Studying the Implementation of DC's Early Childhood Educator Pay Equity Fund: Technical Documentation for Year 1 Early Educator, Home Operator, and Center Director Surveys. Research Report

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Bibliographic Details
Title: Studying the Implementation of DC's Early Childhood Educator Pay Equity Fund: Technical Documentation for Year 1 Early Educator, Home Operator, and Center Director Surveys. Research Report
Language: English
Authors: Justin B. Doromal, Erica Greenberg, Elli Nikolopoulos, Eve Mefferd, Heather Sandstrom, Rachel Lamb, Victoria Nelson, Timothy Triplett, Urban Institute, Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE)
Source: Urban Institute. 2024.
Availability: Urban Institute. 2100 M Street NW, Washington, DC 20037. Tel: 202-261-5687; Fax: 202-467-5775; Web site: http://www.urban.org
Peer Reviewed: N
Page Count: 37
Publication Date: 2024
Sponsoring Agency: Administration for Children and Families (ACF) (DHHS)
Contract Number: 90YE0284
Document Type: Reports - Research
Tests/Questionnaires
Education Level: Early Childhood Education
Descriptors: Program Implementation, Early Childhood Education, Educational Equity (Finance), Educational Finance, Early Childhood Teachers, Teacher Salaries, Demography, Test Construction, Response Rates (Questionnaires), Data Collection, Documentation, Child Care Centers, Administrator Surveys, Teacher Characteristics, Data Analysis, Income
Geographic Terms: District of Columbia
Abstract: Early childhood educators play essential roles in providing stable and high-quality child care for young children and supporting their development and growth. As is also true nationwide, historically low wages in the District of Columbia have led to challenges in compensating and retaining qualified early childhood educators, and in turn, building quality child care systems from which families benefit. In 2022, the District of Columbia passed legislation to tax the wealthy, generating revenue to increase compensation for early educators working in the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE)-licensed child care programs. The first of its kind nationwide, the Pay Equity Fund represents an innovative, long-term, and sustainable strategy for addressing early childhood educator compensation. This technical report documents the steps the Urban Institute and OSSE took to design and administer a set of surveys to learn more about the opportunities and challenges wage supplements offered child care employers and early educators in the first 1.5 years of implementation (FY 2022 and FY 2023). The authors begin by describing the survey development process, survey administration procedures, response rates, and characteristics of the target population (i.e., the set of educators identified as potentially eligible for the Pay Equity Fund, based on administrative data) and the survey sample (i.e., the set of educators who submitted a valid survey response). This is done once for the Early Educator and Home Operator Surveys, and then once more for the Center Director Survey. These steps are presented separately, given different sampling frames and different constructs of interest across samples, and then the steps taken to weight, clean, and analyze survey data are described. The report concludes by summarizing demographic information for each of the survey samples.
Abstractor: ERIC
Entry Date: 2025
Accession Number: ED663731
Database: ERIC
Description
Abstract:Early childhood educators play essential roles in providing stable and high-quality child care for young children and supporting their development and growth. As is also true nationwide, historically low wages in the District of Columbia have led to challenges in compensating and retaining qualified early childhood educators, and in turn, building quality child care systems from which families benefit. In 2022, the District of Columbia passed legislation to tax the wealthy, generating revenue to increase compensation for early educators working in the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE)-licensed child care programs. The first of its kind nationwide, the Pay Equity Fund represents an innovative, long-term, and sustainable strategy for addressing early childhood educator compensation. This technical report documents the steps the Urban Institute and OSSE took to design and administer a set of surveys to learn more about the opportunities and challenges wage supplements offered child care employers and early educators in the first 1.5 years of implementation (FY 2022 and FY 2023). The authors begin by describing the survey development process, survey administration procedures, response rates, and characteristics of the target population (i.e., the set of educators identified as potentially eligible for the Pay Equity Fund, based on administrative data) and the survey sample (i.e., the set of educators who submitted a valid survey response). This is done once for the Early Educator and Home Operator Surveys, and then once more for the Center Director Survey. These steps are presented separately, given different sampling frames and different constructs of interest across samples, and then the steps taken to weight, clean, and analyze survey data are described. The report concludes by summarizing demographic information for each of the survey samples.