Right now, early childhood professionals face a variety of barriers as they pursue higher education degrees. Articulation is one of the most important barriers. In attempting to move smoothly from training and credentialing to associate's and bachelor's degrees, most practitioners find the lack of shared standards and linkages–the lack of bridges between institutions–means that they need to repeat training and course work, a costly and wasteful proposition. Moreover, where counseling and support for continued advancement through training are lacking, movement toward college degrees is further limited.

At the same time that the Congress is mandating some important new professional development advances for Head Start, it is providing a prime opportunity to make higher education more responsive to the needs of the field. Head Start's requirement to increase the numbers of teachers with degrees in early childhood education can be used to build support for services that encourage early care and education personnel to pursue degrees. In addition, it can be used to muster support for forging articulation agreements to provide continuity and accessibility for the swelling ranks of adult learners.

Here are six "shoulds" to support more effective linkages with college degree programs and ease the way to degree attainment–

1. Wherever Child Development Associate (CDA) credential training is provided, it should be offered for college credits that can be used to transfer into degree programs. CDAs who did not receive college credits while they were in training should request post-secondary institutions to grant credits for prior learning after obtaining the credential. Both Pacific Oaks College in California and the University of Oklahoma grant credits for the CDA.

2. College administrators and faculty should identify and eliminate articulation barriers between two- and four-year degree programs, with state and local policymakers contributing to the discussions where needed. The discussions may need to be ongoing as college programs and student populations change, and should include addressing problems that stem from inconsistencies in course titles and names of degree programs.

3. Two-year institutions should build mechanisms to support early care and education students to meet the general education requirements of the degree program. Institutions should consider alternative approaches that are grounded in the realities of the work and life experiences of these students, and that will allow them to successfully demonstrate mastery of the general content and skill areas.

4. Two-year institutions with no existing form of early childhood career preparation should develop a degree track program and build within it preparation for the CDA credential. So many entry-level classroom and home-based practitioners choose CDA as their first professional milestone that colleges are finding that CDA programs provide solid content grounding for their degree track curriculum, as well as serving as an attractive student recruitment strategy.

5. The ongoing discussion of training needs in the early childhood community should be a collaborative, community-based exercise. All stakeholders in the service delivery and training communities–including major institutions such as child care resource and referral agencies (CCR&Rs), and constituent groups such as parents–bring important perspectives, issues, problems, and solutions to the ongoing dialogue.

6. Programs and CDA candidates who purchase training should choose institutions that offer credit-bearing training. Cooperative agreements should be developed between non-degree granting organizations that are delivering high quality and accessible training and degree granting institutions.

In the years ahead, career development groups will have a vital role to play in making the connection between the CDA and degree programs in higher education institutions. The higher education subcommittees of many career development groups are already tackling articulation barriers. If they collaborate with Head Start on making inroads on this and other key higher education issues, the whole field will benefit by increasing the ability of colleges to recruit and retain adult learners, increasing practitioners’ salaries and retention rates, advancing to the next step on the career lattice, and building early childhood careers.

Carol Brunson Day is the President/CEO of the Council for Professional Recognition, and Deborah Jordan is the Deputy Director of the Council for Professional Recognition. They can be reached at 800-424-4310 or 202-265-9090.