These 15-minute In-service Suites are a professional development resource for staff in busy, active early childhood centers and programs. They are organized around one topic or big idea and address effective teaching and assessment practices.

Career development reflects an individual’s vision, goals, motivation, and approaches to learning. It addresses the possibility of an overall career path as opposed to focusing only on the current job.

The e-Catalogue offers professional development resources in a variety of formats. Program management teams and others may use them to create staff training and development opportunities. Depending upon your design, format, and instructional objectives, these resources offer a centerpiece for creating your professional development experience.

The Centers of Excellence Program was established as part of the Improving Head Start for School Readiness Act of 2007. Funding was first appropriated for fiscal year (FY) 2006. Applicants were each nominated by the governor of his or her state. To qualify for the nomination, the Head Start and Early Head Start programs had to serve as exemplary models for other programs by implementing comprehensive, innovative, and targeted approaches to enhance program services.

The Early Childhood Learning Community (ECLC) was developed by the University of Cincinnati to offer an online early childhood associate degree to early childhood teachers and Head Start and Early Head Start staff who were unable to access a campus-based program. In 2005, the ECLC decided to build upon their success by using Head Start Innovative and Improvement grant funds (IIP). A new bilingual/Spanish distance learning degree program was created to specifically target Migrant/Head Start teachers whose first language is Spanish. Head Start program managers can learn from this case study how one university succeeded in broadening the academic opportunities for English/Spanish-speaking early childhood teachers as well as Head Start and Early Head Start staff.