- Early Learning Career Pathways Initiative: Credentialing in the Early Care and Education Field PDF (15MB)
The Office of Early Learning (OEL) is the principal office charged with supporting the Department’s Early Learning Initiative with the goal of improving the health, social-emotional, and cognitive outcomes for children from birth through third grade, so that all children, particularly those with high needs, are on track for graduating from high school college- and career-ready.
OEL is headed by a Deputy Assistant Secretary who reports directly to the Assistant Secretary for Elementary and Secondary Education and advises the Assistant Secretary, Deputy Assistant Secretaries, and other top officials of the Department on policy and administrative issues related to early learning.
In administering the programs assigned to it, OEL establishes cooperative relationships with other Departmental Principal Offices and with other Federal agencies and governmental and nongovernmental organizations as appropriate. For example, OEL jointly administers the Race to the Top – Early Learning Challenge grants with the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Currently, OEL oversees the following grant programs:
The purpose of the Race to the Top-Early Learning Challenge (RTT-ELC) program is to improve the quality of early learning and close the achievement gap for children with high needs. The RTT-ELC grant program focuses on improving early learning for young children by supporting States’ efforts to increase the number and percentage of children from low-income families and disadvantaged children in each age group of infants, toddlers, and preschoolers enrolled in high-quality early learning programs and designing and implementing an integrated system of high-quality early learning programs and services.
The Preschool Development Grants competition supports States to (1) build or enhance a preschool program infrastructure that would enable the delivery of high-quality preschool services to children, and (2) expand high-quality preschool programs in targeted communities that would serve as models for expanding preschool to all 4-year-olds from low- and moderate-income families. These grants would lay the groundwork to ensure that more States are ready to participate in the Preschool for All formula grant initiative proposed by the Administration.
This program offers grants to support local family literacy projects that integrate early childhood education, adult literacy (adult basic and secondary-level education and instruction for English language learners), parenting education, and interactive parent and child literacy activities for low-income families with parents who are eligible for services under the Adult Education and Family Literacy Act and their children from birth through age 7. Teen parents and their children from birth through age 7 also are eligible. All participating families must be those most in need of program services.
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The program supports the development of early childhood centers of excellence that focus on all areas of development, especially on the early language, cognitive, and pre-reading skills that prepare children for continued school success and that serve primarily children from low-income families.
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The purpose is to promote school readiness and improved learning outcomes of young children by providing high quality professional development programs to improve the knowledge and skills of early childhood educators and caregivers who work in early childhood programs located in high-poverty communities and who serve primarily children from low-income families.
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Who May Apply: (specifically) These consolidated grants are limited to the insular areas (American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the U.S. Virgin Islands).
The No Child Left Behind Act amended the Department of Education Act to require the Department to establish the ‘Coordinator for the Outlying Areas’ position. School Support and Rural Programs currently employs the Departments Coordinator for the Outlying Areas, who: (1) serves as the principal advisor to the Department on Federal matters affecting the outlying areas; (2) evaluates, on a periodic basis, the needs of education programs in the outlying areas; (3) assists with the coordination of programs that serve the outlying areas; and (4) provides guidance to programs within the Department that serve the outlying areas.
As used in this section, the term outlying areas includes Guam, the Virgin Islands, American Samoa, and the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianas Islands, but does not include the Freely Associated States of the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, and the Republic of Palau.
Please visit the What Works Clearinghouse (WWC) to search for additional resources and research on effective literacy practices.
This SRCL National Performance Report explores the implementation and outcomes for the 2014–15 grant performance year. To read the full report, click on The FY 2016 SRCL National Performance Report.
The Striving Readers Comprehensive Literacy (SRCL) program is authorized as part of the FY 2010 Consolidated Appropriations Act (Pub. L. No. 111-117) under the Title I demonstration authority (Part E, Section 1502 of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). Through the Act, Congress provided $200 million for a comprehensive literacy development and education program to advance literacy skills for students from birth through grade 12.
Formula grants were awarded to State Education Agencies (SEAs) and other entities to establish or support a Literacy Team with expertise in literacy development and education for children from birth to grade 12 to assist in developing a comprehensive literacy plan aligned with their system-wide academic content standards to advance pre-literacy, reading and writing skills of children and youth. Forty-seven SEAs, the District of Columbia, the Bureau of Indian Education, Virgin Islands, American Samoa, Guam and Mariana Islands each developed a Comprehensive Literacy Plan.
Below are the State Profile Plans that supports development of comprehensive literacy plans for SEAs, BIE and Outlying Areas that receive discretionary grants or set-aside awards.*
*Plans developed with SRCL SEA discretionary or set-aside grant funds to BIE and Outlying Areas.
Alaska MS Word (126K) |
Montana MS Word (192K) |
Alabama MS Word (133K) |
North Carolina MS WORD (190K) |
Arizona MS Word (134K) |
North Dakota MS Word (195K) |
Bureau of Indian Education MS Word (203K) |
Nebraska MS Word (187K) |
California MS Word (192K) |
New Hampshire MS Word (199K) |
Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands MS Word (189K) |
New Jersey MS Word (185K) |
Colorado MS Word (218K) |
New Mexico MS Word (196K) |
Connecticut MS Word (223K) |
New York MS Word (194K) |
District of Columbia MS Word (219K) |
Nevada MS Word (194K) |
Florida MS Word (189K) |
Ohio MS Word (191K) |
Georgia MS Word (190K) |
Oklahoma MS Word (196K) |
Guam MS Word (196K) |
Oregon MS Word (199K) |
Iowa MS Word (186K) |
Pennsylvania MS Word (197K) |
Idaho MS Word (185K) |
Rhode Island MS Word (189K) |
Indiana MS Word (189K) |
South Carolina MS Word (195K) |
Kansas MS Word (187K) |
Tennessee MS Word (192K) |
Kentucky MS Word (188K) |
Texas MS Word (191K) |
Louisiana MS Word (196K) |
Utah MS Word (192K) |
Massachusetts MS Word (195K) |
Vermont MS Word (191K) |
Maine MS WORD (189K) |
Virgin Islands MS Word (192K) |
Michigan MS Word (186K) |
Virginia MS Word (192K) |
Minnesota MS Word (192K) |
Washington MS Word (194K) |
Missouri MS Word (187K) |
Wisconsin MS Word (194K) |
Mississippi MS Word (190K) |
Wyoming MS Word (192K) |
The Preschool Development Grant Birth through Five (PDG B-5) program is a $250 million competitive federal grant designed to improve states’ early childhood systems by building upon existing federal, state, and local early care and learning investments. PDG B-5 was established in 2015 through the bipartisan Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA), which reauthorized the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). While funding for these programs is appropriated to the Department of Health and Human services (HHS), these programs are jointly administered by HHS and the U.S Department of Education (ED).
The PDG B-5 grant seeks to empower state governments to better leverage federal, state and local early care and education investments. States are not to create another early childhood program, but rather help coordinate early childhood programs and services that already exist in the state according to the identified needs of the state
Comprehensive Centers – provide technical assistance services focused on the implementation of reform programs.
Florida & Islands Comprehensive Center
Educational Testing Service
Dr. Alice Lindsay, Director
1000 North Ashley Drive, Suite 312
Tampa, FL 33602
Phone: 1-800-756-9003
*Serves the Virgin Islands.
Pacific Region Comprehensive Center
Pacific Resources for Education and Learning
Melly Wilson, Director
1136 Union Mall, PH 1A
Honolulu, HI 96813
Phone: 1-808-441-1363
*Serves American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Guam.
Equity Assistance Centers– provide technical assistance services in the areas of race, gender, national origin, and religion to public school districts to promote equal educational opportunities.
Mid-Atlantic Equity Consortium
5272 River Road, Suite 340
Bethesda, MD 20816
Ms. Susan Shaffer, Director
<!–>Dr. Gail Sunderman, Director
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PH: 301-657-7741
F: 301-657-8742
*Serves the Virgin Islands.
Metropolitan State University of Denver
P.O. Box 173362, Campus Box 63
Denver, CO 80217-3362
Dr. Jan Perry Evenstad, Director
PH: 303-556-6065
F: 303-556-3912
*Serves American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, and Guam.
Who May Apply: (specifically) These grants are limited to the Insular Areas: (American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, and the U.S. Virgin Islands)