[MUSIC PLAYING] SPEAKER 1: Have you noticed more challenges in the classroom lately? You're not imagining it. Research shows that children born during the pandemic are more likely to experience cognitive, language, and motor skill delays, as well as emotional and behavioral challenges. This means that many of our youngest learners need more support than ever in the classroom.
But this growing need comes at a time when our field is already in crisis. Early educators are facing a perfect storm. A 2024 NAEYC survey said that 46% of all respondents to the survey reported increased levels of burnout since January 2023. Fewer people are going into the field. And there is higher turnover, low wages with 43% of early childhood educators reporting that they are on public subsidies, including Medicaid and SNAP themselves.
And research reports limited training, materials, and human resources to meet children's growing needs. At the same time, we're seeing more intense behaviors in the classroom, often rooted in unaddressed mental health needs, due to a rise in early childhood chronic, toxic stress and adverse childhood experiences or trauma.
NORMA BELL: Once we returned into the classroom after COVID, we had a lot of behaviors. We had students who had difficulty focusing, attending. It's been really hard, just trying to balance the diverse needs of kids, not just one student, but a whole classroom of children who were coming in with-- I hate to use this word, but trauma. A lot of students were holding a lot of emotions in. And they did not know how to express themselves.
SPEAKER 1: This isn't new. In 2016, nearly 17,000 preschoolers were expelled in a single year. And that number has only grown. Unfortunately, Black boys and students with disabilities who exhibited challenging behaviors are disproportionately affected.
SPEAKER 2: Black preschoolers are three to four times more likely to be suspended than white and other non-Caucasian peers.
LAUREN WILLIAMS: We really struggle with behaviors that are bigger than what we've seen in the past where before that might be an outlier-- one or two kids in a year. But now, we're seeing more children who just don't respond well to transitions or limit setting.
Statistically, there are more Black and Brown boys who are recommended for services, receiving services, receiving more aggressive diagnoses. And what those do is they follow them, right? And they track through elementary school, which leads to lower test scores, which leads to the school to prison pipeline. And that's definitely a concern.
SPEAKER 1: Root causes of challenging behaviors and exclusionary discipline-- structural racism and inequitable school funding, limited access to early mental health support, gaps in trauma informed and culturally responsive training. Even with the best intentions, when educators don't have the support that they need to respond to challenging behaviors, exclusion becomes more likely.
This can lead to the preschool to prison pipeline, a pathway where young children, often due to harsh discipline or systemic inequality, are involuntarily pushed out of learning spaces. Children who experience exclusionary discipline are more likely to be involved with the justice system as adolescents and adults.
The good news? Change is happening. 29 states have policies to limit preschool suspension and expulsion, with full implementation in 18. But the no-exclusion policies aren't enough. What we truly need is an action-focused paradigm shift, one that supports children, educators, and families together to experience safe, secure, stable, nurturing educational spaces. This means--
SPEAKER 2: Behavior being recognized as an expression of need, not just being bad. Trauma-informed approach with full classroom wraparound support, not just direct support for children with IEPs or known trauma. Culturally responsive classrooms, including attunement to implicit and explicit bias, and frequent, sustained, family training and coaching, including action-oriented strategies that respond to attachment, insecurity, and intergenerational trauma.
Systems that care for both the child and the educator, including improved wages and educational resources. Increasing awareness for the general public and legislators about the state of early childhood education and the need for policy changes. Policies and funding supporting true, ground level, action-oriented changes, including lower student teacher ratios and increasing consistency and access to the same providers across the years that they will need services.
MILLIE GARCIA: My biggest fear is allowing one of them to slip through the cracks. I know this child needs help. But if this child needs help, this family needs help. So what goes hand in hand is helping parents understand you are capable, and you need to be an advocate, and you need to find time for you to secure yourself, so your child can be secure. This is one of my passions in life. And I truly believe I was put on this planet for this. I've been in Washington advocating for Head Start for preschoolers, for toddlers. I'll send letters to congresspeople.
NORMA BELL: It's a need for a program that would respond to the whole classroom. Because all those adults in a room does not present a calming atmosphere. It's very tense. And it can be stressful for teachers because we have our lessons. We have assessments we need to do in a classroom. You could have six support staff in there, working with students, taking away from an activity. Because other kids want to be around these adults. They want to sit next to them. They want to see what's going on.
So it could be pretty frustrating. But having a program that can meet the needs of all the students where we can all come together and work on various strategies-- that's going to help not only those one or two or three or four kids that really need it, but it'll help all the kids be on the same page, so they could support each other.
SPEAKER 1: Together, we can interrupt the pipeline before it begins.
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