In 2009, the NAEYC Governing Board approved revisions to the NAEYC Standards for Early Childhood Professional Preparation Programs. These standards are designed for the early childhood education profession as a whole, to be relevant across a range of roles and settings. The standards are used across degree levels, from associate to doctoral degree programs, and from initial licensure to advanced programs. They are used in higher education accreditation systems, in state policy development, in state approval of programs leading to early childhood teacher licensure, and in program improvement planning.
2009 NAEYC Standards for Early Childhood Professional Preparation Programs (PDF)
Where We Stand Summary (PDF) provides an overview and brief summary of the revisions.
Degree programs seeking NAEYC accreditation may continue to use the 2003 standards through 2012.
NAEYC’s professional preparation standards are used in NAEYC Early Childhood Associate Degree Accreditation. The NAEYC Commission on Early Childhood Associate Degree Accreditation approved the new standards in June 2010. The Commission also approved the following schedule for implementation of the 2009 professional preparation standards.
- Revised self-study materials - available to programs by January 2011
- Revised reviewer materials - available to reviewers by September 2011
- Programs permitted to submit Self-Study Reports using 2009 Standards - September 2011
- Programs have the option of using the 2009 or 2003 standards in 2012 - March 2012, September 2012
- Programs required to submit using new materials - March 2013 (This allows for two years of self-study using the new materials.)
We expect that NCATE will require programs to use the 2009 standards in Fall 2012. Many associate degree programs submitting in 2012 will want to be accredited using the new standards to stay aligned with their baccalaureate degree partners. However, the Commission timeline allows programs two years, 2011 and 2012, to do self-study work using the new materials.
The current accreditation standards documents are available in PDF format:
The standards, along with rationales, rubrics or evidence for expectations, and more are published in Preparing Early Childhood Professionals: NAEYC’s Standards for Programs, available in the NAEYC online store.
Significant changes in the 2009 standards
- Standard 4 has been separated into two standards. One focuses on early childhood methods and the other on early childhood content. This increases the total number of standards from five to six.
- The language all children is revised to read either each child or every child to strengthen the integration of inclusion and diversity as threads across all standards. In some cases, the phrase “each child” has been added to a key element of a standard.
- Over time, NAEYC has organized these standards in a variety of ways. In this new position statement, the core standards are presented in one NAEYC position statement intended for the use across the entire field. It emphasizes the essentials of professional preparation for careers in early childhood education, regardless of role, setting, or degree level.
As in the past, preparation for inclusion and diversity is required to meet each of the standards. Understanding and applying knowledge of the unique characteristics of children in the period of early childhood development (birth through age eight) is necessary to meet each of the standards. The standards are the core of early childhood professional preparation across degree levels, from associate through doctoral degree programs. Key elements of each standard describe related knowledge and use of knowledge. Thus, field or clinical experiences are essential to assess the ability of the adult student to apply each standard in practice. Decisions about breadth and depth in each standard should be appropriate to the context of each program.
