By

Sarah Gilliland

Too often, programs aimed at supporting families are developed without their input, creating problems with delivery that result in even the best-intentioned efforts from reaching or being used by the people they should serve.. Participatory planning processes can improve program design - not only for the government leaders and administrators responsible for programs, but for the families that ultimately use them. To understand the full scope of lessons about participatory planning, read the full brief here.

As families across the U.S. grapple with the affordability of child care, and as research continues to show the benefits of high-quality early education, more city, state, and local governments are considering their own programs to deliver early childhood education in their communities.

Participatory planning-in which the individuals impacted directly by the policy are brought into policy and decision-making conversations and empowered to shape the outcomes-can make a significant difference in the impact of a given policy, driving trust and program participation amongst target populations. Critically, it helps leaders design programs that are attractive to people, and easier for them to use. When done properly, there are secondary benefits to programs designed through participatory planning processes: because legitimacy is derived from the community, programs are well equipped to withstand political and leadership transitions, and implementation challenges can be identified and designed for earlier on.

These strengths are especially important when it comes to building successful early childhood education programs. These programs are designed to help families, including those that have been historically marginalized and disadvantaged and may be hard to reach. Bringing these communities into the planning process helps ensure that programs are feasible for families to use, and seen as trustworthy amongst those they are designed to help.

In the latest brief from the Early Care and Education Implementation Working Group, we gather insights from across the country about what it takes to design a participatory planning process with a community and how doing so can meaningfully change the culture of the government.

Read the full brief here

Communities across the country have demonstrated that engaging families from the beginning can lead to more successful program launches. Yes, participatory planning can take more time to organize, but it's time well spent. Creating time, even when it seems there isn't any, can help build resilience in a program and generate support-even if, as with all new public services, there are trip-ups in initial delivery.

One particularly successful example of participatory planning happened in Multnomah County, Oregon, where a taskforce of over 100 community members was assembled, meeting regularly for nine months in order to build a program road map. That roadmap turned into the region's Preschool for All campaign, a successful ballot initiative that will establish universal preschool by 2026.

The citizens of Multnomah County were successful in part because they thought outside of the box, bringing in more than just the usual suspects of community members, prioritizing diversity including amongst non-English speaking families and different types of child care providers

Similar trends can be seen across the country, where from Oakland, California to Cincinnati, Ohio, communities are able to fully participate with a planning process that considers their lives, and offers them some means of accountability with the government leaders in charge of the product.

Governments that bring transparency and engagement to the participatory planning process are not only left with better programs, but with stronger communities.

Read the full brief here

About the ECE Implementation Working Group

The ECE Implementation Working Group is a group of early childhood education leaders from cities and counties across the country. These leaders gather to share best practices from their experience working with families and local communities, and their work aligns with the New Practice Lab's theory of change: that implementation lessons should inform policy design from the start. More information about the Working Group can be found here. You can reach out to us with questions about the group and its work at [email protected].

This is the third brief of our ongoing work with early childhood educators. Click here to see all of the ECE Implementation Working Group Briefs.