NAEYC receives grant to support work on Response to Intervention (RTI) position statement

(Washington, D.C.) In a matter of a few short years, Response to Intervention (RTI) has become a familiar phrase in the early childhood field. Because RTI is an emerging practice, it is critical that the early childhood field has a reliable source of information as programs begin to define and implement these practices.

The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) has received a grant from the Emily Hall Tremaine Foundation to support collaborative work with the Division for Early Childhood of the Council for Exceptional Children (DEC) and the National Head Start Association (NHSA) on a joint position statement on RTI in early childhood. The Tremaine Foundation has a history of funding important work in the areas that include RTI, early childhood, and learning disabilities.

The National Professional Development Center on Inclusion (NPDCI) will contribute staff and resources to facilitate the development and validation of the joint position statement. A similar collaborative model was recently used by DEC, NAEYC, and NPDCI to develop Early Childhood Inclusion: A Joint Position Statement of the Division for Early Childhood (DEC) and the National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC).

Initial steps for this project will involve convening a panel of national experts to discuss the parameters for the development of a position statement on RTI (e.g., defining features, content specificity). This will be followed by input from a joint DEC-NAEYC-NHSA work group and the governing boards of all three organizations. A final step will be the national validation of the joint position statement.

Founded in 1926, the National Association for the Education of Young Children has nearly 90,000 members worldwide.  The association is the largest and most influential advocate for early care and education in the United States.

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