Recent staff accomplishments

Learn about some of our stand-out accomplishments over the past few months.

• Alyssa S. Meuwissen Meredith H. T. Reese published “Child welfare workers’ experience of short-term online reflective consultation” in the April 2025 edition of the journal Reflective Practice: International and Multidisciplinary Perspectives.
• The first cohort of Infant Mental Health and Reflective Practice participants wrapped up a three-month, intensive program in May. The program includes coursework, a bimonthly virtual discussion, and bimonthly reflective consultation provided by Mary Harrison. This free program is intended for child welfare workers who work with children in out-of-home placement or who are at risk of out-of-home placement. It is funded via the federal Social Security Act in partnership with the UMN Center for Advanced Studies in Child Welfare. Recruitment is currently underway for a second cohort.
• In August, Kristina Erstad-Sankey and Molly Hughes gave two presentations at the 2025 National Association for Family Child Care Annual Conference held in Dallas, Texas. They presented: “Through the Provider's Eyes: What We Wish Observers Knew” and “Promoting an FCC Peer Mentoring Program: Challenges along the Way and Collaborating for Future Possibilities.”

• The Minnesota Department of Children, Youth, and Families (DCYF) renewed two major contracts with CEED this fiscal year. First, DCYF renewed the Trainer and Relationship-Based Professional Development Specialist Support (TARSS) contract. The TARSS program has been housed at CEED since 2021. We provide professional development and support to trainers and relationship-based professional development specialists who work in Minnesota’s early childhood system. New this year, TARSS will also support course writers!

  Second, DCYF renewed a long-standing partnership with CEED to conduct CLASS™ observations in early childhood classrooms and train CLASS™ observers. These services, which we have provided since 2008, are a key part of Minnesota’s voluntary early childhood quality rating and improvement system, Parent Aware. New this year are plans to organize a hybrid conference that will bring Head Start locations and school districts together around the CLASS™ tool.

• Coordinated Evaluation of Minnesota’s Child Care Assistance Payment Policies, a research project in collaboration with the University of Minnesota’s Department of Applied Economics, entered a new data collection phase. This project is funded by the US Department of Health and Human Services, Administration of Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation. It explores the impact of Minnesota’s Child Care Assistance Program (CCAP), a subsidy program that supports child care access for low-income Minnesotans. The next phase of the research project will include collecting data from parents on their experience with CCAP grants.