Nebraska Extension PD Specialist Presentation

Linda Reddish Author

08/24/2022 Added

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This video provides a short overview of Nebraska Extension's role guiding the recruitment, expansion, and extension of PD Specialist to support CDA Candidates.

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[00:00:01.170]Hi, everyone.
[00:00:02.370]My name is Linda Reddish,
[00:00:05.400]and I am an early childhood Extension educator
[00:00:09.900]with the University of Nebraska,
[00:00:12.960]serving in our Extension program area.
[00:00:17.910]I'm also a PDS specialist.
[00:00:21.690]My specializations are infant, toddler, preschool,
[00:00:27.600]family home visitors, and family childcare.
[00:00:31.770]I'm here today to talk to you a little bit
[00:00:33.900]about why PD specialists are so important
[00:00:37.500]in the state of Nebraska
[00:00:39.480]when we consider looking at the CDA pathway
[00:00:43.530]from beginning to end.
[00:00:54.480]So Nebraska Extension
[00:00:56.370]has always had a pretty significant commitment
[00:00:59.940]in supporting the lives of young children.
[00:01:05.010]Part of what we do is
[00:01:06.150]we really look at the demographics of our state.
[00:01:09.060]And over the years, the number of young children,
[00:01:12.630]meaning specifically birth through age five,
[00:01:16.170]who are in an alternative care
[00:01:17.790]setting outside of the home has increased.
[00:01:20.910]No surprise Nebraska has
[00:01:22.650]one of the highest working percentages
[00:01:25.230]of a two-parent working household.
[00:01:28.320]So as cooperative extension, we say,
[00:01:30.997]"What's our link here
[00:01:32.010]since we're a higher education system?"
[00:01:34.560]Well, Nebraska Extension
[00:01:38.460]is the Cooperative State Research,
[00:01:40.800]Education, and Extension Services.
[00:01:43.260]We're an extension agency, which means specifically
[00:01:46.500]that we have a responsibility
[00:01:49.440]to extend the research and education
[00:01:54.000]of our state land-grant based university,
[00:01:57.180]which is the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.
[00:02:00.870]Many people are familiar
[00:02:02.880]that Extension provides a lot of support to the ag field.
[00:02:06.900]However, we also provide pretty extensive services
[00:02:10.230]when it comes to nutrition education,
[00:02:12.030]healthcare, businesses,
[00:02:14.520]and yes, early childhood development.
[00:02:18.570]We really like to call ourselves the informal outreach arm
[00:02:22.650]of the university.
[00:02:24.510]We like to think of ourselves as that bridge,
[00:02:27.120]helping to really translate research
[00:02:29.730]into education, action,
[00:02:32.190]and in early childhoods case, practice.
[00:02:36.960]Many of our educators work directly
[00:02:40.830]with those who are providing the care and education
[00:02:43.170]of our young children.
[00:02:44.370]It's really the focus of our work, the workforce.
[00:02:48.570]We have an early childhood educator serving
[00:02:53.220]across all of our 93 counties
[00:02:55.470]because we live there.
[00:02:57.300]Each of our educators are stationed throughout the state
[00:03:00.330]to help ensure that each county in Nebraska
[00:03:03.420]has access to the resources they might need
[00:03:06.030]to support early childhood efforts
[00:03:07.980]in their particular region.
[00:03:11.490]So why do we do this?
[00:03:13.710]We know there's a rural childcare shortage.
[00:03:16.320]We wanna see Nebraska Extension be that bridge
[00:03:18.810]specifically by working
[00:03:20.250]with the Nebraska Department of Education's Office
[00:03:22.650]of Early Childhood
[00:03:23.940]to really strengthen Nebraska's career advancements
[00:03:28.380]and professionalism pathways.
[00:03:31.620]We like to ask ourselves
[00:03:32.730]why might be impacting childcare provider's ability
[00:03:35.670]to attain resources, skills or the knowledge
[00:03:38.880]to effectively serve Nebraska's families.
[00:03:42.840]And that's why our approach is
[00:03:44.940]to really do needs assessments.
[00:03:47.190]And in a little bit,
[00:03:48.090]I'll talk about how our interdisciplinary approach
[00:03:50.880]really helped us set the foundation
[00:03:54.150]to explore the groundwork
[00:03:55.890]for CDA programming efforts.
[00:04:00.390]What we discovered when we looked at the needs assessment
[00:04:04.320]was that we had some active PD specialists in Nebraska
[00:04:09.000]at the time of 2019
[00:04:10.800]when we first did this data request,
[00:04:13.590]there was only 32.
[00:04:15.780]However, only a handful of those 32 were publicly available.
[00:04:22.680]So what does that mean
[00:04:23.850]for those who are trying to access a PD specialist
[00:04:27.750]to complete their CDA pathway?
[00:04:30.150]Well, they didn't have access to a PD specialist
[00:04:35.760]who could actually come and do their verification visit.
[00:04:40.380]Now, as Extension educators,
[00:04:42.690]we were really able to confirm some of those local issues.
[00:04:45.840]We had childcare providers coming into our office saying,
[00:04:49.027]"Yeah, I'm struggling to finalize my CDA
[00:04:52.260]because no one's responding to me
[00:04:53.910]when I've sent a request to get a PD specialist."
[00:04:58.110]Others said, "I'm having a hard time
[00:04:59.670]finding those 120 clock hours
[00:05:02.130]in specific subject areas, like professionalism."
[00:05:06.960]Really, the big thing we learned though
[00:05:09.450]was that outside of the metro area, there was a huge gap.
[00:05:16.560]As you can see on this map,
[00:05:19.020]once we kind of looked at,
[00:05:20.640]yes, there's gaps here
[00:05:22.140]because of just overall numbers,
[00:05:24.780]it was really outside of the metro area
[00:05:27.990]that made it pretty hard
[00:05:29.130]to find a professional development specialist.
[00:05:33.240]So we started to identify just internally on our term
[00:05:36.870]because remember, we have a responsibility
[00:05:39.570]to provide resources and materials
[00:05:42.030]in all 93 counties.
[00:05:43.710]Did we have any of our early childhood educators
[00:05:46.470]in those areas that were identified as a geographical gap?
[00:05:51.360]Next, once we did that, we looked at,
[00:05:54.240]are there any specializations or language gaps?
[00:05:57.120]At that time, Nebraska only had one bilingual PD specialist
[00:06:01.590]that was active.
[00:06:03.240]And we had yet, as a state, to have a CDA candidate
[00:06:06.750]who was able to successfully achieve
[00:06:09.120]a bilingual CDA certificate.
[00:06:13.920]So our team worked together
[00:06:16.890]to identify these short, mid, and long-term goals
[00:06:20.430]with the Department of Education.
[00:06:23.190]First, we looked at, let's build out
[00:06:26.070]that geographical diverse pool including immediate areas
[00:06:30.150]in which there were no PD specialists
[00:06:32.550]within a hundred miles.
[00:06:34.710]Next, we worked with our state partners
[00:06:37.110]to create a professional learning community
[00:06:39.990]of Nebraska PD specialists,
[00:06:42.540]specifically the other early childhood educators
[00:06:44.970]in Extension who might wanna become a PD specialist.
[00:06:48.960]And then, we worked with our partners at the council
[00:06:53.100]to do some presentations
[00:06:54.990]about why this work was so important
[00:06:57.570]and making sure that we supported candidates
[00:07:00.420]from beginning to end.
[00:07:04.710]We're pleased to say
[00:07:05.910]that our short term goal has already been accomplished.
[00:07:09.420]Nebraska Extension educators are available
[00:07:12.180]throughout the state
[00:07:13.230]to help fill in those immediate gaps in the area.
[00:07:16.110]So we're really grateful to the collaboration that we've had
[00:07:20.070]with the Council of Professional Recognition over the years
[00:07:23.040]to help us in identifying and supporting those efforts.
[00:07:27.300]Now, we've reached this next goal,
[00:07:28.950]which is why all of you are here today.
[00:07:31.350]We know that long term
[00:07:33.300]that having Extension educators is not a sustainable option,
[00:07:38.610]an important one, a critical one, a vital one,
[00:07:42.210]but to really look at creating a sustainable platform
[00:07:45.180]for Nebraskans,
[00:07:46.590]we really need to think
[00:07:47.730]about how can we recruit community PD specialists,
[00:07:51.480]especially outside of the metro
[00:07:53.220]to help us fill in those gaps.
[00:07:56.250]We're looking forward to meeting all of you
[00:07:58.290]who might be interested in becoming a PD specialist
[00:08:01.350]and doing a better job in leading communications
[00:08:03.780]with current community PD specialists,
[00:08:06.750]to see if we can host quarterly meetings
[00:08:09.060]on how we can better support Nebraska CDA candidates
[00:08:14.070]and helping them navigate that pathway
[00:08:16.410]from start to finish
[00:08:18.180]in our role as PD specialists.
[00:08:23.250]We wanna thank you for your time
[00:08:24.990]and joining us today.
[00:08:27.060]If you have any questions following this presentation,
[00:08:30.000]all of our contact information
[00:08:31.770]for everyone today on the meeting
[00:08:33.210]will be present at the very end.
[00:08:35.220]Again, my name is Linda Reddish,
[00:08:38.760]and I am an early childhood Extension educator
[00:08:42.630]with the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

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Nebraska Extension PD Specialist Presentation

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