CAYL Institute engages over 100 US Principals to increase knowledge of early childhood development

From July 12-15, 2009, over 100 Principals and early education administrators attended the CAYL Institute's National Conference, entitled "Young Learners in America's Schools: What's in Your Toolkit?" This Conference was a result of three years of CAYL's intense work with elementary school Principals in Massachusetts who have pre-kindergarten programs in their schools, and the demand from other states for this type of training.

Principals from 12 other states and the District of Columbia joined their Boston colleagues for the Conference. The visiting principals hailed from Delaware, Iowa, Maryland, Michigan, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Washington, and Wisconsin.

For three days, the attendees participated in the hands on, interactive conference, which featured; presentations by national and local early education and care experts, workshops, and a trip to the Boston Children's Museum. The Conference also included site visits to high quality early childhood programs in Boston, Brookline, Somerville, and Cambridge.

While Principals were able to come together and meet their peers, the Conference did serve a larger purpose. According to Dr. Valora Washington, President of the CAYL Institute, "Principals are witnessing large numbers of children under five enrolling in schools. Our National Conference brought Principals together from across the nation to envision and plan how to make schools work well with very young children."

At the conclusion of the Conference, each attendee received a copy of CAYL's new Principals Toolkit. The Toolkit includes five promising practices that every Principal can use to support developmentally appropriate learning for young children.
These Toolkits are now available for sale on our website at http://www.cayl.org/PrincipalToolkit2009.

To view photos from the conference, click here.

To view a list of conference exhibitors, click here.