McCormick Institute for Early Childhood

BY Michael B. Abel | May 9, 2016

A woman wearing glasses and a suit is smiling in front of a flag.

Sim Loh is a family partnership coordinator at Children’s Village, a nationally-accredited Keystone 4 STARS early learning and school-age enrichment program in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, serving about 350 children. She supports children and families, including non-English speaking families of immigrant status, by ensuring equitable access to education, health, employment, and legal information and resources on a day-to-day basis. She is a member of the Children First Racial Equity Early Childhood Education Provider Council, a community member representative of Philadelphia School District Multilingual Advisory Council, and a board member of Historic Philadelphia.


Sim explains, “I ensure families know their rights and educate them on ways to speak up for themselves and request for interpretation/translation services. I share families’ stories and experiences with legislators and decision-makers so that their needs are understood. Attending Leadership Connections will help me strengthen and grow my skills in all domains by interacting with and hearing from experienced leaders in different positions. With newly acquired skills, I seek to learn about the systems level while paying close attention to the accessibility and barriers of different systems and resources and their impacts on young children and their families.”

This document may be printed, photocopied, and disseminated freely with attribution. All content is the property of the McCormick Center for Early Childhood Leadership.

Over the last 11 weeks we have published a series of posts to explore the multifaceted, nuanced nature of leadership in early childhood programs. We invited you to participate in an online discussion exploring the concept of Whole Leadership—a broad view of program leadership—evidenced in many areas, which we collapsed into three domains: leadership essentials, administrative leadership, and pedagogical leadership. The blog posts were:



You robustly responded, which lead to a rich conversation—expanding on our initial thoughts. I took the opportunity to analyze the 82 posts and replies submitted in this series in order to give you an update on what we are learning thus far.


  • There is affirmation that Whole Leadership is a useful and meaningful term for considering early childhood program leadership.
  • There is a great deal of overlap across leadership domains, and they are highly interconnected.
  • A substantial number of resources are available to support early childhood leaders, but clarity is needed about the distinctive aspects of leadership in the field.
  • Skill related to leadership essentials are foundational for all facets of leadership.
  • Competencies associated with leadership essentials may include confidence, creativity, cultural competence, efficacy, ethical conduct and morality, freedom, humility, inspiration, intentionality, an internal compass, intuition, self-discovery, self-awareness, transparency, and knowledge
  • Leadership essentials can be learned
  • Some activities related to leadership essentials include assessing change readiness among staff, journaling, reflective practice, and shared leadership.
  • Competencies associated with leadership essentials may be helpful in buffering the challenges that many program leaders face—leadership essentials provide a strong foundation to help program leaders get through challenging times.
  • Administrative leadership is important for the success of learning organizations and includes operational and strategic leadership dimensions.
  • Administrative leadership includes management functions such as orchestrating the logistics for teaching and learning, mobilizing staff to achieve program outcomes, establishing systems for effectiveness, and influencing organizational climate to foster collegiality and harmony.
  • Strategic leadership includes planning, operationalizing, and executing initiatives to advance the program’s mission.
  • Leadership for advocacy could be considered a dimension of strategic leadership because it is future oriented.
  • Professional learning communities for program leaders may be helpful for developing administrative leadership skills, sharing management ideas and resources, and providing emotional support.
  • Reflective practice is a method that some leaders have found useful for improving their administrative skills.
  • Pedagogical leadership—inclusive of instructional leadership—addresses the complexity of teaching and learning in birth to age 8 programs.
  • Effective pedagogical leadership fosters organizational cultures through reflective inquiry, continuous quality assessment and improvement, professional learning communities, and intentionality in allocating resources for teaching and learning.
  • Pedagogical leaders support family engagement, align curriculum to philosophy, make data-informed decisions, and optimize learning by applying evidence-based standards.
  • Bridging the Birth-3rd grade continuum should be a priority for all pedagogical leaders, regardless of the ages their programs serve.


This week, we are continuing the discussion started in this blog series at the McCormick Center’s Leadership Connections™ conference in Wheeling, Illinois. Over 600 participants will be invited to join the conversation through several interactive experiences. Members of the McCormick Center national Advisory Board will be examining ideas explored thus far and will contribute to the discussion.


Over the next year, the McCormick Center will continue to refine and clarify our understanding of early childhood program leadership. We hope this will lead to the development of a Whole Leadership framework which will add value to the field. We believe this is only the beginning of these efforts and encourage you to join us in the journey.

Mike Abel is the Director of Research and Evaluation at the McCormick Center for Early Childhood Leadership at National Louis University. His background is in early childhood program leadership, teacher education, and applied research. He has worked on a number of state and national projects related to systems development and highly vulnerable children and families. He served as the Missouri AEYC-MO President and as a member of the NAEYC Affiliate Council Executive Committee.

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The AI-Enabled Administrator: Reclaim Valuable Time

By Dr. Neal Green • February 8, 2026
Tools: Gemini Gems, NotebookLM, Perplexity Spaces Overview The evidence is clear that early childhood professionals' most significant challenge is a lack of time. Artificial Intelligence (AI) tools, when used strategically, can give administrators some of the time they desperately need, allowing them to focus more on their staff and the children and families in their care. This approach aligns with the foundational goal of strengthening leadership effectiveness and program impact (Abel, Talan, & Masterson, 2023). When I scan the AI landscape of available products and platforms, it becomes overwhelming. There are so many options that it is impossible to keep up with every new development. Focusing on a limited number of AI tools backed by organizations with strong infrastructure and fiscal stability is a wise place to start your AI journey. McCormick Institute for Early Childhood’s (MIEC’s) upcoming professional development sessions will focus on three AI tools. These include Gemini Gems, NotebookLM, and Perplexity Spaces. Think of Gemini Gems as your customized AI assistant that you "train" to follow your rules and meet your goals. Gemini Gems are the right tool to tackle Internal Operations . NotebookLM is perfect for creating Family Support resources that stick. NotebookLM is a powerful AI tool that uses only the documents or other resources you add to generate specific, focused output. Perplexity Spaces is a fantastic choice to address Marketing demands. Like many AI tools, you can toggle back and forth between open web searches and focused documents that are specific to your work. Gemini Gems: The “Specialist Teammate” Gemini Gems allow you to create templates you can use repeatedly for agendas, HR policies, and more. If you have used AI in the past, you know that writing an effective prompt takes time, and they can easily get "lost" if you use AI often. Gems removes that challenge and lets you save your most effective prompts without having to rewrite them every time you use Gemini. It is up to you to decide if you want to create several smaller Gems to tackle common challenges you face or create larger Gems that encompass large swaths of your work. For our purposes, we will focus our Gem work on Internal Operations, addressing Program Administration Scale (PAS) Item 9: Internal Communications (Talan & Bloom, 2011). Imagine using a Gem to turn messy staff meeting notes into professional minutes with clear action plans in minutes or less! NotebookLM: The "Walled Garden" NotebookLM is an excellent tool for Family Support for your center, addressing PAS Item 17: Family Support and Involvement (Talan & Bloom, 2011). After uploading documents and resources, such as your parent handbook or community referral lists, to your Notebook, you can create several resources that parents/guardians of your center students will love. Just a few of the impressive features available with NotebookLM include audio (podcast) summaries, video summaries, and reporting functions with templates or the option to create your own report with metrics that matter most to you. Perplexity Spaces: The "Research Librarian" Perplexity Spaces is a perfect AI partner for Marketing your early childhood education (ECE) program, addressing PAS Item 18: External Communications (Talan & Bloom, 2011). You can build your own centralized repository, with control over branding to ensure consistency and present a professional, current image. Adding specific instructions to your space eliminates the need to format documents constantly and saves valuable time. The consistency that a Perplexity Space offers in this regard allows you to upload messages that are the "voice” of your brand. Your marketing efforts are not only more aesthetically pleasing but also enable you to track trends at similar centers in your area, helping you assess the competition. Strategies for Success: Audit your Internal Communications: Identify one repetitive task, such as creating staff meeting agendas (PAS Item 9), and automate it with a Gemini Gem. Curate your Family Resources: Gather three to five existing documents to "feed" a NotebookLM project for more responsive family support (PAS Item 17). Standardize your Brand: Use a Perplexity Space to ensure all public relations tools project a consistent, professional image (PAS Item 18). Reflection Questions: Which administrative task takes the most time away from your interactions with staff and families? How might centralizing marketing materials (branding) impact the professional image to prospective families? Table 1: AI Tools for ECE Professionals
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