Prelude: Moving Beyond False Choices May Be Within Our Reach

Prelude by Stacie G. Goffin, series editor

Moving Beyond False Choices for Early Childhood Educators—A Compendium is the culmination of an 18-month blog series that engaged diverse viewpoints about disentangling early childhood education’s (ECE) long-standing thorny knot which is comprised of three of its most challenging issues: preparation and education, compensation and status, and diversity and inclusivity.

Launched in January 2018, the 32 pieces in the series spotlighted the ECE field’s diverse perspectives regarding the entwined relationships among the knot’s three strands. Laura Bornfreund and I strove to incorporate a range of perspectives and voices, including those too often not at the table. We sought to invite new possibilities for unraveling a knot increasingly resistant to being loosened so new options could emerge.

The series was well received, and as it drew to a close, it became evident that the exploration of ECE’s thorny knot had yet to run its course. The conversation kindled by the series clearly warranted further encouragement. As a result, the compendium’s format and its new content is intended to foster continuing discussion, deepen understanding of the knot’s underpinnings, lift up unexamined presumptions, and cultivate the level of consensus necessary for formulating next steps to move the field beyond false choices for early childhood educators.

The Compendium’s Organization

The blog series succeeded in presenting co-existing perspectives and accruing new insights, but revelations of new ways to respond to the challenge of untangling the knot were less evident. The new content prepared for this compendium broke through this impasse. First, by identifying five overarching themes from the series, each associated with a set of related pieces, the series’ seemingly diverging views coalesced around several common topics. Second, by attaching a field-defining question to each theme, a sharper, higher-level examination of ECE’s thorny knot was catalyzed. And third, the request made of new authors to offer questions warranting further exploration and recommend next steps created an action orientation missing from the blog series.

Below are the five themes and their defining questions:

1. Degrees and Education: Do degrees and education matter for early childhood educators? Why or why not?
2. Higher Education: What does higher education need to do to regain its stature as a gateway to the ECE profession?
3. Race, Class, and Gender: What is the role of race, class, and gender in resolving ECE’s thorny knot?
4. Family Child Care: Where does family child care fit in the ECE system?
5. Early Childhood Educators: ​Why Do Educators’ Voices Matter in Conversations About the Field’s Thorny Knot? What should be done differently to authentically engage them?

The authors invited to prepare introductions for these five theme sections were prodded to push readers’ thinking and invited to be provocative in their responses to the field-defining questions. Authors were charged to

• Introduce each theme section by consolidating what can be learned from “their” authors by presenting a synopsis that offered a fresh platform for unpacking ECE’s thorny knot.
• Expand the ECE field's exploration of its thorny knot in the context of the theme’s overarching, field defining question without falling into the abyss of inaction.
• Steer the conversation toward next-step possibilities.
• Demonstrate awareness of race, class, and gender issues.

This charge is reflected in the common organizational format used for each introduction, with the intent of honing authors’ attention to their field-defining questions. Their answers are aimed at sparking fresh approaches to unraveling ECE’s thorny knot.

The issue of equity, of course, has no boundaries, so a framing essay is organized around the question of “What do equity and progress look like for children and their early childhood educators?” The compendium’s concluding essay examines the fundamental question of “Getting Unstuck: What’s Needed for ECE to Take a Big Step Forward?”

Moving Beyond the Status Quo

The compendium’s format propelled the conversation evoked by the blog series beyond revelations of the range and diversity of perspectives about the ECE field’s thorny knot and insights into its complexity. The five theme introductions, as well as the opening and closing essays, differ from one another, as one would expect since each responds to a unique field-defining question. Yet there is a unifying conclusion: different kinds of intervention are necessary for releasing ECE’s thorny knot. Recommendations from the compendium’s new authors all urge the ECE field to move beyond current approaches to addressing its thorny knot.

These authors individually, and often collectively, contend that awareness is needed of the field’s historical legacies, past choices, and existing presumptions. We are asked to recognize that the presumptions we hold, and the choices we’ve made, are contributing to the field’s present challenges and relative inertia when it comes to its thorny knot. The authors maintain that those of us in the ECE field need to forge a new mindset if we want to drive meaningful change.

The compendium’s new content unearths buried assumptions hindering ECE’s evolution as a field of practice and offers novel strategies. Not unlike Barbara Bowman’s, Bela Mote’s, and Patricia Snyder’s pieces, they challenge us to open ourselves to different alternatives. And perhaps foretelling an adjustment of increasing importance, they almost unanimously join with series authors who called for repositioning early childhood educators so they are central in shaping the field’s developmental trajectory (e.g., Anne Douglass, Sherri Killins Stewart, Lauren Hogan, and Michele Miller-Cox ). Collectively, they also corroborate a conclusion I expressed in the series’ final piece: “given how long these issues have thwarted ECE’s development as a field, it would seem obvious that the ‘same ole’ is not well serving the field or children and families.”

I don’t want to be misinterpreted as agreeing with all that’s been written. Nonetheless, without trying to over-project a sense of optimism, Moving Beyond False Choices for Early Childhood Educators—The Compendium conjures up the possibility that the ECE field is awakening to the realization that transcending boundaries¹ and transforming systems² cannot be accomplished if one’s approach to change is driven by technical thinking and a restricted problem-solving mentality. Rather, it is characterized by creative work that calls upon not only commitment and perseverance but also upon a willingness to venture into the unfamiliar with a spirit of learning, experimentation, and discovery.

Acknowledgments

Huge thanks are due to the series’ 32 authors whose willingness to express their thoughts with authenticity and courage fueled the success of Moving Beyond False Choices for Early Childhood Educators. Without their willingness to work through multiple drafts to fine-tune their thinking, the compendium’s authors would have been unable to take this project to new heights.

The seven authors who graciously accepted the invitation to write the compendium’s essays and introductions deserve similar credit. Responding to the seven field-defining questions provided both opportunity and challenge and each of these authors rose to the occasion.

Finally, special appreciation is extended to Laura Bornfreund, director of Early & Elementary Education Policy at New America, who generously agreed to host the blog series and this follow-up compendium. She has been a strong supporter and valued colleague throughout the project’s nearly two years, as have members of her team.

Stacie G. Goffin, EdD, is principal of the Goffin Strategy Group, LLC and author (with Valora Washington) of the recently published Ready or Not: Early Care and Education’s Leadership Choices —12 Years Later