Nicole B. Adams

As the United States becomes increasingly diverse, the disparity in practitioner representation that mirrors the salient backgrounds of the children and families they are supporting continues. In special education, federal law mandates that families be involved as team members when they have a child with a disability, with a stronger focus on family-professional partnerships (FPPs) in the early childhood years. Given the mandate for and benefits of strong FPPs coupled with practitioners not reflecting the linguistic, ethnic, and cultural backgrounds of the families with whom they are ethically responsible for partnering, there is a need to provide guidance on culturally responsive practices to early childhood practitioners. In this qualitative study, we analyzed interdisciplinary standards and documents that support early education practitioner preparation and practice to partner with families. We used an inductive content analysis to identify focal categories including communication, understanding families’ backgrounds, and self-awareness. Implications for future research and practice are discussed.

Refugee families are not a homogeneous group. Their experiences navigating early childhood education (ECE) and early childhood special education (ECSE), particularly family-professional partnerships (FPPs), may vary based on their intersectional identities (e.g., race, language, disability status). In this iterative qualitative study, we explored early childhood educators’ perspectives on FPPs with refugee families of children who have disabilities or are at increased risk of being identified with disabilities. Specifically, we examined how the intersectional identities of both refugee families and educators influenced their partnerships. Nine early educators participated in two rounds of semi-structured interviews and completed demographic forms. Findings revealed how early educators perceived refugee families’ intersecting identities as influencing FPPs and how these educators’ own identities shaped their approaches to partnerships. In this study, we contribute to the limited literature on the role of intersectional identities in FPPs with refugee families. Implications for future research, policy, and administrative practice are discussed.

Background: To identify the mental health care needs of resettled refugees, researchers have studied the perspectives of mental health service providers but have paid limited attention to the perspectives of individuals who work directly in resettlement agencies or in agencies that exclusively provide services to promote refugees’ self-sufficiency and integration—the refugee resettlement workforce—who routinely provide support, make referrals, and coordinate mental health care. To better inform programming and service delivery, this qualitative case study focuses on the perspectives of the resettlement workforce. Methods: Focus group interviews conducted with 48 refugee resettlement workforce members were analyzed for their perspectives on refugee mental health needs and care. Results: Thematic analysis revealed that their perspectives centered on barriers to (i.e., resettlement challenges, notions about mental illness, stigma associated with mental illness, inadequate access to mental health care, and limited technology literacy) and facilitators of (i.e., promoting mental health literacy, addressing stigma, providing specific and targeted training, mental health coordination, allies, and building programming capacity) refugee mental health care. A set of recommendations to minimize barriers and promote facilitators is presented. Conclusions: These findings corroborate previous research and inform the practices, programs, and policies that should be developed and implemented to support refugees’ mental health wellbeing, self-sufficiency, and community integration post-resettlement.

The number of refugees displaced internationally and entering the United States (U.S.) continues to rise, with recent U.S. refugee arrivals recovering past pre-pandemic numbers. Upon resettlement in the U.S., refugees have access to resettlement staff support, including the support of education case managers (ECMs) who often support refugees resettling with children with disabilities. Many families with children with disabilities experience marginalizing systems, but the intersectional identities of refugee families with children with disabilities compounds the impact of systems that marginalize families with children with disabilities. This study utilized semi-structured interviews from a bio-ecological approach to explore what facilitated and impeded ECMs support of refugee families with young children with disabilities. Nine ECMs, located across the U.S., participated in the study. Participants identified two themes related to barriers and facilitators: (1) responsiveness of schools and agencies, and (2) professional factors. The study highlighted systemic barriers that impacted ECMs’ opportunities to support refugee families to access special education supports, as well as facilitators, such as resettlement agency staff conducting developmental screenings to monitor children’s progress. ECMs also described how their limited understanding of special education contributed to their abilities to support refugee families in gaining access and advocating for their child’s needs. This study provides additional research about approaches, policies, and practices of resettlement agencies and educational systems that can support or impede refugee children’s access to special education supports. Additionally, this study highlights implications to support ECMs’ knowledge of special education and changes to policies to further support refugee families with young children.

In this systematic literature review, we examined which caregivers were represented within caregiver-focused studies in three top-tier early childhood special education journals: Infants & Young Children, Journal of Early Intervention, and Topics in Early Childhood Special Education . The purpose of this review was to highlight where the field can shift toward a more representative and inclusive body of research-based literature and guidance for practitioners. We reviewed 115 articles. The results indicate that most studies (1) were conducted with White mothers with high-school diplomas or GEDs, (2) included an English-only or English-dominant approach with caregiver participants, and (3) had limited income data and context of the included incomes, thus informing the field that there is a need to interpret studies from a lens of who was included as well as conduct research with a more inclusive, intentional lens when seeking participants. We share specific directions for future research.

This study aimed to further the understanding of transactional relationships that exist between problem behaviors and academic performance in early childhood. Early academic and behavior difficulties increase the risk of school disengagement, academic failure, and dropout. Although children’s academic and behavioral difficulties have been shown to be intercorrelated, little research has focused on how the relationship reciprocates and progresses in early childhood. This study investigated how problem behaviors (i.e., externalizing and internalizing) influence and are influenced by academic performance (i.e., poor reading and math) from kindergarten to third grade. Participants included 18,135 students (51.22% boys) derived from a nationally representative sample in the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten Class of 2011 (ECLS-K: 2011). Teacher ratings of children’s internalizing (low self-esteem, anxiety, loneliness, or sadness) and externalizing (fighting, arguing, showing anger, impulsively acting, and disruptive behaviors) problem behaviors, as well as direct assessments of children’s academic performance (reading and math), were collected yearly. Cross-lagged panel modeling (CLPM) was employed to examine reciprocal relationships between problem behaviors and academic performance over time from kindergarten to third grade. The results supported the transactional relationships in early childhood, with higher externalizing as well as internalizing problem behaviors predicting lower academic performance and lower academic performance predicting higher externalizing and internalizing problem behaviors. The implications for research, prevention, and early intervention regarding the progression of academic and behavioral problems are discussed.

Challenging behavior (CB) is a common occurrence in early childhood and frequently occurs in young children with disabilities. CB is also culturally perceived and includes differences in how caregivers understand and define the topography of CB. Despite the cultural interpretation, CB is known to impact the child and their family but there has been little exploration of what marginalized caregivers perceive as the impact of the CB that their young children with disabilities exhibit. We used semi-structured interviews to explore the perceptions of 24 caregivers, who identified as Black, Mexican American, and White, about the impact of their child’s CB. Caregivers shared how the CB impacted themselves, their families, their child, and others. Although much of the impact was similar among caregivers, we discuss nuanced differences across ethnic groups.