Despite the fact that Blythe Hinitz has won numerous awards, they are not the first thing you notice about her career. It’s the endurance. In a nation that has never quite figured out what to do with its youngest children, 45 years of attending the same college in the same field. These days, that kind of perseverance is uncommon. Perhaps it was always the case.
In 2015, Exchange magazine named Hinitz, a professor of elementary and early childhood education at The College of New Jersey, one of just three people in the US to be named an Exceptional Master Leader. Out of a much larger pool, the Master Leaders Review Team identified 49 Exceptional Master Leaders. This may seem insignificant, but keep in mind how few people remain in early childhood education long enough to be regarded as masters of anything. The field is turbulent. It pays poorly. When it does come, the recognition is frequently delayed.
Reading her record gives the impression that Hinitz never really pursued any of it. In the 1970s, she oversaw TCNJ’s Day Care Management Minor, an almost unprecedented program that combined courses from business, nursing, and education. It now seems clear that managing a daycare might require knowledge from three different schools. Then, it wasn’t. Someone had to make the case, attend committee meetings, and convince administrators that it was worthwhile. Yes, she did.
Then there was Head Start. Hinitz served on the local CAP Board for forty years, overseeing the work and preserving the relationship between TCNJ and the federal program when other organizations allowed theirs to wane. It’s longer than most marriages—forty years. longer than the average career. It’s the kind of dedication that doesn’t look good in pictures but is very important to the families who receive it.
The only thorough history of the field published in the US is her co-authored book, History of Early Childhood Education. It’s worth pondering that statement. the sole one. There is only one thorough history book to consult in a nation where debates about pre-K funding, kindergarten readiness, and whether or not four-year-olds should be doing worksheets are ongoing. Hinitz wrote it because she thought—and continues to think—that the field is constantly changing. Her frustration is evident in the way she frames it. She has stated that understanding the past keeps us from repeating the same actions under the guise of innovation.
It’s difficult to ignore how global her work has become. She co-wrote the Anti-Bullying and Teasing Book for Preschool Classrooms, which has been translated into Spanish and Indonesian. She gave the keynote address on peace education in the twenty-first century at the First International Conference on Primary and Early Childhood Education in Bandung, Indonesia. She has worked with researchers in Goteborg, Bangkok, and Hong Kong. Because the questions are universal, the work travels. How can a child be taught not to harm other children? How can a classroom be created where differences are not penalized?
The other honors quickly mount up. In 2012, the New Jersey Secretary of Higher Education named him a Distinguished Professor. 2011 NAEYC Hero of Early Childhood Education. NAECTE named me an Outstanding Early Childhood Teacher Educator in 2007. One hundred living members are eligible to receive the lifetime Eleanor Roosevelt Honorary Chapter of Kappa Delta Pi. The list becomes hazy when you read it quickly. When you read it slowly, you’ll notice a pattern of people concluding that she had earned it once more year after year.
A list of honors is not as messy as what she leaves behind. It’s a model. If the term “blueprint” still has any meaning. Construct the less glamorous programs. Hold on for forty years. Write the book that no one else has ever written. When invited, visit Bandung. And continue to insist that the youngest children should have adults who truly know what they’re doing, despite all the noise surrounding education reform.
