Program Office: Student Achievement and School Accountability Programs

CFDA Number: 84.349A
Program Type: Discretionary/Competitive Grants

The purpose is to promote school readiness and improved learning outcomes of young children by providing high quality professional development programs to improve the knowledge and skills of early childhood educators and caregivers who work in early childhood programs located in high-poverty communities and who serve primarily children from low-income families.

These professional development programs must provide primarily research-based training that will improve early childhood pedagogy and will further young children’s language and literacy skills to prevent them from encountering reading difficulties when they enter school.

The program purpose is to enhance the school readiness of young children, particularly disadvantaged young children. In an attempt to prevent young children from encountering reading difficulties once they enter school, the program seeks to improve the knowledge and skills of early childhood educators who work in communities that have high concentrations of children living in poverty. In particular, projects must utilize evidence-based practice focused on early reading and cognitive development for both the professional development activities and early childhood curricula.

Furthermore, the program authorizes project partnerships to include an entity with demonstrated experience in providing training to educators in early childhood education programs concerning identifying and preventing behavior problems or working with children identified as or suspected to be victims of abuse. Allowable activities include, among others, professional development to familiarize early childhood educators with the application of recent research on child language and literary development and professional development on working with children who have special needs, such as those who are limited English proficient.