Carsey School Launches NH’s First Ever Early Care and Education Research Consortium
September witnessed the exciting launch of the New Hampshire Early Care and Education Research Consortium under the leadership of Drs. Jess Carson and Evan England, at the Carsey School of Public Policy at the University of New Hampshire. The Consortium brings together researchers, providers, funders, policymakers, advocates, and other leaders committed to understanding and enhancing early care and education in New Hampshire. The aim is to build a rigorous body of applied research to support designing, implementing, and strengthening a robust and equitable ECE system.
The Couch Family Foundation is delighted to support the Consortium to strategically conduct ECE research that will fill knowledge gaps in the field, but more importantly to convene an ECE research hub to promote collaboration and establish a comprehensive data infrastructure for ECE in the state.
As Dr. Jess Carson, director of the Carsey School’s Center for Social Policy in Practice, asserts “We want to inform the state’s long-term ECE vision. What are the things that we know, the things that we need to know, and the things that we want to keep track of?”
Historically, many institutions have been working on ECE research. However, the shortcoming Dr. Carson and her colleagues identified was that the work has typically been produced in separate spheres, without institutions or organizations working together intentionally to coordinate efforts. That’s largely because New Hampshire-specific ECE research has traditionally been conducted in silos. “But the result is pockets of research happening that are really great, but not necessarily knitted together intentionally,” Carson said.
She added, “On the data-user side, we see lots of folks who really need data to be able to make decisions on the ground, but they don’t have a specific source to find those data points and that information. That includes our friends at the state, our friends in the field, and folks like legislators who are working in policy spheres.”
“And when it really comes together, we’ll hopefully be able to answer, ‘What is the policy agenda that we should all be working for?’” Carson said. And from a systems change perspective, “What can we share to be able to go further together?”
To learn more about the Consortium, watch the video of Drs. Carson and England in the Carsey Policy Hour: Gaining Insight into NH’s Early Care and Education Landscape.
In addition, the Carsey School and NH ECE Research Consortium have begun to release a series of primers on issues central to understanding the NH ECE ecosystem. Please read the ECE landscape overview and the first primer in the series, What Do NH Families Want for Child Care?