Project Description:
The purpose of this leadership application is to develop, implement, and evaluate a new doctoral training program in early childhood intervention (ECI) at the University of Connecticut (UConn) Neag School of Education. The ECI pedagogy which will form the foundation of the content of the doctoral program will reflect national personal preparation standards with a focus on high need children (because of poverty. The pedagogy will be applied to a series of leadership competencies aimed at preparing the doctoral students for faculty positions in higher education programs where they will teach early childhood intervention to students preparing for careers in early childhood intervention. The program will do this by providing learning opportunities that includes coursework, seminars, supervised internships and individual mentoring across the core responsibilities of higher education faculty: education, research, scholarship (e.g. writing for journals and books, presenting original work and research at state, regional, and national conferences; grant writing) and community engagement and outreach to improve intervention practice and policy. The competencies will result in products and outputs that will be measured as one aspect of program effectiveness. The doctoral students will participate in internships in personnel preparation (teaching and supervision), research projects (both participating on a funded projects and designing their own) and community engagement and outreach for practice and policy. This last area will be implemented through established partnerships in programs and agencies serving high need infants, families and families in high poverty urban schools districts in CT. Other internships will occur with state agencies and national organizations which also have partnered with the applicants of this proposal in the past.
