Foundations for Teaching Excellence: Connectingearly Childhood Quality Rating, Professional Development, and Competency Systems in States: National Center for Research on Early Childhood Education

Dr. Halle is Codirector of Early Childhood Research at Child Trends. She oversees projects in Child Trendsa s Washington, D.C., office. She conducts research on childrena s early cognitive and social development, childrena s school readiness, family and community supports for school readiness, and school characteristics associated with ongoing achievement and positive development. Her recent work focuses on early literacy development among children who are English language learners and evaluations of early childhood curricula, programs, and professional development aimed at supporting childrena s school readiness. Carollee Howes, Ph.D., is the director of the Center for Improving Child Care Quality, Department of Education, and a professor of the Applied Developmental Psychology doctorate program at the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr. Howes is an internationally recognized developmental psychologist focusing on children's social and emotional development. She has served as a principal investigator on a number of seminal studies in early child care and preschool education, including the National Child Care Staffing Study; the Family and Relative Care Study; the Cost, Quality, and Outcomes Study; and the National Study of Child Care in Low Income Families.Dr. Howes has been active in public policy for children and families in California as well as across the United States. Her research focuses on children's experiences in child care, their concurrent and long-term outcomes from child care experiences, and child care quality and efforts to improve child care quality. Dr. Howes is the editor of "Teaching 4- to 8-Year-Olds: Literacy, Math, Multiculturalism, and Classroom Community" (Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2003) and the coeditor of "The Promise of Pre-K" (Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2009) and "Foundations for Teaching Excellence: Connecting Early Childhood Quality Rating, Professional Development, and Competency Systems in States" (Paul H. Brookes Publishing Co., 2011). Alison Lutton, M.Ed., Senior Director of Higher Education Accreditation and Program Support, National Association for the Education of Young Children, 1313 L Street NW, Suite 500, Washington, DC 20005. Ms. Lutton's 30-year career in early childhood education includes direct work with children and families, consulting, community college faculty, and administrative positions. She has 20 years of experience in the development of early childhood professional standards and accreditation systems. Dr. Martinez-Beck coordinates the work of the child care research team at the Office of Planning, Research and Evaluation (OPRE), developing the child care policy research agenda, managing large research projects, and representing OPRE and the child care policy research perspective in diverse federal interagency research work groups. Prior to joining The Administration for Children and Families, Dr. Martinez-Beck held a Society for Research in Child Development Executive Branch Policy Fellowship with the Child Care Bureau where she was involved in designing a research agenda to answer policy-relevant questions for Child Care and Development Fund State Administrators and other key stakeholders. A recent focus of her work has been on issues related to the quality of early care and education settings and links to young children's developmental outcomes. Robert C. Pianta, Ph.D., is Dean of the Curry School of Education, Director of the Center for Advanced Study in Teaching and Learning and Novartis U.S. Foundation Professor of Education at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville. A former special education teacher, Dr. Pianta is a developmental, school, and clinical child psychologist whose work focuses on assessment and improvement of teacher-student interactions and their role in fostering children's learning and development. Dr. Pianta"