CHILD CARE QUALITY AND TEACHER-CHILD INTERACTIONS
Deborah Cassidy: Ongoing research on the relationship between teacher-child relationships and child care quality
Karen LaParo: My research focuses on observed quality in early childhood classrooms. I have been involved in several national studies of state-funded pre-k programs and continue to work these large data bases to examine questions related to continuity and stability of children's early childhood education experiences. I co-authored the CLASS, a classroom based observations system that focuses on 3 broad domains of classroom quality, emotional support, classroom organization, and instructional support. Currently I am involved in a study of Head Start and pre-k teachers and classroom quality in Guilford County using the CLASS to classroom practices.
Marion O'Brien: I have done extensive work in the area of child care quality both as an investigator for the NICHD Study of Early Child Care & Youth Development and in developing new measures for assessing quality in child care.
Catherine Scott-Little: I study evaluations of school readiness programs to determine the relationships between quality early care and education programming and child outcomes.