July 13, 2020
A new child care and education partnership: Kansas Institute for Early Childhood Education and Research
Submitted by Communications and Marketing
The College of Health and Human Sciences and the Division of Student Life announce the creation of the Kansas Institute for Early Childhood Education and Research, a strategic partnership between the university's academic and service components.
Both units offer child care and education on campus, core components of their missions, at the Hoeflin Stone House Early Childhood Education Center — known as Stone House — and the Center for Child Development, or CCD. These facilities will merge under the institute, integrating the clinical field experience requirements for students and the expertise of the early childhood education teacher education program faculty in the Center for Child Development. The institute will be housed in the College of Health and Human Sciences with a director to be named.
Under the institute, the university will continue its commitment to offer high-quality affordable child care and education to the K-State and Manhattan communities. Families enrolled at Stone House will be guided through the enrollment process at the Center for Child Development and plans are underway for welcoming all families to the facility. Instructional faculty from Stone House will lead designated classrooms in the Center for Child Development. All classroom teachers and faculty will work collaboratively on curriculum and program design. Students in the early childhood education program will complete required clinical experiences in the center.
The institute will open to families on Aug. 10 at the Center for Child Development. Plans for the Stone House facility will be announced on a later date.
"Through this partnership between the College of Health and Human Sciences and the Division of Student Life, Kansas State University will take an important step forward in both serving the early childhood education needs of our university community while also advancing research in child development," said Charles Taber, provost and executive vice president. "The talented faculty and staff of the Kansas Institute for Early Childhood Education and Research will help create a better future for our university and our state by serving the education needs of our children."
Institute goals include expanding engagement of and access by academic programs across the university to support student learning and interprofessional development; support cross-disciplinary research on the science of child and family development, education and allied disciplines; and expanding on the university commitment to engagement and outreach with communities statewide and nationally on child and family development, early education and implications for research, policy and workforce development.
K-State's early childhood pre-service teacher education program, in the applied human sciences department, is accredited through the National Council for the Accreditation of Educator Preparation and approved through the Kansas State Department of Education to prepare students for birth through age 5 unified teacher licensure. Supervised clinical experiences with mentored opportunities in reflective practice are integral in course and curriculum requirements and completed at Stone House. The program is accredited by the National Association for Early Childhood Education, or NAEYC.
Under the institute, the Center for Child Development provides child care on the K-State campus serving children from birth to age 12. Initially founded as a parent cooperative in 1985, the university assumed administration in 2006. The center moved from Jardine to its current location in 2010 and greatly expanded in a state-of-the-art facility, which is licensed by KDHE and accredited by NAEYC.
Creation of the institute is consistent with the call by the Institutes of Medicine and the National Research Council in 2015 for institutions of higher education to reexamine their programs in light of the current state of the research on the science of child development, best practices care and education, and economic and workforce development. Specifically, institutions are charged to review and revise their programs, policies and infrastructure to support child development and a cross-departmental, cross-disciplinary foundation for academic programs preparing students for multiple and interprofessional roles.
Questions may be directed to Bronwyn Fees, associate dean for academic affairs in the College of Health and Human Sciences, at fees@k-state.edu.