It is our responsibility as an early childhood professional to work to strengthen the quality of early learning programs. High-quality early care and education has a positive impact on school readiness, school success, and long-term social and economic outcomes. Currently there is a national movement to support early educators in implementing high-quality practices, as teacher quality is the most important factor affecting child outcomes. State-wide Quality Rating and Improvement Systems (QRIS) hold promise for offering a systemic, coordinated approach to improving quality (QRIS, n.d). Educators need to be open to be a part of these programs and by taking in the information and make changes where they are needed.
In my own experience I have seen barriers when our program decided to go with QRIS because there were changes that needed to happen to make our program meet the standards. I think educating the staff members to help them understand how being a part of quality improvement can benefit the system as a whole. When it comes to program evaluations it is essential everyone is on the same page and understands exactly what needs to be done and why.
I believe you can minimize the barrier by having very open communication and meeting often as a group to discuss the results of an evaluation and how change can happen to raise the quality of the program to the next level.
Reference
Homepage: QRIS National Learning Network |. (n.d.). Retrieved August 04, 2020, from https://qrisnetwork.org/
Hello Alissa,
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading your post, the QRIS system is a good program that monitors the quality in care. Communication is a big thing, it is needed in any setting especially in the early childhood profession. It is how we get and give information about programs being used in the early childhood setting.