice and he felt sad,” Goodwin recalls. “The teachers recognized within themselves an internalized expectation of boys to be little men, not to cry, not to show feelings. It challenged them in their own work as teachers to experience a shift.”

EGG works by providing people–children, parents, and teachers alike–with examples and opportunity for self-expression, “so they can re-engage with the full range of emotion,” Goodwin says. This, in turn, supports executive function skills–the first casualty in a potentially lifelong struggle against the toll of toxic stress.

Staff at The Family Partnership feel the urgency of that struggle deeply.

“My mom had dementia, and at the time that [EGG] was coming together she was still alive,”  Till remembers. “When we have a loved one suffering from dementia, we would do anything to take that away from them. Don’t we feel the same about children? Wouldn’t we do anything for every single child to be buffered from ACEs and toxic stress, and to grow up healthy, without the problems brought on by those early experiences?”

EGG is an effort to do just that. It has been a long time in the making, but as Till points out, decades can elapse between a new scientific discovery and any real-world impact. 

“A lot of what we know about brain science today is based on research that was done in the nineties,” says Till. “Today, most people know that smoking cigarettes will give you cancer, but people are not aware you can have these exposures in early life that can affect your health later. It takes time to raise awareness, and this is an effort to accelerate that, so if we’re where we want to be in 10 years instead of 20, that is success.”

Margarita Milenova, PhD, program quality specialist, was certified as an anchor for the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scales Third Edition (ECERS-3) after four days of rigorous in-the-field testing. ECERS-3 is a tool for measuring the quality of early childhood classrooms. In this Q & A, Milenova explains how the tool is used in classroom observations and what it means to be an ECERS-3 anchor.

What does the ECERS-3 measure?

MM: ECERS-3 is part of a suite of Environment Rating Scales (ERS) products. These products look at aspects of classroom quality like classroom setup, materials, and interactions between children and educators. A lot of states use ERS products in their quality rating and improvement systems for early childhood education.

This is not the same as licensing. Classroom observers are not looking at issues like basic safety considerations. However, they do look at aspects of the children’s environment, like furniture. For example, are there enough chairs for all the children to have the opportunity to sit down for a snack or to work on an art project? Are the chairs the right size so that the children are able to sit comfortably?

What else are you looking for when you do a classroom observation with the ECERS-3?

You look at how much time children have access to materials, measured in minutes. You also look at interactions. Let’s say there’s a display on the wall. Is the educator talking about that display? How are they talking about it? You look at how educators use math talk as part of daily events. In other words, how is math integrated into children’s day other than through planned math activities?

There are 35 categories of items in ECERS-3, and the math category is just one of them. During an observation, you fill out a score sheet that is several pages long. It lists the subscales, items, and indicators. You write down notes on your score sheet describing what you observe. You also carry an ECERS-3 manual so you can refer to it as you observe, take notes, and write down examples.

Scoring should happen right after the observation. There is a numerical score for each item. You then provide the program you’re observing with a feedback report. Then it’s up to the program what they want to do with their scores. The whole process of observing takes three hours.

You traveled to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for four days of testing. Why?

The Environment Rating Scales Institute is located at UNC-Chapel Hill. They developed the ERS tools, and they offer training and testing to be certified as a reliable observer. “Reliable” means you’ve shown you can use the tool accurately over time.

The ECERS-3 is an updated tool that replaces ECERS-R. I have been an ECERS-R observer for a long time, and the new tool has a lot of commonalities with that, but the scales are different. One major difference is that ECERS-3 has additional indicators that focus on interactions. Before, the scales emphasized the environment more. Now they emphasize interactions as well.

Reliability testing consisted of going into child care centers and doing observations for four days in a row. We did observations in groups of two or three, along with a group facilitator who provided feedback. We observed the same things, took notes, assigned scores, and debriefed with the group facilitator.

People came from all over the US to participate in training and testing. To be certified as reliable, you have to score 80% across three days of testing. But there are two levels above that that you can go for. If you get 85%, you are certified to provide technical assistance to programs. If you get above 85%, you’re certified as an anchor.

It was an intensive experience. Scores were not conveyed privately so everyone knew if someone succeeded or failed in hitting the percentage they were aiming for. For me, it was stressful because I had to switch from ECERS-R to ECERS-3. But it wasn’t just me–everyone else was exhausted, too! The team at UNC is amazing, though, especially the group facilitators who provide feedback.

Congratulations on being certified as an ECERS-3 anchor! What does being an anchor entail?

Basically, the anchor is the standard of reliability. So, if I do a classroom observation as part of a team, the other observers can check their results against mine.

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To learn more about the ECERS-3 and classroom observations, or to hire CEED to conduct ECERS-3 observations, fill out our interest form.

Research and Evaluation Assistant Meredith Reese and Research Associate Mary McEathron, PhD, presented to a standing-room-only crowd at the American Evaluation Association (AEA)’s annual conference in October 2024. They delivered a presentation entitled “Using Qualitative Data Visualizations to Promote Use and Change.”

What is data visualization? Why is it useful in the evaluation field? And what was it about this topic that attracted such interest? Reese and McEathron explain in the following Q & A.

What is evaluation?

MM: Usually when Meredith and I talk about evaluation, we mean program evaluation. When programs are created or funded by federal, state, foundation, or other funders, these funders want to know how the programs are working. Evaluators are tasked with finding that out. 

If you go to the AEA conference, though, you’ll find that evaluation includes a big swath of different roles. We met quite a few people in our field (early childhood), but we also met statisticians, economists, and environmental evaluators who work for the EPA, for example. There’s an enormous variety of professions represented at this conference.

Your session was about presenting qualitative data visually. What is qualitative data?

MR: Anything that isn’t numerical data is qualitative data. It’s information that you gather from interviews, focus groups, and open-ended responses on surveys. It can also include images, like photographs and video. A lot of times, numerical data, or quantitative data, can easily be visualized with an attractive graph. But qualitative data most often just gets reported out in text. Our session was an effort to show how we can increase engagement with and learning from qualitative data by using visualization techniques.

How do you approach visualizing qualitative data?

MR: Quantitative data visualization has certain practices and principles that we borrow for this type of data. First, you have to decide how you want to structure your visual, choosing among what Ryan Bell calls spatial metaphors. So, for example, let’s say you want to compare a person’s experience with coaching in person and online. A Venn diagram could be used to show what’s the same and what’s different about those two formats. Or you could depict those similarities and differences in a parallel structure where it’s a one-to-one comparison. Four spatial metaphors or structures that we highlighted in our talk were “network,” which can display connections; “hierarchical,” which can present groupings or importance; “linear,” which can show impact or change over time; and “parallel,” which can highlight comparisons or parts of a whole. [See image below.] Multiple formats may work to display the same information, but they differ in what they highlight, or draw attention to. So it’s important to be thoughtful in what you want to emphasize when selecting a format.

When you’ve determined the structure for your visualization, you want to build layers of information, so that your audience can quickly absorb the main points and go deeper where they choose. For example, bolded headings could express themes. Summary sentences or bulleted items could elaborate on those themes. In addition to layers, which go from high-level to more detailed data, we also use what we call slices–like case studies or profiles–that highlight a particular segment within the broader data set. Throughout the process, you have to guard against oversimplifying and losing the richness of qualitative data.

MM: Richness and nuance are the things that make qualitative data lengthy and dense in written form. But you want that richness and nuance! So you need to make sure you don’t lose those aspects as you try to make the data more compact and visual.

At the AEA conference, Meredith gave examples of this from our work at CEED. [See images below.] She showed how she visualized data about child care providers and the changes they made in their practice after they received coaching. She divided the information into manageable chunks and organized them around themes. This landed so nicely with our audience. 

What are some of the challenges of visualizing qualitative data?

MR: The first is figuring out the crux of the themes that emerge from the data and what you want to highlight. The second is doing that without losing the complexity of the original data. There’s a tension or balance between simplifying and saying something briefly, and losing the richness and detail. You also have to be careful not to present a skewed view of the data by cutting too much out.

MM: One thing about this whole process is that it’s another level of analysis, beyond our standard data analysis. It requires you to go in and think about the data set in terms of visuals: what stays in? If I use this visualization, how does it turn out? Then you have to double check: is this visualization accurate? Should I try different formats and see what jumps out at me in each? At the end of that process, you should have an even better understanding of the data. So visualizing can be a step in the analysis. 

The title of your presentation mentions that data visualization can promote use and change. Can you say more about what that means?

MM: Within the evaluation community, evaluation use and program or policy change have been a big topic of interest for quite some time. So many evaluation reports get written up and handed off to the client, they say thank you, and that’s it. The reports get shelved without anyone acting on the information in them. Evaluators want to know, “How can we get people to engage more with the results we’re presenting?” 

For one thing, the amount of data that is generated through qualitative methods can be daunting to someone who just needs to get a handle on the information and use it. So handing them a big stack of paper with a lot of dense paragraphs may not be the answer. Data visualization can help the reader focus on what is most important.

MR: Using data visualizations, we really want to present qualitative data in a way that turns it into information that our clients or stakeholders can understand and act on. Breaking findings into manageable chunks through visualization makes it easier for readers to gain knowledge from the data presented. We have found that our clients really value having qualitative data represented visually and in a variety of formats. They have shared that they passed these more visual reports on to program staff, and use them in marketing, which is validating as evaluators, because we want to cultivate a culture around data-use, and making decisions informed by data.

Questions to ask when developing a visual

Reese shares the questions she relies on to guide her work when she is creating a new data visualization.

• What finding am I trying to highlight? Or what’s the most important information I’m trying to share?
• What is the simplest way to display this information?
• What structure (network, linear, hierarchical, parallel) makes sense to depict the data?

• Does this format…
  • Make the information easily interpretable?
  • Improve the clarity and utility of the findings?
  • Match the audience’s comfort level with data?

This year, Alyssa Meuwissen, PhD, Research Associate at CEED, wrapped up the final phase of a multi-year study funded by the Sauer Family Foundation. The study looked at reflective consultation for child welfare workers in Minnesota. Reflective supervision or consultation is a form of relationship-based professional development. It is mainly offered in fields that impact the lives of young children, like infant mental health and home visiting. People who work directly with families and young children can be provided with reflective supervision or consultation (sometimes referred to as RSC or RS/C) by their own supervisor or by a trained outside consultant.

The child welfare field is increasingly making use of reflective consultation. Meuwissen’s study looked at a pilot reflective consultation program for a county child welfare agency. The agency had not done any reflective supervision prior to participating in the research project. 

The pilot implemented group reflective consultation for child welfare workers and administrators. It also included training to help workers get the most out of their reflective consultation sessions. The training included information on secondary trauma, burnout, physiological stress, and trust-building among teammates. 

Data collection amid staff churn

Meuwissen surveyed participants before, after, and at the midpoint of the 18-month pilot. There were, however, limits on the data she was able to collect. Due to high turnover rates, only four workers participated in the full 18 months of the study. Still, the results are encouraging.

“We learned that most people really appreciated the chance to sit down, talk through things, and be seen as a human whose wellbeing was worthwhile. The fact that their agency decided to pay for this service made them feel cared for,” says Meuwissen. “Also, a lot of people were working fully remote and did not have strong relationships with their coworkers. So many felt like they got more connected to their team.”

 The results demonstrated that:

• The model worked well for child welfare workers and supervisors; participants were satisfied with the format.
• Workers felt supported and valued the opportunity to reflect and connect with co-workers.
• Additional support was helpful in managing stress, navigating crises, and promoting wellbeing. However, stress levels remained high, and some still found the work unsustainable.
• Workers increased their skills in perspective taking, self-regulation, and relationship building.
• Reflective consultation sessions were a safe place to discuss issues of power, privilege, and race.

Studies have demonstrated the benefits of reflective consultation in other fields such as clinical infant mental health and home visiting. This study shows that these benefits also apply to child welfare, which can have more intense job stress and a higher prevalence of the belief that showing emotions on the job is unprofessional (Ferguson et al., 2019).

The pilot study was an important, detailed look at what occurred in one county. But Meuwissen feels there is still much that remains unexplored about reflective consultation in the child welfare field. The Sauer Family Foundation funded an extension project that included interviewing child welfare workers around Minnesota about their experiences with reflective consultation.

“Many studies have focused on the impact of reflective supervision on supervisees. People like it, and it’s generally good for them. That has now been established,” Meuwissen says. “I thought, because we’re doing this across different agencies, let’s learn more about how people do reflective supervision and consultation. How big is your group, or do you meet one-on-one? How often do you meet? Do you meet on Zoom or in person? There is still a lot to learn about the impact of these decisions.”

Surprisingly varied responses

Meuwissen asked interviewees about the logistics of their reflective supervision and consultation programs. She asked how participants felt about different modalities. She asked about barriers to being reflective. What made it easier to reflect? What were the pros and cons of different formats? What she learned surprised her.

“I was expecting that participants would basically cast their votes and one modality would win,” she says. “It was not like that. It was so nuanced. For example, take meeting online versus in person. Some people were adamant that being in person seems more respectful of human stories. Other people felt so much safer not being in the office. They said things like, ‘I can turn off my camera if I get overwhelmed. I can share more, and more authentically, when I’m on my computer.’ And there are snow storms, transportation, accessibility issues. The data did not show that being in person or being online works better. It depends a lot on the person and the situation.”

With study participants expressing so many individual–and contradictory–preferences, Meuwissen says the most important thing organizations can take away from this study is “to be intentional when making decisions about doing reflective consultation. Take time to think through how it will work, and know that it matters for how open participants are to deep reflection.” Supervisors should seek input from their workers and understand that having some flexibility for groups to operate in ways that feel best for them can help participants get the most out of their experience.

Workers with reflective supervision experience think and talk differently about their work

Part of the purpose of reflective consultation is to help people in relationship-based work (like child welfare) increase their ability to be reflective. Reflection can be defined as “stepping back from the immediate, intense experience of hands-on work and taking the time to wonder what the experience really means” (Zero to Three, 2019). Meuwissen’s interviews with practitioners around the state showed initial evidence that reflective consultation is effective in increasing reflectiveness.

“I asked each participant to tell me about a family that has been challenging,” Meuwissen says. “Why has it been difficult to work with them? How did you resolve the difficulty? What did you learn?”

The research team rated participants’ responses on 15 different scales. They then refined their results to score participants in five different areas of reflectiveness.

“Workers who had experience with reflective consultation talked differently and understood their work with families differently. People who had been doing reflective consultation for longer scored higher on reflective skills like taking other people’s perspectives, understanding their own emotional reactions to the work, and holding a curious, non-judgemental stance. It’s what you expect and hope, but this research hasn’t been done,” Meuwissen says. “So it was exciting to actually find that this was the case. If reflective consultation helps people be reflective, compassionate, and nonjudgmental, that should directly translate into better practice.”

Another insight from the study was that having a reflective consultant with experience in child welfare was very important to child welfare workers.

“There’s a big difference between being a child welfare worker and being a home visitor, for example. Child welfare workers are assigned to a case after something bad has happened. They can take children away. So that’s a really different feeling for your work and what your work means,” Meuwissen says. “It seems hard to understand from an outsider’s point of view: ‘How do you do that every day?’ So child welfare workers really value having a consultant who is an insider.”Meuwissen shared the results of the project’s first phase in a report and podcast on Promoting Resiliency in Child Welfare Workers through Reflective Practice. The second phase yielded a report as well as two practical guides, collected under the title Learning from Child Welfare Workers’ Experiences with RSC. One guide is for child welfare administrators who are considering adding reflective consultation. The other guide is for the consultants. All of the study results are freely accessible to the public.

Plus: a standing-room-only conference presentation and other recent accomplishments at CEED

Study of reflective supervision and consultation is first to describe implementation trends

Alyssa Meuwissen, PhD, completed the final phase of a research project to find out how reflective consultation affected child welfare workers in Minnesota. Reflective consultation is a type of relationship-based professional development where a supervisor or consultant provides regular, ongoing support to frontline workers. This takes the form of one-on-one or group meetings that encourage workers to reflect on the emotions that come up for them in their jobs.

This project, which was funded by the Sauer Foundation, began by evaluating a reflective consultation program that was created for a county child welfare agency. Meuwissen created a report and podcast to share the results of this phase of the study. In phase two of the project, Meuwissen interviewed child welfare workers all over the state to find out about their experiences participating in reflective supervision or reflective consultation.

“One of my biggest questions for child welfare workers statewide was: ‘How are you doing reflective consultation?’” says Meuwissen. “Many studies have focused on the impact of reflective supervision or consultation on supervisees. It’s been established that it’s generally good for them, and they like it. But these studies haven’t asked questions like, how big is your group? How often do you meet? Do you meet on Zoom or in person? No one knows anything about the impact of these decisions.”

Meuwissen released a series of reports on the second phase of the project that delve into Minnesotan workers’ answers to these questions.

CEED’s work featured in Connect Magazine

CEHD Connect Magazine, the alumni magazine of the College of Education and Human Development (CEHD), ran a feature article on the revised Early Childhood Indicators of Progress (ECIPs), Minnesota’s early learning standards. The Minnesota Department of Education tasked CEED with leading the revision. The article explores the importance of the ECIPs and the collaborative process that CEED created and implemented to guide the revision of the document.

Milenova achieves ECERS-3 anchor status

Margarita Milenova, PhD, Program Quality Specialist with the Center for Early Education and Development (CEED), was certified as an anchor for the Early Childhood Environment Ratings Scale Third Edition (ECERS-3) after four days of rigorous in-the-field testing at the Environment Rating Scales Institute (ERSI) in Chapel Hill, North Carolina. ECERS-3 is an assessment tool used in early childhood classroom observations. In order to use the tool, classroom observers must complete an ECERS-3 training and pass a test with a score of 80% or greater. The test consists of completing a real-world classroom assessment with a guided facilitator. Milenova went a step beyond to achieve anchor status. She had to get a score of 90% or greater across three days of classroom assessments. As an anchor, Milenova can provide technical assistance to early childhood education programs, and she can do ECERS-3 dual assessments with other observers.

Data visualization presentation draws crowds at evaluation conference

Mary McEathron, PhD, Research Associate and Lead Evaluator, and Meredith Reese, Research Assistant, presented “Using Qualitative Data Visualizations to Promote Use and Change” to a standing-room-only crowd at the American Evaluation Association’s annual conference in October. “Evaluation” often refers to assessing the effectiveness of a program or initiative and determining if it is meeting its goals. Evaluators get information in different ways, including from surveys and interviews and even photos and videos. That type of information is known as qualitative data. 

“A lot of times qualitative data just gets reported out in a paragraph, while quantitative data can be visualized with an attractive graph,” says Reese. Yet people in leadership roles need information at a glance to “let them learn from qualitative data and use it to make decisions and change.”

McEathron and Reese presented general principles and examples of visualizing qualitative data in a way that conveys the “richness and the nuance” that it offers, McEathron explains.

Public health professionals hear from Harrison, Meuwissen on safe, stable, nurturing relationships

Mary Harrison, PhD, LICSW, IMH-E, and Alyssa Meuwissen, PhD, participated in a panel discussion at the American Public Health Association Annual Meeting in October. The session focused on “safe, stable, nurturing relationships,” or SSNRs. SSNRs are a component of a healthy environment that supports children’s growth and protects against the negative effects of childhood stressors and adversity. The panel responded to questions from an engaged audience on how families, early childhood professionals, policy makers, and others can promote SSNRs and hence, help young children thrive.

As RBPD manager with the TARSS program, Emily Beckstrom plans professional development events and opportunities for coaches who work with early childhood educator. In this Q & A, she shares how her own experience with a skilled coach shaped her subsequent career.

Talk a little about your background in early childhood.

EB: After working in museum settings for many years, I made the decision to go to graduate school to focus on studying child development, and in 2004, I earned an MS from Erikson Institute in Chicago. I was fascinated to learn about the history, major theories, and best practices of early childhood development. The second year of my graduate program was spent working in the field. I applied what I had learned in my coursework while being supported in regular reflective practice by Erikson faculty. This definitely planted the seed for me that adult learners really benefit from having a “guide on the side,” rather than just a “sage on the stage!”

I missed my graduation from my master’s program, because I was in the hospital with my first baby! I often joke that my daughter, and later, her two brothers, taught me infinitely more than the books I read in school. When my children were little, I continued to work in informal education, doing contract work to support several creative projects at local and national children’s museums and children’s theaters. One of my proudest achievements was to collaborate on an early childhood storytelling project that fostered children’s language and critical thinking skills, while also protecting play’s important place in the early childhood curriculum. I also worked as a coach with the Center for Inclusive Child Care and with Minnesota Reading Corps.

What is your role at CEED?

I joined CEED in 2023 as a CLASS® observer, conducting observations throughout the state of Minnesota. I also co-led the revision of the Minnesota Early Childhood Indicators of Progress (ECIPs). In 2024, I accepted the position of Relationship-Based Professional Development (RBPD) manager with the TARSS program, which required me to pivot to a different set of responsibilities.

In this role, I assist with everyday operations, longer-term planning, and helping to ensure we meet all of our contract deliverables for the TARSS project. I also manage professional development opportunities for coaches and RBPD specialists, like the RBPD Credential training and the RBPD Fall Retreat. I really enjoy working with the TARSS team! It’s a collaborative, super-caring group of people all focused on how to best meet the needs of our state’s trainers and RBPD specialists.

What is RBPD, and how does it help the person who is receiving this type of support?

In a nutshell, RBPD helps early childhood practitioners focus on professional learning through one-on-one interactions with an RBPD specialist, coach, consultant, or mentor. The job title of the person providing RBPD can vary, but their goal is always to improve children’s developmental outcomes by increasing practitioners’ knowledge, skills, and abilities.

I was the very lucky recipient of RBPD support in one of my previous professional roles. My coach was extremely skilled, not only in the coaching process but also in encouraging professional growth in a really guided way. Her influence on my own coaching cannot be overstated! Once someone “feels” the benefit of this kind of professional support and what you feel capable of doing with this support, you want to create this experience for others. The real benefit of RBPD support is that coaching not only affirms where you are currently, but also gives you new ideas to try and accountability for making the new ideas happen.

What don’t people know about working in early childhood?

Anyone who works in the field knows this, but people who have never worked with young children may not understand how hard early childhood practitioners have to work. Balancing the emotional and cognitive needs of a wide range of developmental ages and stages, while also following ALL the guidelines for best practice, is a very tall order. The depth of the work (beyond supervising children, it involves curriculum, assessment, documentation, family engagement, just to name a few!) is often not recognized. Neither are the pressures that practitioners feel. Whenever I’m in a classroom or family child care setting, I wish I could give the practitioners a giant, sparkly badge or crown–something to show the folks who don’t get to see the preparation, patience, and pivoting ability involved in this work. I want people to understand that practitioners are doing incredible things under often incredibly challenging circumstances!

What are some pursuits you enjoy outside of work?

I love to be with my family, although our kids are teenagers and college-aged, so we rarely see them! I also love to cook, read fluffy-but-well-written books, and travel. I am also learning to salsa dance.

Tamara Masters, PhD, joined CEED in 2024 as TARSS program manager. In this Q & A, she describes how her career and educational pathway have allowed her to experience many different facets of the early childhood field. She also shares her thoughts on the vital work that educators do in early childhood classrooms–and why routines and relationships are key to children’s development.

Tell us about the journey that brought you to your current role at CEED.

TM: My love of the early childhood education field began at a very young age. I am privileged to have found many ways to explore my love of working with children. I began my career as a classroom teacher of different age groups (infants, first grade, and third grade). Then, after spending two years as a stay-at-home mom, I rejoined the workforce as an Early Head Start home visitor. My work in Head Start expanded as an instructional coach for teachers working with children aged birth through five and included child care partnerships in Des Moines, Iowa. I continued my education and eventually completed my PhD in education leadership at Drake University in Des Moines. For the past four years, I worked as a college professor, teaching all early childhood education courses at Central College, a small liberal arts college in Pella, Iowa. My family relocated to Minnesota this past summer and I was happy to join the TARSS team in June. 

What does your role at CEED entail?

As TARSS project manager, I lead the day-to-day operations of the TARSS program. I focus on our work plan, policies, and procedures, and on ensuring our contract deliverables are met. I also collaborate with partners across the state such as Achieve; Develop; Child Care Aware; Minnesota’s new Department of Children, Youth, and Families; and many others. 

What is new for you in your position?

The aspect of my job that is the newest for me is familiarizing myself with the early childhood education landscape within the state of Minnesota. I grew up in Lino Lakes, but I lived out of state for 20 years (in Nebraska for eight years and in Iowa for 12 years). Since moving home, I have focused on learning about the many systems and supports available to educators in Minnesota.

TARSS exists to serve the trainers, coaches and RBPD specialists who work with early childhood educators throughout Minnesota. Why is the training and professional development that they provide so important for the early childhood workforce?

Early childhood professionals serve the most vulnerable population. 90% of brain development occurs within the first five years of life. Since babies learn through everyday interactions, it is critical that ECE professionals understand the importance of each interaction. Having a system of training and professional development allows educators to learn about new research and stay up-to-date with best practices. That, in turn, helps educators deliver high quality early experiences that we know make an impact on children’s lives.

What don’t a lot of people know about early childhood education?

For those who aren’t familiar with what goes into caring for young children, I like to highlight the importance of routines and relationships. This goes back to all those brain connections that are being built during the first five years of life. Supporting children’s healthy development in the early years is all about consistency. Building routines into the day helps babies learn patterns and see the world in a predictable way (helping with self-regulation). Relationships are the same; they build trust, which allows children to explore and learn from their environment. Working in early childhood means creating those safe environments for children to explore and learn, which is the foundation of all future learning. The impact our field has on each and every community is very beautiful.

What are some of your interests and hobbies outside of work?

In my spare time, I spend a lot of time cheering for the Minnesota Twins, playing piano, and taking tap dancing classes.