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Bullying has been around for ages. That doesn’t mean it’s ok, or we should get used to it. It is a persistent problem for all ages, and now it’s reaching into our early childhood programs. What can program administrators do? Some definitions and tips are below. WHAT IS BULLYING? Bullying has been described as a student’s repeated exposure to negative actions on the part of one or more students in which there is an imbalance of power between bullies and the victim. Some children learn that by bullying others, they can get ahead. It can affect the goals of education if not handled well. While the behaviors of young children can sometimes be aggressive, they lack the more strategic and deliberate actions that typically define bullying. Still, early behaviors can be precursors to later behavior, so awareness and positive interventions are needed . Bullying prevention can be embedded into SEL practices, diversity awareness, and behavior guidance practices of early childhood programs. HOW COMMON IS BULLYING? Most studies look at bullying as something that involves older children. Research on early childhood bullying is still developing. The Olweus Bullying Prevention Program (OBPP) is considered one of the most effective school-based anti-bullying programs that schools and centers study. Its founder, Dan Olweus, Ph.D, found that 35-40% of boys characterized as bullies in grades 6-9 had been convicted of at least three officially registered crimes by the age of 24. Bullies sometimes teach their children to be bullies. PREVENTION AND GUIDANCE CONCERNING BULLYING There are things parents, teachers, and friends can do to prevent or stop bullying . During the early childhood years, programs to help prevent bullying are helpful. Teachers and parents should be role models of caring behavior. Children raised in safe and nurturing environments will learn to be caring individuals. As children’s abilities develop, they can learn anger management, problem-solving skills, and decision-making skills. TEACHERS AND PARENTS CAN ALSO: Dispel myths that bullying is part of childhood. Encourage a positive environment by stating desirable behavior instead of negative behavior. Emphasize respect, fairness, caring, and responsibility in classrooms. Incorporate lessons about appropriate social skills in classrooms and everywhere; provide words for children to use. Understand the seriousness of bullying. Encourage children to consider the needs of others. Parents can arrange play groups for their children. A COMPREHENSIVE PROGRAM SHOULD: Promote a caring, respectful environment Help victims help themselves Challenge the bullies’ thinking Consider the effects of peer pressure Elicit students’ input FOR FURTHER INFORMATION: Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs (ASPA). (2025, February 5). Get help now. StopBullying.gov. https://www.stopbullying.gov/resources/get-help-now The Institute on Family and Neighborhood Life. (n.d.). Olweus bullying prevention program, Clemson University. Olweus Bullying Prevention Program, Clemson University. https://clemsonolweus.org/ Temkin, D., & Snow, K. (2015, August 18). To prevent bullying, focus on early childhood. NAEYC. https://www.naeyc.org/resources/blog/prevent-bullying-focus-early-childhood

A few weeks ago, on a cold Chicago evening in January, my niece arrived at our front door as she often does, semi-unannounced, but radiating a joyful presence that causes you to forget the shoes cluttering the foyer and the toddler toys every three to four feet. She arrived as usual with a gift in hand, a testament to her generous personality and old soul. With a quick hug, she placed a flower pot filled with beautiful yellow tulips in my hands, along with a card, and said, “Read this later, Aunty Kim.” Hours later when the kids were tucked away, I picked up the bright sky-blue envelope. Inside, I found a beautifully hand-written message along with a lesson about tulips. The line that stood out most to me was that tulips grow best in winter. As a self-proclaimed “nature girl,” this line set me on a quest to more deeply explore gardening, an activity that I have always found fascinating. As a former kindergarten teacher, Froebel-influenced educator, and advocate for the “children’s garden,” this deeply resonated with me and so the journey began. The idea of a tulip, something so delicate, growing in winter stuck with me and reminded me how many beautiful things in the world are born and nurtured in dark, cold conditions—circumstances that, to the naked eye, might be perceived as hopeless. Yet beautiful things can emerge out of the soil of life, and while tulips typically flourish and bloom in spring, the most critical growth happens in winter. Chicago’s dark, cold winters and blustery winds off Lake Michigan can overshadow memories of flowers in bloom, but gardening, as I have learned, is much more about the process than the product, a relatable concept for early educators. At its core, the gardening process includes cultivating, planting, nurturing, and harvesting. My exploration into gardening became a reflective metaphor for the state of our “world garden” today and the transitions that I believe are calling our true values and beliefs to the surface. Amid this exploration, I found myself reflecting deeply on how the principles of gardening could be applied to the current challenges impacting our profession. During these times of challenge and change, it might seem trite to talk about gardens and flowers, but I challenge each of you to simply use the gardening metaphor as a landscape for our collective work as early childhood professionals and institutional leaders. The principles of gardening are like many things, an “art,” but gardening is also a science. It is easy to focus on the beautiful blooms and foliage that appear above ground, but what lies beneath the surface is what matters. The scientific element of gardening is about planning and cultivating the deep dark soil where the seeds will be planted. Make no mistake, a wise gardener knows that gardens are full of surprises and that not every seed will thrive or survive, but there are lessons to be learned in both successes and failures in gardening. Our theme for the Leadership Connections 2025 conference is “Leadership in Bloom.” While the theme is a nod to our past and the visionary leadership of our founder, Dr. Paula Jorde Bloom, it is also an aspirational look toward the future and what it can be. It is also an acknowledgment of the seasons and circles of life. Audrey Hepburn said, “To plant a garden is to believe in tomorrow.” As leaders in communities and institutions of higher education and early learning, I challenge you to consider what you want to cultivate as you mentor future leaders, nurture learning communities, strategically advocate, and honor every voice within reach of our care. I also challenge you to examine your soil. Check the condition, provide extra nutrients if necessary, and be willing to break up the fallow ground. Once the soil is ready, consider intentionally planting seeds of hope, knowledge, collaboration, and kindness. Remember, not all plants need the same thing, so be mindful of what’s in your garden and be careful not to give too much or too little water or sunlight. I believe it is important to be generationally minded and think about those who will follow us and that is why I am so inspired by the African proverb that says, “We must be willing to plant gardens from which we may never eat.” Even the possibility that someone might be encouraged or empowered because of my contributions makes it worth the effort and sacrifice. As I close, I want to share this inspiring quote from Dr. Maya Angelou, “As I gaze at my garden and regard the varying colors the Creator has made for us, red, yellow, blue, white, pink, purple, etc..., I also think of the many colors the Creator has made of us, black, beige, brown, red, yellow and white—and all of us are beautiful.” By the time this article is published, it will be Spring and I hope that like the tulips, we have grown through winter and that we all recognize the beauty in the garden.

INTRODUCTION The early childhood education (ECE) workforce is diverse, encompassing professionals operating in various settings and under varying conditions. Among these, child care center directors and family child care (FCC) professionals—those who own and operate home-based child care programs—represent two critical groups of leaders who play pivotal roles in shaping the quality of children’s early learning experiences. Both groups function as administrators, responsible for delivering high-quality programming, ensuring compliance with licensing and regulatory standards, managing staff, and fostering relationships with families. While their overarching goals often align, the day-to-day realities of their roles differ in many meaningful ways. Center directors typically manage larger teams and multi-classroom programs within formal organizational systems, whereas FCC professionals often operate as sole proprietors, balancing the role of mixed-age group educator and business owner with administrative duties and non-traditional working hours in a home-based setting (Bromer et al., 2021; Hooper et al., 2019; Kelton & Tenis, 2024; Porter & Reiman, 2016). These structural differences shape not only their work experiences but also their professional needs and identities. Recognizing the commonalities and distinctions between these roles is essential to understanding the workforce and informing tailored workforce supports and professional development strategies. Moreover, understanding the perspectives of the administrators themselves is critical. This research brief contributes to those efforts by examining data from licensed FCC professionals and center-based administrators in Illinois, comparing their career motivations, job satisfaction, commitment, and self-efficacy across key leadership competencies. METHOD This study analyzed data from two distinct samples. The first included 89 FCC professionals who owned and operated FCC programs, and the second included 85 center-based administrators. All participants worked in licensed early childhood programs in Illinois. Data were collected as part of the registration process for various leadership academies hosted by the McCormick Institute’s Center for Early Childhood Leadership, prior to the start of the academies, between 2022 and 2025. Although each sample is reasonably robust, caution should be used when generalizing findings, as participants were not selected through random sampling but were instead individuals enrolled in leadership academies. Samples. Broadly, both groups had similar years of experience in the ECE field. On average, FCC administrators had 13 years of experience (range less than 1 year to 35 years), while center administrators also averaged 13 years of experience in the field (range 1 to 36 years). Both groups were generally well-educated, but the FCC sample had a smaller percentage of participants without degrees. Notably, 74% of FCC professionals without a degree had completed some college coursework. Twenty-eight percent of center-based administrators held an administrator or director credential, compared to 27% of FCC professionals who held an FCC credential. The infographics below provide further demographic comparisons between the two samples, including age, race, and educational background. While differences in variables collected limited the ability to make direct program-level comparisons, a few overlapping variables revealed meaningful distinctions in program auspice, funding, and operating models, and accreditation status. These findings are also highlighted in the infographic section.  Measures. Data were collected using two tailored versions of the Administrator Role Perception Survey (ARPS): the ARPS, designed for center-based administrators, and the ARPS–Home Based (ARPS-HB) for FCC professionals (Bella et al., 2017; Bella & Kelton, 2021). Both surveys are administered online and take approximately 25 minutes to complete. They assess alignment between current and ideal work experiences, past perspectives, current role perceptions, self-efficacy levels, and mastery perceptions.

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Leaders, policymakers, and systems developers seek to improve early childhood programs through data-driven decision-making. Data can be useful for informing continuous quality improvement efforts at the classroom and program level and for creating support for workforce development at the system level. Early childhood program leaders use assessments to help them understand their programs’ strengths and to draw attention to where supports are needed.  Assessment data is particularly useful in understanding the complexity of organizational climate and the organizational conditions that lead to successful outcomes for children and families. Several tools are available for program leaders to assess organizational structures, processes, and workplace conditions, including: Preschool Program Quality Assessment (PQA) 1 Program Administration Scale (PAS) 2 Child Care Worker Job Stress Inventory (ECWJSI) 3 Early Childhood Job Satisfaction Survey (ECJSS) 4 Early Childhood Work Environment Survey (ECWES) 5 Supportive Environmental Quality Underlying Adult Learning (SEQUAL) 6 The Early Education Essentials is a recently developed tool to examine program conditions that affect early childhood education instructional and emotional quality. It is patterned after the Five Essentials Framework, 7 which is widely used to measure instructional supports in K-12 schools. The Early Education Essentials measures six dimensions of quality in early childhood programs: Effective instructional leaders Collaborative teachers Supportive environment Ambitious instruction Involved families Parent voice A recently published validation study for the Early Education Essentials 8 demonstrates that it is a valid and reliable instrument that can be used to assess early childhood programs to improve teaching and learning outcomes. METHODOLOGY For this validation study, two sets of surveys were administered in one Midwestern city; one for teachers/staff in early childhood settings and one for parents/guardians of preschool-aged children. A stratified random sampling method was used to select sites with an oversampling for the percentage of children who spoke Spanish. The teacher surveys included 164 items within 26 scales and were made available online for a three-month period in the public schools. In community-based sites, data collectors administered the surveys to staff. Data collectors also administered the parent surveys in all sites. The parent survey was shorter, with 54 items within nine scales. Rasch analyses was used to combine items into scales. In addition to the surveys, administrative data were analyzed regarding school attendance. Classroom observational assessments were performed to measure teacher-child interactions. The Classroom Assessment Scoring System TM (CLASS) 9 was used to assess the interactions. Early Education Essentials surveys were analyzed from 81 early childhood program sites (41 school-based programs and 40 community-based programs), serving 3- and 4-year old children. Only publicly funded programs (e.g., state-funded preschool and/or Head Start) were included in the study. The average enrollment for the programs was 109 (sd = 64); 91% of the children were from minority backgrounds; and 38% came from non-English speaking homes. Of the 746 teacher surveys collected, 451 (61%) were from school-based sites and 294 (39%) were from community-based sites. There were 2,464 parent surveys collected (59% school; 41% community). About one-third of the parent surveys were conducted in Spanish. Data were analyzed to determine reliability, internal validity, group differences, and sensitivity across sites. Child outcome results were used to examine if positive scores on the surveys were related to desirable outcomes for children (attendance and teacher-child interactions). Hierarchical linear modeling (HLM) was used to compute average site-level CLASS scores to account for the shared variance among classrooms within the same school. Exploratory factor analysis was performed to group the scales. RESULTS The surveys performed well in the measurement characteristics of scale reliability, internal validity, differential item functioning, and sensitivity across sites . Reliability was measured for 25 scales with Rasch Person Reliability scores ranging from .73 to .92; with only two scales falling below the preferred .80 threshold. The Rasch analysis also provided assessment of internal validity showing that 97% of the items fell in an acceptable range of >0.7 to <1.3 (infit mean squares). The Teacher/Staff survey could detect differences across sites, however the Parent Survey was less effective in detecting differences across sites. Differential item functioning (DIF) was used to compare if individual responses differed for school- versus community-based settings and primary language (English versus Spanish speakers). Results showed that 18 scales had no or only one large DIF on the Teacher/Staff Survey related to setting. There were no large DIFs found related to setting on the Parent Survey and only one scale that had more than one large DIF related to primary language. The authors decided to leave the large DIF items in the scale because the number of large DIFs were minimal and they fit well with the various groups. The factor analysis aligned closely with the five essentials in the K-12 model . However, researchers also identified a sixth factor—parent voice—which factored differently from involved families on the Parent Survey. Therefore, the Early Education Essentials have an additional dimension in contrast to the K-12 Five Essentials Framework. Outcomes related to CLASS scores were found for two of the six essential supports . Positive associations were found for Effective Instructional Leaders and Collaborative Teachers and all three of the CLASS domains (Emotional Support, Classroom Organization, and Instructional Support). Significant associations with CLASS scores were not found for the Supportive Environment, Involved Families, or Parent Voice essentials. Ambitious Instruction was not associated with any of the three domains of the CLASS scores. Table 1. HLM Coefficients Relating Essential Scores to CLASS Scores (Model 1) shows the results of the analysis showing these associations. Outcomes related to student attendance were found for four of the six essential supports . Effective Instructional Leaders, Collaborative Teachers, Supportive Environment, and Involved Families were positively associated with student attendance. Ambitious Instruction and Parent Voice were not found to be associated with student attendance. The authors are continuing to examine and improve the tool to better measure developmentally appropriate instruction and to adapt the Parent Survey so that it will perform across sites. There are a few limitations to this study that should be considered. Since the research is based on correlations, the direction of the relationship between factors and organizational conditions is not evident. It is unknown whether the Early Education Essentials survey is detecting factors that affect outcomes (e.g., engaged families or positive teacher-child interactions) or whether the organizational conditions predict these outcomes. This study was limited to one large city and a specific set of early childhood education settings. It has not been tested with early childhood centers that do not receive Head Start or state pre-K funding. DISCUSSION The Early Education Essentials survey expands the capacity of early childhood program leaders, policymakers, systems developers, and researchers to assess organizational conditions that specifically affect instructional quality. It is likely to be a useful tool for administrators seeking to evaluate the effects of their pedagogical leadership—one of the three domains of whole leadership. 10 When used with additional measures to assess whole leadership—administrative leadership, leadership essentials, as well as pedagogical leadership—stakeholders will be able to understand the organizational conditions and supports that positively impact child and family outcomes. Many quality initiatives focus on assessment at the classroom level, but examining quality with a wider lens at the site level expands the opportunity for sustainable change and improvement. The availability of valid and reliable instruments to assess the organizational structures, processes, and conditions within early childhood programs is necessary for data-driven improvement of programs as well as systems development and applied research. Findings from this validation study confirm that strong instructional leadership and teacher collaboration are good predictors of effective teaching and learning practices, evidenced in supportive teacher-child interactions and student attendance. 11 This evidence is an important contribution to the growing body of knowledge to inform embedded continuous quality improvement efforts. It also suggests that leadership to support teacher collaboration like professional learning communities (PLCs) and communities of practice (CoPs) may have an effect on outcomes for children. This study raises questions for future research. The addition of the “parent voice” essential support should be further explored. If parent voice is an essential support why was it not related to CLASS scores or student attendance? With the introduction of the Early Education Essentials survey to the existing battery of program assessment tools (PQA, PAS, ECWJSI, ECWES, ECJSS and SEQUAL), a concurrent validity study is needed to determine how these tools are related and how they can best be used to examine early childhood leadership from a whole leadership perspective. ENDNOTES 1 High/Scope Educational Research Foundation, 2003 2 Talan & Bloom, 2011 3 Curbow, Spratt, Ungaretti, McDonnell, & Breckler, 2000 4 Bloom, 2016 5 Bloom, 2016 6 Whitebook & Ryan, 2012 7 Bryk, Sebring, Allensworth, Luppescu, & Easton, 2010 8 Ehrlich, Pacchiano, Stein, Wagner, Park, Frank, et al., 2018 9 Pianta, La Paro, & Hamre, 2008 10 Abel, Talan, & Masterson, 2017 11 Bloom, 2016; Lower & Cassidy, 2007 REFERENCES Abel, M. B., Talan, T. N., & Masterson, M. (2017, Jan/Feb). Whole leadership: A framework for early childhood programs. Exchange(19460406), 39(233), 22-25. Bloom, P. J. (2016). Measuring work attitudes in early childhood settings: Technical manual for the Early Childhood Job Satisfaction Survey (ECJSS) and the Early Childhood Work Environment Survey (ECWES), (3rd ed.). Lake Forest, IL: New Horizons. Bryk, A. S., Sebring, P. B., Allensworth, E., Luppescu, S., & Easton, J. Q. (2010). Organizing schools for improvement: Lessons from Chicago. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press. Curbow, B., Spratt, K., Ungaretti, A., McDonnell, K., & Breckler, S. (2000). Development of the Child Care Worker Job Stress Inventory. Early Childhood Research Quarterly, 15, 515-536. DOI: 10.1016/S0885-2006(01)00068-0 Ehrlich, S. B., Pacchiano, D., Stein, A. G., Wagner, M. R., Park, S., Frank, E., et al., (in press). Early Education Essentials: Validation of a new survey tool of early education organizational conditions. Early Education and Development. High/Scope Educational Research Foundation (2003). Preschool Program Quality Assessment, 2nd Edition (PQA) administration manual. Ypsilanti, MI: High/Scope Press. Lower, J. K. & Cassidy, D. J. (2007). Child care work environments: The relationship with learning environments. Journal of Research in Childhood Education, 22(2), 189-204. DOI: 10.1080/02568540709594621 Pianta, R. C., La Paro, K. M., & Hamre, B. K. (2008). Classroom Assessment Scoring System (CLASS). Baltimore, MD: Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co. Talan, T. N., & Bloom, P. J. (2011). Program Administration Scale: Measuring early childhood leadership and management (2 nd ed.). New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Whitebook, M., & Ryan, S. (2012). Supportive Environmental Quality Underlying Adult Learning (SEQUAL). Berkeley, CA: Center for the Study of Child Care Employment, University of California.

The Whole Leadership Framework, developed by the McCormick Center, is now featured in Exchange magazine—offering guidance on integrating administrative, pedagogical, and leadership capacities in early childhood programs.

A tribute to Paula Jorde Bloom, honoring her lasting legacy and transformative contributions to early childhood leadership, education, and advocacy.

Take a look back at the 2018 Leadership Connections Conference, where early childhood leaders came together to share insights, spark innovation, and build brighter futures for children and families.

Share your expertise and inspire others by presenting at Leadership Connections—an annual conference for early childhood leaders passionate about making a difference.