Time Well Spent

During my experience with Walden University, I have learned that I have more friends and colleagues in the early childhood field than I could have ever imagined. As educators, we all share the passion for working with children and improving their educational experience, no matter what we do to make this happen. My Walden colleagues have been extremely support and insightful, contributing to my understanding about the early childhood field. I am looking forward to continuing to collaborate with my colleagues from Walden in order to promote our shared understanding about advocating for quality early childhood education and partnering to make a positive change in society.

I have also learned that I possess a strong passion for play-based learning and am committed to ensuring that all young children in early childhood programs experience learning through play during their time in school. The change in educational standards have forced teachers to teach young children more rigorous material in a shorter amount of time, adding stress on teachers, leading them to resort to rote-style learning to ensure they meet their required deadlines. As a result, children are actually falling behind in essential development because the skills that develop through play are not established. My mission is to advocate for play-based learning in all early childhood settings in order to promote positive changes in children's developmental outcomes. Teachers will receive support from mentors as they work together to include play while they meet curricular requirements.

My knowledge about Head Start and the impact that it can have on children's lives has also grown drastically. When I began working on my Master's degree, I had just accepted a position working with a local Early Head Start program while having only two years of prior experience working in the early childhood field and no experience working with Head Start. As I progressed through my degree program, I used the discussions and application assignments to further explore what Head Start stands for and impact it has made on the community I serve. I can now proudly say that I confidently contribute to the writing of my program's grant and other governing documents, knowing that the knowledge and experience that I have gained throughout the course of my Master's program is being used. I am looking forward to what the future holds in terms of my early childhood career and being able to confidently contribute to improving the lives of young children through quality education.

As I progress in my career in the early childhood field, I see myself moving up into higher administrative positions in the Office of Head Start, whether that be at a regional or national level. While I enjoy currently serving my community, I believe that I should share my knowledge and experience with educators on a grander scale. I have already been monitoring regional positions, noting the qualifications and other requirements for application. I would like to help other grantees establish strong partnerships with community resources to help ensure that the children in their service area have access to essential services necessary to promote learning. I also want to advocate to improve the availability for quality education experiences for all young children, not just those that qualify for Head Start services or live in upper-class society. I know of several middle-class families, mine included, that cannot afford to send their children to quality educational programs and resort to having either family or private, less qualified babysitters care for their children. These children are missing out on essential experiences that can help foster development. Childcare and other early childhood programs need to be more affordable in order to maximize the chances to improve the future of society through today's children.

My experience with Walden University has truly been wonderful. I am honored to have had the opportunity to work with my professors. The level of experience and professional connections is inspiring. I have attended two other well-known universities in my lifetime and I can honestly say that I never received the personal feedback and professional guidance as I received from my Walden professors. Thank you all for your support throughout this journey. I also want to thank my colleagues for the vast amount of information and insight that you have shared with my along this journey. I think it is truly amazing that I have had the opportunity to collaborate with such passionate educators that represent early childhood education from around the world. I hope that you all keep in touch. I would love to continue to collaborate with all of you as we continue to pursue our professional careers in the early childhood field.

Lastly, I have posted a Wordle that describes my Walden experience. I want thank everyone (family, friends, professional colleagues, etc.) who have supported me through this journey.

 

Contact Information

Tiffany Booze

Education Coordinator

Pickaway County Head Start & Early Head Start

465 E. Ohio Street, Circleville, OH 43113

boozet@piccaheadstart.info

International Jobs and Roles in the ECE Community

As I near the completion of my Master's degree through Walden University, one of my final assignments is to explore international organizations that positively promote working with children. The first organization that I have found is the Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI), which can be found at http://acei.org/. ACEI is a non-profit organization that strives to promote quality educational services worldwide. They work to customize educational experiences based on the traditional customs and resources available in a child's environmental context where they live. It would be an honor to serve as a member of ACEI's Board of Directors. Qualifications for candidates include professional knowledge pertaining to business or public policy related to education, strong leadership skills, and the passion to represent diverse populations around the world (http://acei.org/qualifications-for-candidates-for-the-acei-board-of-directors).

Another international organization is the International Child Resource Institute (ICRI), which can be found at http://www.icrichild.org/. The ICRI is another non-profit organization that promotes quality care and services to children around the world. They believe that they should only offer services where they are welcome, so their organization is invited to serve regions where local leaders offer their support. One of ICRI's current projects was to provide training to teachers about learning and implementing non-violent discipline techniques with their students. ICRI provides a variety of consultation services that work to improve the quality of care and services offered to children in a certain locality. As a consultant for ICRI, I could have the potential to work with public policy leaders and key educators to determine the need to provide higher quality services to populations in question. I could also provide training to educational staff about developmentally-appropriate practice and other professional development opportunities.

A third international organization is the International Step by Step Association (ISSA), which can be found at http://www.issa.nl/. ISSA is a relatively new educational organization that was established in 1999 in the Netherlands. ISSA strives to provide professional development opportunities for educators working with young children and acknowledging the diverse populations of children served around the world. ISSA works to build the capacity of educators' knowledge by providing unique professional development opportunities to bring educators up-to-date with current issues and trends in the education field. As an early childhood educator, I would find it interesting to serve as a program mentor or adult educator for ISSA. ISSA offers a variety of trainings and online courses for educational programs. By serving as an adult educator or trainer, I would be able to share my knowledge for the early childhood field and advocate to other parts of the world to offer quality educational services to children everywhere.

There are several other international organizations that promote quality educational services to children, but I wanted to feature a few programs that I found to be unique in the populations they serve and services that they provide.