Accountability Matters
“If you do what you always did, you will get what you always got.” CEO of the NAACP, Yonkers, New York
In July 2006, the Early Childhood Education Cabinet adopted a set of goals for Connecticut’s young children and described them within a landmark document: Ready by Five, Fine by Nine: Connecticut’s Early Childhood Systems Framework. In November of 2006, the Governor’s Early Childhood Research and Policy Council published the first-ever multi-year business plan to resource this work.
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Beginning with babies born in 2006, all Connecticut young children will:
- Reach age appropriate developmental milestones, ages birth to five
- Enter kindergarten with the knowledge, skills and behaviors necessary for early school success
- Demonstrate mastery in reading by the beginning of the 4th grade.
41,789 babies were born in 2006. These young children will generally enter preschool in 2009 or 2010, enter kindergarten in 2011 and enter 4th grade in 2015.
Ready by Five, Fine by Nine (July 2006)
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Over the past three years, the Cabinet and the Council have been engaged in several major types of work to promote public accountability for our progress to meet these goals. That work has several major categories of work. See below:
RBA – Results Based Accountability: This section includes background information on the policy framework now in use in CT by the CT General Assembly’s Appropriations Committee to guide a new approach to results-oriented, data-driven fiscal decision making.
Data: This section provides information on data development, interoperability and reporting work. It includes information about Connecticut’s emerging Early Childhood Information System (ECIS) and also provides access and linkages to actual data findings.
Quality: This section includes information about the Cabinet’s Interim Preschool Quality Improvement Project, the Council’s work to develop our legislatively mandated Quality Rating and Improvement System, and other resources related to early childhood quality.
Funding: This section includes information about the Cabinet’s budget and includes links to a variety of resources related to funding and budget accountability at the federal and state levels. New links to reports on the 2009 federal stimulus funding are included.
Assessment: This section includes information about child assessment and program evaluation, including CT’s participating in the national Taking Stock Accountability and Assessment Project.
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