Naeyc code of ethical conduct and statement of commitment summary

WEBSITE: NATIONAL ASSOCIATION FOR THE EDUCATION OF YOUNG CHILDREN
National Association for the Education of Young Children

National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC). (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.naeyc.org/

WEBSITE: DIVISION FOR EARLY CHILDHOOD

Division for Early Childhood

Division for Early Childhood (DEC). (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.dec-sped.org/

WEBSITE: ZERO TO THREE: NATIONAL CENTER FOR INFANTS, TODDLERS, AND FAMILIES

ZERO TO THREE

ZERO TO THREE: National Center for Infants, Toddlers, and Families. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.zerotothree.org/

WEBSITE: NATIONAL CENTER FOR RESEARCH ON EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION

National Center for Research on Early Childhood Education

National Center for Research on Early Childhood Education (NCRECE). (n.d.). Retrieved from http://curry.virginia.edu/research/centers/castl/project/ncrece

WEBSITE: COUNCIL FOR EXCEPTIONAL CHILDREN

Council for Exceptional Children

Council for Exceptional Children. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.cec.sped.org/

WEBSITE: NATIONAL CHILD CARE ASSOCIATION

National Child Care Association

National Child Care Association. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.nccanet.org/

WEBSITE: NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR EARLY EDUCATION RESEARCH

National Institute for Early Education Research

National Institute for Early Education Research (NIEER). (2014). Retrieved from http://nieer.org/

WEBSITE: WESTED

WestEd

WestEd. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.wested.org/cs/we/print/docs/we/home.htm

WEBSITE: FRANK PORTER GRAHAM CHILD DEVELOPMENT INSTITUTE

Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute

Frank Porter Graham Child Development Institute. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.fpg.unc.edu/

WEBSITE: HEAD START'S NATIONAL RESEARCH CONFERENCE

Administration for Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation

Administration for Children and Families, Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation. (n.d.). Head Start's National Research Conference. Retrieved from http://www.acf.hhs.gov/programs/opre/events/head-starts-national-research-conference-research-on-young-children-and

Learning Activity
BOOK EXCERPT: ENGAGING IN INFORMED ADVOCACY
Planning and Administering Early Childhood Programs, pp. 373-378

Freeman, N. K., Decker, C. A., & Decker, J. R. (2012). Planning and administering early childhood programs (10th ed., pp. 373–378). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

CHAPTER 13 Contributing to the Profession
· NAEYC Administrator

Competencies addressed in this chapter:

Management Knowledge and Skills

· 1. Personal and Professional Self-Awareness

The ability to evaluate ethical and moral dilemmas based on a professional code of ethics

· 8. Leadership and Advocacy

Knowledge of the legislative process, social issues, and public policy affecting young children and their families

The ability to advocate on behalf of young children, their families and the profession.

Early Childhood Knowledge and Skills

· 10. Professionalism

Knowledge of different professional organizations, resources, and issues impacting the welfare of early childhood practitioners

Ability to reflect on one’s professional growth and development and make goals for personal improvement.

Learning Outcomes
After studying this chapter, you should be able to:

· 1. Apply the eight criteria of professionalism to the field of early care and education and describe how the field satisfies each.

· 2. Develop an advocacy plan that indicates which tools would be most effective in addressing an issue the field of early care and education is currently facing at the local, state, or national level.

· 3. Reflect on your own professional journey. Identify a mentor who has made a significant contribution to your professional development. Describe the most important lesson you have learned about effective mentoring and indicate how you plan to support developing leaders in your center or community.

Grace’s Experience

Grace found that working with children came naturally, and she considered herself to be a gifted teacher after only a short time in the classroom. She is now somewhat surprised that she is enjoying the new responsibilities that come with being a program director. She is gaining confidence talking with families, even when faced with a difficult conversation, and her skills as a supervisor and mentor are increasing as well. She is now comfortable as a leader in her own center, and is considering volunteering to serve as an officer in the local early childhood professional organization. Grace is finding that she enjoys the leadership role she has assumed.

Early childhood administrators are leaders. They have a responsibility to ensure the quality of the program they serve. They also have an opportunity to be an advocate. They can work toward ensuring that all families have access to quality early childhood programming by becoming active in their community or in a larger arena. Program administrators also have an opportunity to contribute to the field’s efforts to move toward higher standards of practice and increased professionalism.

Some ways program administrators can accomplish these goals are by engaging in informed advocacy; mentoring novices, experienced practitioners, and emerging leaders; making the public aware of the field’s reliance on a code of ethics; and, when appropriate, becoming involved in research to increase what we know about the characteristics and lifelong benefits of quality programming for young children.

PROMOTING PROFESSIONALIZATION1
Lilian Katz, one of the most influential voices in the field of early care and education, began discussions about the professionalism of the field in the mid-1980s. At that time, she noted that “professionalism” generally denotes praiseworthy work, and she observed that professionals are typically rewarded with high pay and elevated social status (Katz, 1995 ).

It is now generally agreed that early childhood education is an “emerging” profession (Feeney, 2012 ). It is neither like the “paradigm professions” of law and medicine, nor are early childhood educators unskilled workers, such as day laborers or short-order cooks, who enter the workplace with little prior training or specialized knowledge and whose employers are likely to consider them to be interchangeable.

To understand where early childhood lies on the professional continuum, consider how it measures up in terms of the following attributes commonly used to determine whether an occupation is or is moving toward becoming a profession (see Figure 13.1 for a depiction of the professional continuum).

· 1. Professionals possess specialized knowledge. They acquire this knowledge and skill and in its application by following a course of prolonged training.

· 2. Professions have rigorous requirements for entry into professional training, and training is delivered in accredited institutions.

· 3. Members of a profession have agreed-upon standards of practice that guide their efforts to carry out their duties and meet their professional obligations.

· 4. A profession has a commitment to meet a significant societal need.

· 5. Professionals are altruistic and service oriented rather than profit oriented. Their primary goal is to meet clients’ needs.

· 6. Professionals provide an indispensable service and are recognized as the only group in society that can perform its function.

· 7. A profession is characterized by autonomy—it has control over entry into the field, oversees the quality of the services offered by its members, and regulates itself.

· 8. A profession has a code of ethics that spells out its obligations to society (Feeney, 1995 ; Katz, 1995 ).

Figure 13.1 A Professional Continuum
1 Versions of this discussion have been published in “The New Face of Early Childhood Education: Who Are We? Where Are We Going?” by N. K. Freeman and S. Feeney, 2006, Young Children, 61 (5), pp. 10–16, and also in “Professionalism and Ethics in Early Care and Education,” by N. K. Freeman and S. Feeney, 2009, Continuing Issues in Early Childhood Education (3rd ed., pp. 196–211), by S. Feeney, A. Galper, and C. Seefeldt (Eds.), Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson.

The field of early care and education is making strides in some of these areas, but progress has been slow in others. The following discussion focuses on two particular dimensions of professionalism in which there has been notable progress in recent years. The first is the acquisition of specialized knowledge attained through prolonged training (number 1 in previous list), and the second is reliance on a code of ethics (number 8).

Application Activity
Our discussion focuses on efforts to increase the professionalism of the field by setting higher expectations for professional preparation and by making our reliance on our Code of Ethical Conduct explicit. Select one of the other six criteria of professionalism in the previous list. Decide where the field of early care and education falls on the professionalism continuum that puts doctors and lawyers at one end and unskilled workers at the other. Provide a rationale for your conclusion.

Moving Toward Professionalism: Professional Preparation and Reliance on the NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct
Professional Preparation:
It remains true that many states’ licensing regulations are minimal. Some require child care teachers and caregivers to have only a high school diploma or GED and stipulate only that directors and master teachers hold a child development associate (CDA) credential (which is generally considered equivalent to 1 year of postsecondary study; NCCIC/NARA, 2010 ).

Publically funded programs, however, have begun to raise the bar for entry into the field. The Improving Head Start Act of 2007 requires 50% of all center-based teachers to hold at least a bachelor’s degree in early childhood or a related field by 2013 (Administration for Children and Families, 2007 ). Publically funded 4K is following suit. Most require teachers to hold at least a bachelor’s degree or to be making progress toward attaining a degree (Barnett, Hustedt, Hawkinson, & Robin, 2007 ).

NAEYC’s Program Accreditation Standards also, over time, raise educational requirements across the board. They stipulate that by 2020, 75% of the teachers in an accredited program must have a minimum of a baccalaureate degree in early childhood education or a related field. NAEYC accreditation also requires directors to hold at least a baccalaureate degree and requires them to have specialized coursework in administration, management, and child development and learning or a plan to meet these requirements within 5 years (NAEYC, 2011a ).

It is likely that the effects of these policy changes will be felt across the entire field of early care and education, raising expectations for educational attainment in nonprofit and for-profit programs operated under a wide variety of auspices. These developments point to progress the field has made in one criterion of professionalism: requiring early childhood practitioners to have specialized knowledge gained by following a course of prolonged training.

Reliance on the NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct:
Reliance on a code of professional ethics is a second criterion of professionalism in which early childhood educators have made strides in recent years. The NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct ( 2011b ) includes statements of the profession’s core values and guides practitioners in their efforts to meet their responsibilities to children, families, colleagues, and society. It articulates ideals (how we aspire to behave), and principles (standards of conduct describing what we must and must not do). A Statement of Commitment accompanies the Code. It is not a part of the Code of Conduct but attests to members’ resolve to abide by the Code as they work with young children and their families.

NAEYC first adopted its Code of Ethical Conduct in 1989 (Feeney & Kipnis, 1989 ), revised it in 1992, 1997, and 2005 , and reaffirmed and updated it in 2011. The field has taken steps to enhance practitioners’ reliance on the Code and to make this reliance more apparent to those outside the profession.

One way reliance on the Code has been promoted is by making it an important criterion in NAEYC Accreditation Standards both for programs serving young children and for postsecondary programs preparing teachers for every rung of the professional ladder—from the CDA through doctoral degrees such as Ph.D. and Ed.D. These standards ensure that all practitioners in accredited programs are knowledgeable about the Code, and all who graduate from accredited postsecondary programs have demonstrated their knowledge of and skill applying it in their work.

Two supplements have been designed for use with the original Code of Ethical Conduct. They extend the reach of the Code beyond those working directly with young children and their families. The first supplement addresses the particular needs of program administrators (NAEYC, 2011c ). It provides guidance as you face situations with ethical dimensions unique to the director, such as filling a much-sought-after opening in the infant room, terminating a teacher because decreased enrollment is forcing you to downsize, and managing relationships with families in a way that lets you keep the needs of children paramount in your decision making.

The second supplement guides adult educators (NAEYC, 2004b ). It extends the original Code to meet the needs of those providing training and education, whether in credit-granting institutions such as colleges or universities or in informal professional development activities. As a program director, you are likely to provide professional development designed to meet the particular needs of your staff. This supplement reminds you, for example, to remain true to the approved training plan and helps you have the courage to deny credit to the caregiver who slept through the training activity instead of participating and learning from it.

Several efforts have helped to make the Code widely accessible. The original Code is now reprinted in many introductory textbooks; the Code and both supplements are posted on the NAEYC Website, the original Code in both English and Spanish; and the Code is available from NAEYC in both English and Spanish in an inexpensive brochure format. NAEYC also offers an attractive laminated poster of the Statement of Commitment. Programs that display this poster attest to their pledge to abide by the field’s ethical standards.

In addition to making the Code widely available, NAEYC has made efforts to support practitioners’ efforts to apply the Code effectively in their work. NAEYC has published two books focusing on professional ethics: Ethics and the Early Childhood Educator (Feeney & Freeman, 1999 / 2005 ) provides a comprehensive introduction to the Code, describes its development, and offers guidance in applying each of its sections: responsibilities to children, families, colleagues, and the community. This book is often a required text in 2-year and 4-year institutions’ early childhood programs. The second book, Teaching the NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct (Feeney, Freeman, & Moravcik, 2000 ), describes many activities for teaching the Code and includes reproducible materials that help you prepare for effective training sessions.

NAEYC’s journal, Young Children, includes a regular column that might help you include discussions of ethics in your regular staff meetings. “Focus on Ethics” alternates descriptions of commonly occurring dilemmas with an analysis and resolution of a previously published dilemma. This column is based on NAEYC members’ submissions. You might decide to submit a dilemma your center has been grappling with to be considered for publication and analysis. Specifics about how to become involved are included with each article. Other materials to help you teach your staff to apply the Code are identified on the “Teaching the NAEYC Code updates” link from the NAEYC website. This website also includes video clips of an interview with Stephanie Feeney, one of the original Code’s authors and a leader in the field’s work on professional ethics. Links to those resources are included at the end of this chapter.

You can help make the families you serve and others outside the profession aware of the field’s reliance on the Code of Ethical Conduct. One way to accomplish this goal is to include the Code (or a link so they can find it online) in your program’s family handbook and to put families (and staff) on notice that they can expect your behavior and that of your staff to reflect your commitment to these ethical principles. Another is to prominently display the Statement of Commitment poster attesting to your program’s reliance on the Code. You are likely to think of others that will work well in your particular setting.

Other Criteria of Professionalism:
Since early care and education is an emerging profession with a rich and unique history, we believe it is more appropriate to satisfy some criteria of professionalism than others. It is unlikely, for example, that early childhood educators would want to abandon our commitment to making a place for novices eager to pursue their education while working in the field. This is why we embrace T.E.A.C.H.® scholarships that support employees’ pursuit of their associate’s degree while they are working with young children. The field’s commitment to the career ladder that has room for beginners as well as experts illustrates why we believe it is appropriate for early care and education to carve out a unique niche on the professionalism continuum that honors our roots while at the same time moving toward greater reliance on standards of practice shown to benefit young children and their families.

As we move toward increased professionalism, it is important that program administrators, as leaders in the field, be active in organizations that support their efforts to remain informed and engaged professionals. Consider the organizations listed in Appendix 8 . Participation in organizations that are of particular interest to you can enhance your practice and connect you with the larger community of early childhood educators and advocates.

Application Activity
Rely on the NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct ( Appendix 2 ) and the Supplement for Early Childhood Program Administrators ( Appendix 3 ) to resolve one of the following dilemmas. Analyze each dilemma by identifying to whom you have responsibilities. Find guidance in the NAEYC Code and Supplement for Early Childhood Program Administrators (note item number[s]). Then decide what the “good director” should do in each of these situations.

· An enrollment issue: The mother of the next child on your list for admission has told you that she has had her child in five different preschools in the past 6 months. She tells you very emotional stories about what she found wrong with each of them.

A personnel issue: Your enrollment is down. You must close a classroom and let a teacher go. Do you choose the last person hired who is an excellent teacher or the long-time employee who has never done a very good job?

A family issue: A parent who has been rude and abusive to staff withdraws her child but then wants to come back to the center.

ENGAGING IN INFORMED ADVOCACY
Advocacy is speaking out for and taking action in support of causes that protect and support vulnerable populations. It is “part of the historical tradition of early childhood education” (Feeney, 2012 , p. 71). Advocates sometimes take immediate action such as when they lobby on behalf of specific legislation or build a coalition around a specific issue. In other instances, advocates set goals for what they want to accomplish in the future. They engage in this kind of advocacy when they contribute to political action campaigns or vote for candidates who support their interests.

Early childhood advocates invest their efforts on behalf of young children, their families, and the profession. They can champion a wide variety of causes, all designed to improve the lives of children and families. Our commitment to advocacy is established by the Statement of Commitment that accompanies the NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct. It states that early childhood educators agree to “serve as advocate[s] for children, their families, and their teachers in community and society” (NAEYC, 2011b ). The Code includes the following ideals that should guide our work, both individually and collectively, on behalf of children, the community, and society:

· I-1.9—To advocate for and ensure that all children, including those with special needs, have access to the support services needed to be successful.

I-4.3—To work through education, research, and advocacy toward an environmentally safe world in which all children receive health care, food, and shelter; are nurtured; and live free from violence in their home and their communities.

I-4.4—To work through education, research, and advocacy toward a society in which all young children have access to high-quality early care and education programs. (NAEYC, 2011b )

Advocacy can involve speaking up in a private or public setting or working on behalf of a particular child or family. Advocacy may also take you into a public arena where you have the opportunity to protect the well-being of children and families in your community, state, or nation.

Your personality, your passion, your available time and energy, and your stage of professional development are all likely to influence the kinds of advocacy that are right for you. When you are a novice in the field, advocacy on behalf of a particular child or family will probably be the best fit for your interests and abilities. As you become more experienced, and particularly when you move into an administrative role, it will be time to reevaluate your strengths and interests. You may be ready to assume a leadership role in your local community, perhaps even on a larger stage. Consider the following list to identify the kinds of advocacy that are right for you:

1. Individual advocacy involves professionals in working on behalf of children or families. You engage in advocacy when you help a particular child or family gain access to needed services. An example of this kind of personal advocacy is pursuing speech therapy for the child whose poor articulation is making it difficult for him to have positive interactions with his peers.

Your individual advocacy efforts may also involve sharing your views with individuals or groups to raise their awareness about an issue. This kind of advocacy can be either spontaneous or planned (Robinson & Stark, 2002 ). Distributing information about the Campaign for Commercial Free Childhood to the families of the children in your program and encouraging them to limit the number of commercial messages to which their children are exposed are examples of individual advocacy. You are also engaged in individual advocacy when you write a letter to the editor or submit a guest editorial to your local paper.

2. Collective advocacy involves professionals working together on behalf of a group of people, for example, young children, working mothers, or individuals with disabilities. As an early childhood advocate, you are probably focused on securing a “greater societal commitment to improving programs for young children and more support for early childhood educators” (Jacobson & Simpson, 2007 , p. 92) and in speaking up “because all is not right for children in our country and the world” (Feeney, 2012 , p. 71). Two kinds of collective advocacy target decision makers far removed from the daily lives of young children and their families:

· a. Public policy advocacy may involve you in efforts to influence public policies and practices to make them more responsive to the needs of children and families. Public policy advocates challenge those who receive public funds and who develop laws, regulations, and policies to enact policies that support young children and their families (Robinson & Stark, 2002 ). When a professional organization such as your state NAEYC affiliate communicates its position to the state legislature, the organization’s spokespersons are engaged in collective public policy advocacy.

· b. Private-sector advocacy includes efforts to make the workplace more family friendly. Successful advocacy efforts have increased the number of corporations that offer employees flexible schedules, job sharing, telecommuting, and part-time employment. Other advocacy efforts have increased the number of corporations that offer onsite employer-supported child care, support breastfeeding mothers, or invest in goods and services for children.

The field of early care and education has a long history of advocacy for children and their families. We hope that you will continue this tradition by seizing opportunities to speak out for those who are most vulnerable and unable to speak out for themselves.

Application Activity
Identify an issue facing your center, your community, or your state. Identify who might help you resolve this issue. Should the target of your advocacy be local policy makers, state-level legislators, or corporate leaders? Identify strategies likely to be most effective to bring attention and eventually action to remedy the problem or resolve the issue.

Becoming an Effective Advocate
Becoming an effective advocate is an important part of becoming a mature professional. But the fact is, many early childhood educators who enjoy their work with children find it difficult to speak with authority to adults, particularly to public-sector or business policy makers. That may be because working directly with children requires a different skill set than leading adults. We know, however, that if we are to attract the public support needed to create a robust and sustainable system of early care and education, we must be effective advocates.

One strategy that helps ensure success is to create coalitions of support and to network with other individuals or groups who share your cause (Ellison & Barbour, 1992 ; Levine, 1992 ). That may mean linking with providers of special services such as speech or occupational therapists or working with support groups for mothers such as Mom’s Rising, a grassroots effort designed to support family-friendly policies and practices. Review Figure 13.2 , which identifies characteristics of effective advocates.

Figure 13.2 Characteristics of Effective Advocates
Sources: Information from “Advocacy Leadership” by H. K. Blank, 1997, Leadership in Early Care and Education (pp. 39–45), by S. L. Kagan and B. T. Bowman (Eds.), Washington, DC: National Association for the Education of Young Children; Advocacy Strategy: The Fundamentals, by Nonprofit (NP) Action, 2005, Washington, DC: Author, retrieved from www.npaction.org/article/articleview/574/1/229; and Advocates in Action: Making a Difference for Young Children, by A. Robinson and D. R. Stark, 2002, Washington, DC: National Association for the Education of Young Children.

An Advocate’s Toolbox
Effective advocates are good communicators. They are clear about their message and keep their communications factual, explicit, and direct (Jacobson & Simpson, 2007 ). They have many tools in their toolbox. Each must be tailored to meet a particular audience’s need for information about the problem you have identified and the role members of the audience could play to help you reach the solution you propose.

· Position statements are a professional organization’s formalized stance on issues related to its mission. NAEYC, the Southern Early Childhood Association (SECA), and the Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI) have developed position statements addressing controversial or critical issues related to early childhood education practice, policy, and professional development. Sometimes two or more professional organizations develop position statements together. For example, Early Childhood Mathematics: Promoting Good Beginnings (2010) is a joint position statement of NAEYC and the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM). In other instances, allied organizations embrace each other’s position statements, as ACEI did when endorsing the NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct.

Position statements typically include extensive reviews of the literature and are a valuable foundation upon which to base your advocacy efforts. They are not usually appropriate, however, for legislators or other decision makers because they are too in-depth and detailed for their purposes. They can be most helpful as you prepare to testify on behalf of legislation or to meet with policy makers in other settings.

A briefing paper typically describes one problem, describes the policy you propose, and gives an example of how the policy you propose is working in another locale. Legislators are particularly interested in policies in neighboring states, so provide a close-to-home example whenever possible (Robinson & Stark, 2002 ).

Talking points are short and to the point. They include “sound bites telling why you support or oppose a particular policy or decision” (Robinson & Stark, 2002 , p. 82). Advocates can use talking points when meeting with policy makers or talking to the media.

Key facts handouts are an advocacy tool intended for the public, policy makers, and the media. They are short (one- or two-page) to-the-point summaries of the basic facts surrounding your issue. Any statistics you reference must be accurate and up to date (Robinson & Stark, 2002 ). See Figure 13.3 for an example of a Key Facts Handout.

Figure 13.3 Key Facts Handout
Source: Information from “Research into Action: The Effects of Group Size, Ratios, and Staff Training in Child Care Quality,” by NAEYC, 1993, Young Children, 48 (2), pp. 65–67.

Concrete examples are compelling and often effective ways to demonstrate the importance of the policy or initiative you are recommending. If you are advocating for quality programs for 4-year-olds, for example, you will want to give policy makers a glimpse into a classroom full of authentic hands-on experiences and will need to make it clear to them what children learn when they build with blocks or dress up in the dramatic play center. You can do this by inviting policy makers to your center or by taking the center to them with photos, short videos, and real-life success stories (Jacobson & Simpson, 2007 ).

Action alerts are tools advocates use to mobilize their support network. They are often emailed to supporters urging them to call their legislators to ask them to vote in support of particular bills under consideration. Action alerts include phone numbers and email addresses of targeted legislators and specific facts advocates can use in their message (Robinson & Stark, 2002 ).

A number of organizations focused on young children and their families have become more active in the advocacy arena in recent years. It is likely their stepped-up efforts have been prompted by their commitment to retaining public support even in today’s bare-bones local, state, and federal budgets. These organizations may be a good place to find resources that support your own local- or state-level advocacy efforts, whether you are concerned with expanding infant/toddler programs, retaining state-supported 4K programs, or increasing services to young children with special needs and their families. Some organizations active in leading advocacy efforts are listed at the end of this chapter. You may know of other advocacy groups that address issues faced in your own community.

NAEYC sponsors an annual Week of the Young Child in mid-April. This might be an ideal advocacy opportunity when used as a platform for informing elected officials about issues related to young children and their families, to spotlight a local champion for children, or to grow grassroots advocacy efforts by involving students, programs, and providers in high-profile activities (“Advocates in Action,” 2009 ). By coordinating advocacy efforts in your community, city, or state, you can increase the chances for presenting a unified message that is likely to have a greater impact than would be a single, isolated effort.

Important Reminders!
We hope we have inspired you to become an effective advocate for young children and families on the local, state, or national level. It is important to remember, however, that some agencies or organizations prohibit their employees from taking a public stand on controversial issues. Before you or members of your staff speak out publically, you need to be certain you are following your employer’s policies related to advocacy activities. You may not be permitted to participate in rallies or other demonstrations during work hours or may be prohibited from identifying yourself as a public employee in a letter to the editor or a guest editorial in your local paper. It is best to find out about any restrictions that might limit how you can speak out before your community is engaged in heated public debate. That way, you can be assured that the limits are not intended to silence your weighing in on a particular issue but are, instead, related to the agency’s established policies.

You also need to be aware of limitations that apply to an NAEYC affiliate (if it is registered as a nonprofit 501(c) (3) organization) and to your program if it has this nonprofit designation. It is not permissible, for example, for nonprofit 501(c) (3) organizations to recognize elected officials who are candidates for reelection with an award during an election year. That means that it would not be possible for your local NAEYC affiliate to honor your local state senator as a Champion for Children after she has announced her candidacy for reelection (NAEYC, 2004a ).

If the kinds of advocacy efforts described earlier are not permitted by your employer, we encourage you to share information with your friends and family. Maybe you will inspire them to advocate on behalf of children and families.

· A Better Way

Grace has become comfortable as a supervisor, mentor, and coach to the teachers in her center, and she is beginning to see herself as a leader in the local early childhood community. She was not willing, however, to talk to the newspaper reporter who recently asked her to comment on proposed changes to the state’s child care regulations. She does not consider herself an expert on that issue and did not want to make a misstatement she would later regret.

After studying the guidelines describing tools of effective advocates, Grace decided that she needed to become better informed about how the proposed reduction in adult-child ratios for licensed centers could improve child outcomes. She attended public hearings on the issue and networked with the directors of other high-quality programs in her community. After checking with her board of directors to be certain public advocacy would not violate any established policies, she studied relevant position statements and prepared a key facts handout to summarize the points she wanted to make. She called back the reporter and agreed to be interviewed on the topic. She knew she had done the right thing when the parents of the children in her program thanked her for speaking out publicly on behalf of quality.

INVESTING IN THE PROFESSION’S FUTURE
Supporting Developing Professionals
When you help others find their place in the profession of early care and education, you are engaging in another form of leadership. Some of the ways program administrators can help others find their place in the profession are by

· 1. Being a resource for those who want to know more about a career in early care and education

· 2. Welcoming students enrolled in internships or courses that require them to observe or interact with young children or families

· 3. Mentoring and coaching novices to enhance their skills and knowledge of young children and early childhood education

· 4. Encouraging emerging leaders to enhance their professional knowledge by enrolling in postsecondary degree programs; pursuing advanced professional development opportunities; and participating in professional organizations, including attending and presenting at local, regional, and national conferences.

Supporting Research
Another way you can contribute to the future of the field is by participating in research projects investigating some topic related to children, families, teaching, or learning. You will first want to be certain proposed projects meet the standards established by the NAEYC Code of Ethical Conduct’s ( 2011b ) principle addressing research with young children:

· P-2.10—Families shall be fully informed of any proposed research projects involving their children and shall have the opportunity to give or withhold consent without penalty. We shall not permit or participate in research that could in any way hinder the education, development, or well-being of children.

When experienced leaders find time to provide mentoring, they are contributing to the future of the profession.

Then you will want to ask researchers if their project has been approved by the appropriate institutional review board (IRB). This review requires researchers to have a plan to request participants’ consent and to have procedures in place to protect the privacy of participating children and adults. Once you are convinced those requirements have been met, we advise you, whenever possible, to grant research requests and invite researchers involved in expanding the field’s knowledge base into your program.

Teachers as Researchers
It is important to appreciate that research can be conducted not only by scholars such as university-based researchers, but also by teachers in their own classrooms (Cochran-Smith & Lytle, 1999 ). Teachers involved in this kind of action research (which is sometimes called teacher research) explore practical questions within their own world of work “to better understand teaching and learning and to improve practice in specific and concrete ways” (Stremmel, 2007 , p. 4). For them, research is an everyday event that informs their practice (Paley, 1981 ).

As a program administrator, you can create a culture that supports teacher research. This moves teachers away from the view that they transmit knowledge to children and toward the view that they construct knowledge and understandings with the children they teach (Moran, 2007 ). Action research can take teachers to the cutting edge of best practices and can give them opportunities to collaborate with colleagues, university researchers, and preservice teacher preparation programs (Charlesworth & DeBoer, 2000 ; Cooney, Buchanan, & Parkinson, 2001 ; Moran, 2007 ).