TKW Consulting

New collaborative to promote research and policy analysis on early childhood

MINNEAPOLIS / ST. PAUL (9/13/2006) -- The Center for Early Education and Development at the University of Minnesota and the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis are teaming up to enhance multidisciplinary research and high-profile policy discussions on early childhood development.

The Early Childhood Research Collaborative (ECRC) is a unique partnership that brings together prominent researchers and faculty members in a variety of disciplines at the university with economists at the Federal Reserve to develop and synthesize research on cost-effective investments in early childhood.

Co-directed by Arthur Reynolds, professor of child development and Fellow of the Center for Early Education and Development (CEED), and Art Rolnick, senior vice president and director of research at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, the ECRC is funded in part by University of Minnesota President Robert Bruininks' Interdisciplinary Academic Initiative on Children, Youth, and Families. CEED is an outreach and research center in the College of Education and Human Development. The Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis is one of 12 Federal Reserve banks in the United States.

The most visible sign of the new collaboration is its newly-launched Web site at www.earlychildhoodrc.org, where discussion papers on a variety of topics have already been posted.

The collaborative's mission is to foster multidisciplinary research on early development from birth to age 8 on topics such as the impact and cost-effectiveness of preschool and family support programs; family, school and community influences on child development; and psychological and biological foundations of child health and well-being.

To accomplish this, the collaborative will conduct research and policy analyses, disseminate research through discussion papers and other reports, convene forums and conferences, provide Web resources and help coordinate early childhood research activities around campus and in the community. The collaborative's national advisory committee includes Edward Zigler, Yale University; James Heckman, University of Chicago; Jack Shonkoff, Harvard University; and University of Minnesota professors Megan Gunnar, Institute of Child Development, and V. V. Chari, department of economics.

“We want to conduct and promote research that is policy-relevant as well as based on a thorough understanding of child development and how early experiences influence later development,” Reynolds says.

“We want to bring together the best research on early childhood development in the country,” Rolnick says, “to help Minnesota and other states develop the most cost-effective early childhood education programs.”

The papers currently posted on the Web site focus on effective programs and practices from preschool to third grade (PK-3), the productivity argument for investing in young children, developing high quality PK-3 classrooms, the long-term effects of child-parent centered early childhood intervention, and the role of cooperative behavior in preschoolers' social development. To read them, see www.earlychildhoodrc.org/papers/catalog.cfm.

The first public event of the collaborative is a conference on Friday, Oct. 13 at the Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs. The event will provide an overview of the collaborative and will feature an address by Nobel Laureate James Heckman of the University of Chicago.

See the collaborative Web site for conference information.For more information on the collaborative, to sign up for the collaborative's listserv, and to contact its members, go to www.earlychildhoodrc.org.