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Credible research is the foundation of the Children's Institute's work. Scroll down for a list of our research publications.
Visit our online Resource Center for access to research from other leading sources.
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Is Oregon Ready to Learn? |
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Improving Oregon's Kindergarten Readiness Survey
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 Assessments of school readiness, when done correctly, are useful planning tools. Assessing children as they enter kindergarten allows policy-makers to identify and respond to achievement gaps and communities to determine whether children are prepared for success in school. Well-designed assessments help public officials direct resources effectively and efficiently. On the other hand, poorly designed or poorly administered assessments - even if inexpensive - are not a good use of public resources.
As Oregon and the nation move toward comprehensive data systems that track the education of children from birth through college, now is the time to re-engineer Oregon's kindergarten readiness survey to provide Oregonians - policy-makers in particular - a useful tool for measuring school readiness. |
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Parent Perspectives on the First Five Years |
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Strategy for School Success
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 To ensure the perspective of low-income parents is reflected in its public policy agenda, the Children's Institute commissioned Davis, Hibbitts & Midghall to conduct four focus groups. The research has been designed to assess parents' understanding of and attitudes toward the first five years of their child's life, covering topics such as school readiness, child care, and preschool. Participants also discussed what barriers they face in getting what they need to make sure their children have a healthy start during their first five years of life.
Click here to view the appendices. |
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Investing in Young Kids = Investing in Their Teachers |
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Building Oregon's Early Education Workforce
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 Early childhood education is capturing the attention of policymakers and the public like never before. A growing body of research proves that quality early childhood education is crucial from birth to age five, when brain development is most dramatic. We know that the stimulation and security a child receives during these years has everything to do with cognitive, linguistic, and socio-emotional development -- in short: the ability to learn, engage, and be prepared for school success. As we increase our investments in early education, we must grow and strengthen our workforce of teachers and caregivers.
Better training, compensation, and support are essential for those who work in varied early childhood settings -- from the Head Start classroom teacher with a degree to the 18-year-old working as a teaching assistant in a local child care center to the mature caregiver who has raised two generations of healthy kids in a home-based program. When we give all of these teachers the tools to be better at what they do, we serve our children and build a stronger workforce for Oregon. |
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Investing in High Quality Pre-K: A Strategy for School Success |
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Issue Brief 2
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There is an urgent need to invest in early childhood education for the future of Oregon and its citizens. To be economically competitive, Oregon must produce more high school and college graduates and a more highly trained and skilled workforce. To accomplish this, we must ensure all children come to school ready to succeed.
The economic and scientific research is clear. Young children are hard-wired to learn from birth. We lose a vital opportunity if we do not help them succeed during the most critical window of brain development -- from 0-5. When we provide young children with a high quality pre-kindergarten experience and support their healthy development, their chances of succeeding in school and life increase tremendously. |
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Oregon Children's Budget Project |
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2000-2005
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 In 2005, the Children's Institute commissioned ECONorthwest to produce this Oregon Children's Budget. We asked ECONorthwest to answer the question: what federal, state and foundation spending is devoted to low-income children in Oregon? As basic as this question may seem, the answer to it was unknown with any detail before the publication of this report.
Our goal in asking this question and commissioning this report is to help decision-makers and the general public better understand how Oregon addresses the needs of low-income children, so that resources can be
allocated in a way that has the greatest possible benefit. The information in this report will serve as a baseline for comparing future spending and resource allocation.
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Early Childhood Development: Investing in Oregon's Economic Future |
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Issue Brief 1
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Building and sustaining a robust Oregon economy in the midst of intense global competition depends on a highly educated and skilled workforce. And yet, we are failing to invest in our future workers, parents, and citizens when we get the greatest return -- in the early years of life. Instead, we continue to direct limited resources to late stage treatments such as remedial education, jails, and public assistance -- we respond to crises instead of preventing them.
In the process, thousands of children have been robbed of reaching their potential to contribute to their community and the economy. We can still choose what kind of state we want to be. Now is the time to change our thinking and direct our scarce resources to those strategies that have achieved the greatest results. |
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