Dreaming of a universal early childhood system

Starting the public good at 5 years old

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My EdNC early childhood teammate Katie Dukes and I spent the week listening to early childhood experts and community leaders from North Carolina and across the country talk about this moment, described repeatedly as a crossroads, when it comes to the needs of young children and families and how our systems, policies, and government structures could better address those needs.

I often hear folks talk about the array of services and programs that support the youngest children as a “nonsystem.” The theme of these discussions, hosted by Duke’s Center for Family and Child Policy and the Hunt Institute, was how to create a system — one that is accessible universally in the way K-12 education is.

Guilford County leaders provided us with a local example of what that could look like. Nonprofit organization Ready for School, Ready for Life has been working since 2014 with a bold vision of equitable access to universal, high-quality supports and services for young children and families. Their initiative, Get Ready Guilford, is building an early childhood infrastructure to help families navigate a complex network of resources and services.

“This vision is as breathtaking and groundbreaking as public school universally was 200 years ago for children age 7 to 16, but for children 0 to 8,” said Kenneth Dodge, past director of the Center for Family and Child Policy and founder of Family Connects International.

Early childhood investment is both a moral and economic imperative for North Carolina, said Rep. Ashton Clemmons, D-Guilford.

“If you knew what you know now… would we start the public education system at 5?” Clemmons asked the crowd Wednesday. “If we knew all the things we now know, would we start a public good of building who we’re going to be as a state at 5? Or would we be doing something different?”

You can check out Katie’s Twitter thread or mine for takeaways on Tuesday’s national early childhood discussion and my article for Wednesday’s conversation on North Carolina.

Below, don’t miss how the 2020 census fell short in its count of young children and how businesses policies can support families.