Straus Center for Young Children & Families

Our Work

The Straus Center exists to advance Bank Street College’s Mission & Credo through applied research and translational scholarship. This stance is in keeping with the College’s first principle of using research to inform teaching practice, policy practice, and justice-centered social reform. Our approach is based on the three core activities and associated guiding questions below.

  • Participatory, Equity-Focused Research

    What is the progressive early childhood education of the 21st century and importantly, what are its effects?

    The Straus Center pursues this question with the following stances:

    • Science is not neutral: We must critically reflect upon the historical role science has played in constructing race, class, gender, sexuality, dis/ability, age, and associated social inequities.
    • Participation matters: Research has traditionally treated children, parents, and teachers as objects of study. In order to rectify the silencing of their perspectives and experiences in the research literature, we will strive for their maximum feasible participation in research projects. 
    • Research methods are non-binary: Social scientific paradigm wars about what data and methods are a priori more rigorous are anti-scientific; ignore the value of methodological pluralism; and stifle the scientific community’s potential to help address the vexing social problems affecting children, families, and educators.  
  • Ground-Up Policy Analyses

    What should decision-makers know about how policies are affecting young children, families, schools, and communities?

    While policy analyses that consider outcomes and cost-benefits are important, how policies are implemented and navigated on the ground are a missing component of policy improvement efforts.

  • Synthesizing and Promoting Research-Based Practices

    What is the field already doing that is supported by evidence and what new approaches should be incorporated into educators’ toolboxes? 

  • Current Projects

    Supporting Latina Family Child Care Provider Voices Through Inquiry: A Mixed Methods Project to Learn How They Navigate the Credit-Bearing Child Development Associate Credential (CDA)
    Principal Investigator: Cristina Medellin
    Agenda Area: Professionalization with Equity
    Funder: Foundation for Child Development

    The Child Development Associate (CDA) is a national early childhood credential created in 1971, and historically administered by Bank Street, before early childhood education degree programs were widely available. As degree programs developed, the CDA–which was not for college credit–became a detour that complicated many early childhood educators’ path to college degrees. This study focuses on how Latina home based child care professionals experience newly developed, culturally and linguistically-responsive support systems designed to facilitate a smooth journey from credit-bearing CDA to college degrees.   

    Racial and Gender Equity for Young Children with Disabilities in New York City: A Mixed-Methods Investigation of Disparities in New York City Preschool Program Ecologies
    Principal Investigator: Sarika Gupta
    Co-investigators: Natasha Strassfeld (University of Texas, Austin) and Gregory Cheatham (University of Kansas)
    Agenda Area: Systemization for Equity; Equity-Centered Family & Community Engagement
    Funder: New York City Early Childhood Research Network/Foundation for Child Development

    This mixed-methods project examines the role of New York City’s program ecologies in supporting early childhood professionals’ 1) equitable referrals to preschool special education, 2) their use of high-quality inclusive practices, and 3) their understanding of families’ experiences with preschool special education systems.

    Where Does Science Live in Your Community? A Photovoice Project
    Co-Principal Investigators: Cristina Medellin and Mark Nagasawa
    Agenda Area: Equity-Centered Family & Community Engagement
    Funder: New York Hall of Science/Simons Foundation

    Photovoice is a participatory research approach using photographs and stories to illustrate neighborhood residents’ perspectives on their lives. This project is a partnership with the New York Hall of Science and community members in Corona, Queens with the goal of increasing cultural responsiveness in science and museum education.  

    Multiple Case Study of New York State’s Implementation of the Pyramid Model
    Principal Investigator: Mark Nagasawa
    Agenda Area: Systemization for Equity
    Funder: Institute for Research on Poverty/US Department of Health & Human Services

    The Pyramid Model is a nationally recognized, evidencebased preschool approach that is being implemented across New York. This study follows up on the Listening to Teachers study, which asked how New York’s early childhood educators were faring during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic and the question that emerged about what was being done systemically in New York to support early childhood teachers–so they can support children. 

    Promoting Teacher-Child Relationships in Early Care and Education Classrooms
    Co-Principal Investigators: Cristina Medellin, Sarika Gupta, and Mark Nagasawa (Principal Investigator: Shelia Smith, Bank Street’s National Center for Children in Poverty)
    Agenda Area: Professionalization with Equity
    Funder: New York City Early Childhood Research Network/Heising-Simons Foundation

    This project is a partnership with early childhood teachers at East Harlem Block Nursery and Bank Street Head Start who will be collaboratively co-designing and evaluating a reflection tool focused on improving relationships with children through an equity lens. 

    Reconceptualizing Early Childhood Systems for Justice and Equity
    Co-Principal Investigator: Mark Nagasawa (Principal Investigator: Mathias Urban, Dublin City University)
    Agenda Area: Systemization for Equity
    Funder: Spencer Foundation  

    A partnership between researchers from Argentina, Indonesia, Ireland, South Africa, and the United States working to develop a transnational, comparative research agenda examining policy initiatives focused on increasing equity in ECE systems, conceptualized as the interplay between local, regional, national, and global policies.  

    Early Childhood Care & Education Quality with Equity at the Center
    Principal Investigator: Mark Nagasawa
    Agenda Area: Systemization for Equity
    Funder: Spencer Foundation

    Initially conceived of as a research conference, this project has expanded to become an ongoing network of teachers, scholars, policy makers, and philanthropists working towards centering equity in efforts to increase ECE program quality.

    _______________
    PAST WORK

    Racial and Gender Equity for Young Children with Disabilities in New York City: A Mixed-Methods Investigation of Disparities in New York City Preschool Program Ecologies
    Principal Investigator: Sarika Gupta
    Co-investigators: Natasha Strassfeld (University of Texas, Austin) and Gregory Cheatham (University of Kansas)
    May 2021­–May 2023

    This mixed-methods project examines the role of New York City’s program ecologies in supporting early childhood professionals’ 1) equitable referrals to preschool special education, 2) their use of high-quality inclusive practices, and 3) their understanding of families’ experiences with preschool special education systems.

    Improving Dual Language Teaching for Spanish Speakers: Evaluating a Professional Learning System That Elevates Latina Teacher Voices
    Principal Investigator: Alexandra Figueras-Daniel
    April 2021­–April 2023

    This project employs a mixed-methods design with the dual purposes of using data collection to both understand Latina teachers of dual language learners’ teaching practices as well as prompt their reflection on specific pedagogical practices in three specific ways: 1) engaging teachers in conversations about the existing system of Professional Learning focused on supports for Dual Language Learners (DLLs); 2) training a sample of teachers and coaches to use the Self Evaluation of Supports for Emergent Bilingual Acquisition (SESEBA) system and to examine its ability to guide teachers and coaches in their practice with DLLs; and 3) examining change among various teacher groups relative to DLL supports with use of a domain-specific, standardized classroom observation tool, the Classroom Assessment of Supports for Emergent Bilingual Acquisition (CASEBA).

    Listening to Teachers: Towards a More Equitable ECE System in NYC
    Co-Principal Investigators: Mark Nagasawa & Alexandra Figueras-Daniel
    April 2021–April 2022

    This is a multiphase, mixed-methods follow-up study on a survey of New York’s early care and education (ECE) workforce conducted in May 2020. Its broad purposes are to 1) understand how New York City’s ECE professionals are faring more than a year into the COVID-19 pandemic and 2) draw lessons from their experiences—statistically and phenomenologically—to inform decisions about what a more equitable post-pandemic ECE system can and should look like.

    Emotionally Responsive Practices & COVID-19: A Phenomenological Evaluation
    Principal Investigator: Mark Nagasawa
    May 2021–May 2022

    This interview-based evaluation study in collaboration with Bank Street’s Center for Emotionally Responsive Practice (ERP) asks about the role of developmentally guided, emotionally attuned professional learning in helping teachers adapt to the shifting demands presented by the COVID-19 pandemic.