Early Education Leaders, an Institute at UMass Boston

provides the leadership development opportunities and infrastructure that early educators need to support thriving children and families.

June 6, 2024
by earlyedinstitute
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Applications now open for the Post Master’s Certificate in Early Education Research, Policy & Practice

Each year, we accept up to eight Leadership Fellows into the Post Master’s Certificate in Early Education Research, Policy & Practice (PMC) at UMass Boston. Fellows are selected based on their experience and interest in advancing the field of early care and education. They represent a variety of public and community-based early education programs and employer- and home-based child cares and come from every level of the field.

The PMC equips seasoned educators with advanced skills in research, policy, leadership, and data-driven practice. This 12-credit advanced graduate course of study is designed to help you deepen your knowledge and enhance your impact on early childhood education from birth to age 8.

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June 5, 2024
by earlyedinstitute
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An inspiring day at the 11th annual Leadership Forum

Gathering in person for the first time in four years, the energy and excitement was palpable at our 11th annual Leadership Forum on Early Education Research, Policy, and Practice May 4. We had record attendance as nearly 250 early education professionals joined us from New York, Maryland, and all across Massachusetts.

Early educators connecting at the Leadership Forum.

“I am so excited to be here!,” said Tiffani Peguese, a Black Student Achievement Program Liaison in the Howard County (Maryland) Public School System. “This is my first year here. It was really, really wonderful being in community with other early childhood educators and I learned quite a bit that I’m going to process, take on home, and put it into action when I go.”

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May 3, 2024
by earlyedinstitute
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Announcing our new name!

The Institute for Early Education Leadership and Innovation is proud to announce its new name: Early Education Leaders.

This new name powerfully communicates our work cultivating effective leaders who reflect and represent their communities—through workforce and leadership development, research, and partnerships that strengthen the larger early education ecosystem.

We formally announced our new name at the 11th annual Leadership Forum on Early Education Research, Policy, and Practice on May 4.

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April 15, 2024
by earlyedinstitute
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What ECE Advocacy Looks Like

Amanda Wiehe Lopes, Ph.D., the Leadership Institute’s Learning & Quality Improvement Manager, spoke to the MA Board of Early Education and Care at its April meeting to advocate for continued funding of programming that cultivates educational leadership and continuous quality improvement.

In remarks delivered during the public comment portion of the meeting, Lopes noted that the Leadership Institute has enjoyed a close partnership with the MA Department of Early Education and Care to deliver leadership programming to the state’s early care and education (ECE) workforce and professional development related to continuous quality improvement in the field.

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April 15, 2024
by earlyedinstitute
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11th annual Leadership Forum back in person for first time in four years!

The Institute for Early Education Leadership and Innovation (“Leadership Institute”) at UMass Boston is pleased to announce the 11th annual Leadership Forum on Early Education Research, Policy, and Practice (“Leadership Forum) will take place May 4 from 9:30 a.m. – 3 p.m. at the UMass Boston Campus Center, 100 Morrissey Boulevard, Boston. 

Past participants of the Leadership Forum on Early Education Research, Policy, and Practice.

This year the Leadership Forum returns to an in-person format after being held virtually since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. The theme is “Celebration of Early Educator Leadership,” in recognition of the central role early educators have played in shaping the new initiatives to improve the affordability and accessibility of early care and education that are now coming from Beacon Hill after years of advocacy. 

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March 12, 2024
by earlyedinstitute
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Adopting the Essential Leadership Model: Early Learning Center at the YWCA of Northeastern MA 

As a longtime educator and ECE leader, Mandy Chaput is confident in her skills and in her work as director of the Early Learning Center and of school-age programs at the YWCA of Northeastern MA. 

“I pride myself on having a very strong program. I’m very close to my families, my staff, my children,” Chaput said. “Even as a director, I want to be known in the program, not just run it.” 

But like any experienced leader, Chaput knows there’s always room for improvement. 

She credited UMass Boston’s Early Childhood Support Organization (ECSO) with enabling her and her staff to collect the data they needed to pinpoint exactly what changes they needed to make to improve program quality. 

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March 1, 2024
by earlyedinstitute
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Adopting the Essential Leadership Model: Little Voices Early Education and Care 

Initially, neither Maureen Myers nor Katie Shanley was enthusiastic about joining UMass Boston’s Early Childhood Support Organization (ECSO), a multi-year program for center-based ECE teams looking to build their capacity to provide the highest-quality learning experiences for the children and families they serve. 

Myers, the founder and program administrator for Little Voices Early Education and Care, Inc. in Hyde Park, has always sought out ways to boost program quality and form productive partnerships with other organizations, but she didn’t love the idea of introducing the new systems and protocols that are foundational to our ECSO into her 16-year-old nonprofit program. 

“I thought, ‘No—we have so many rules and so many protocols, we don’t need more,’ ” Myers confessed. 

Staff from ECE centers enroll in our ECSO in groups. In 2021, Myers asked Shanley, Little Voices’ director, to do the program with her. Shanley, who was relatively new to ECE leadership after spending much of her career as a lead teacher, found it overwhelming at first. 

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February 22, 2024
by earlyedinstitute
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Leading for Change reunion!

Alums of our Leading for Change program recently gathered together at the Community Room at the Salty City Market in Syracuse to reconnect, share stories—and laugh! Leading for Change is offered in upstate New York through our partnership with the Syracuse-based Early Childhood Alliance Onondaga, a coalition of community stakeholders with a shared vision for a more coordinated and strategic early childhood system and which is funded through Home Grown’s Building Comprehensive Networks initiative.

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This is the blog of the Institute for Early Education Leadership and Innovation, a university-wide initiative housed in the College of Education and Human Development at UMass Boston.
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