Author: Nelson Rosario

When the damage has already been done, a certain silence descends upon a statehouse. When Gov. Andy Beshear stood in front of the cameras in Frankfort, Kentucky, in early June 2026, he announced what months of legislative wrangling had finally resulted in: massive cuts to the Cabinet for Health and Family Services that affected Medicaid, foster care, temporary cash assistance, senior meals, and a variety of programs that assist the state’s most vulnerable children and families. A Republican supermajority approved the budget, but it was $691 million less than what the agency had asked for. Instead, almost $290 million was…

A specific type of academic lecture alters how entire fields communicate with themselves, but it doesn’t make headlines. Several of those have been given by Ingrid Pramling Samuelsson, a senior professor at the University of Gothenburg. However, one recurring theme in her recent work has been more difficult to ignore than the others: the persistent, fact-based insistence that the world’s youngest children should be included in the discussion of climate justice and that it cannot be restricted to adults. At climate summits, this is not the kind of assertion that is met with applause. It has a gentle tone. After…

Reading a progress report that primarily details the lack of progress is extremely unsettling. The most recent cycle of UNICEF’s Countdown to 2030 country profiles, which cover 198 countries, accomplishes just that. They describe in great detail how far the world still needs to go in providing mothers, newborns, kids, and teenagers with basic health interventions. 2030 is the deadline. 2026 is listed on the calendar. To be honest, the data reads like a slow-motion reckoning. In partnership with the Nurturing Care for Early Childhood Development Technical Working Group, the Countdown to 2030 initiative has been monitoring reproductive, maternal, newborn,…

Once you hear a certain number, it sticks in your memory. For each child under five, the federal government spends about $2,500 annually on child care and early education. That is roughly 50% of the average for Europe. It is less than the investments made by 32 other developed countries. And it comes to a nation where families already pay about $15,000 a year for private full-time childcare, sometimes more, depending on the zip code and whether you’re fortunate enough to find a spot at all. No one in Washington seems eager to do the math aloud, even though it’s…

A woman with a bachelor’s degree, a classroom full of three-year-olds, and a salary that wouldn’t cover rent in most mid-sized cities are all examples of the kind of absurdity that lurks quietly inside the American educational system. She works as a Head Start instructor. The parking lot attendant across the street frequently earns more money for a job that doesn’t require a degree or any credentials other than a current driver’s license. For years, that comparison has been made in education circles, typically with a tone of weary disbelief. However, it endures because it is still true. In order…

There’s a particular kind of irony in walking through an early education technology expo and noticing that the most engaged children aren’t the ones tapping screens. They’re the ones scribbling with fat crayons on butcher paper, fingers smeared with paint, completely absorbed. The booths with the sleekest tablets draw crowds of adults. The messy corner with the paper and glue draws the kids. It’s possible that tells us more than any product demo ever could. The push to digitize early childhood classrooms has been relentless for over a decade. School districts across the United States and Europe, pressured by parents…

There is an odd development in Illinois education. The youngest children, the three and four-year-olds sitting cross-legged on alphabet rugs in underfunded classrooms, don’t seem to care that the state keeps writing larger checks for its schools and lawmakers keep discussing priorities. The National Institute for Early Education Research recently released a report that put it simply: despite an increase in overall education spending, Illinois’ efforts to increase preschool access have stagnated. It’s the kind of disconnect that, until you look at the numbers, seems unthinkable. With sincere aspirations, Governor JB Pritzker established Smart Start Illinois in 2023 with the…

In southeast Washington, D.C., there is a playground that has been a part of a Head Start center since the early 1970s. The chain-link fence surrounding the yard appears to be original, but the swings are more recent, having been replaced perhaps five years ago. One wall is covered in a faded mural of kids holding hands. Three and four-year-olds eat breakfast provided by the program while seated in tiny chairs inside. Since 1965, this scene has appeared in different forms about 40 million times. Last year, Head Start celebrated its 60th anniversary. Depending on who you ask, it was…

In Ypsilanti, Michigan, a classroom has been empty since the late 1960s. With its low ceilings, linoleum floors, and public school architecture that denotes modest aspirations, the building where the Perry Preschool Project formerly operated appears unremarkable. However, what transpired within those walls between 1962 and 1967 sparked a series of investigations that Nobel laureate James Heckman would later refer to as one of the most important discoveries in contemporary economics. Between seven and twelve dollars have been returned to society for every dollar spent on that small preschool program for underprivileged children ages three and four. Not emotionally. in…

In a lab at the University of Washington, infants sit inside a brain scanner that resembles a helmet and wave their arms while a researcher coos at them in that distinctive high-pitched voice that parents unconsciously adopt. The combination of state-of-the-art magnetoencephalography equipment and the erratic wriggling of a five-month-old seems almost comical. However, the information flowing from those sessions has begun to change how parents, educators, and legislators view the first few months of human communication. The study, which came from UW’s Institute for Learning & Brain Sciences, or I-LABS, monitored the brain activity of infants in two straightforward…