Study of Early Education in Virginia (SEEVA)

In December 2018, the Virginia Department of Education (VDOE) received a federal Preschool Development Birth through Five Initial Grant Award (PDG B-5). In partnership with the Virginia Early Childhood Foundation (VECF) and researchers at UVA, VDOE began a set of efforts to improve early childhood opportunities at scale. In January 2020, VDOE received a three-year PDG B-5 Renewal Award to continue this work.
 
The SEEVA team at UVA leads three main research activities to evaluate and inform Virginia’s PDG B-5 efforts. First, we regularly field large-scale workforce surveys of early educators in family child care homes, child care centers, Head Start, and pre-k programs participating in the PDG. Second, we administer surveys of parents and guardians to learn about families’ experiences in accessing ECE programs for their children.

Finally, we are currently evaluating Virginia’s Recognition Program for early educators. We are conducting the first ever randomized controlled trial measuring the impacts of financial supports for early educators on reducing turnover.