Center for the Study of Childcare Employment

This report examines teaching staff assessments of their work environments in New York state across the five SEQUAL domains: Teaching Supports, Learning Community, Job Crafting, Adult Well-Being, and Program Leadership with a focus on how their program environment contributes to or hinders their ability to apply their knowledge and skills and improve their practice. In addition to teaching staff perceptions of their work environments, assessments of how responses varied by teacher and site characteristics are documented. Findings reveal that common workplace challenges pose barriers to early child care educator well-being and classroom effectiveness. Findings also demonstrate the value of program policies that ensure dependable workplace supports and policies such as provisions for paid planning and reporting time.

This report is part of our Teachers’ Voices (SEQUAL) series. To facilitate bringing teachers’ voices into quality improvement strategies, the Center for the Study of Child Care Employment (CSCCE) developed Supportive Environmental Quality Underlying Adult Learning, or SEQUAL, as a tool to document teaching staff perspectives about workplace conditions that impact their practice and program quality. SEQUAL can be used as a research, educational, or technical assistance tool.