Early Childhood Jewish Education Summit

Early childhood Jewish education is on the tipping point. There are consultation services for JCCA affiliated schools, USCJ, and URJ programs. There is support for Chabad schools and a Jewish Montessori contingent. We have the National Jewish Early Childhood Network which is associated with NAEYC and NAJECS (National Association of Jewish Early Childhood Specialist- directors of early childhood services at central agencies of Jewish education. We have new higher education certificates and degrees out of Gratz and Hebrew College. And we have the Alliance, a membership organization where all of these groups can get together and share information. It seems we have a lot of services and support, and we do. But we also have a lot of challenges facing us. New challenges.

We don't have a central address anymore with CAJE's closing. We don't have a place where we can all come together at a conference and study, share and grow together. We don't have a professional journal. We don't have a central advocacy organization or voice fighting for early childhood Jewish education on the national and local level. We have UPK at our back door. States are requiring BA degrees for all early childhood educators. There are new demands on directors and teachers.

On June 29th, professionals addressing early childhood and family education will be meeting at the JCCA in NYC to discuss the state of the field and options we have for providing support for our professionals and advocacy for the field. Please join us in person, on the phone, or check back here as we will be sharing the deliberations on this blog. If you can't attend, please feel free to comment on your concerns and ideas on how we can maintain our professionals and continue to grow professionally.