For Parents

NAEYC Questionnaire December 2001 Dr. Sharon Carver

With the leadership of Jean Simpson, our accreditation process is progressing smoothly. Our mentor, Linda Tozier, is a director of an accredited center, has been through the process several times for other centers, and is a trained "validator" (NAEYC's representatives for evaluating programs). She spent most of the day at the Children's School on Monday and feels confident that our high quality program will pass the accreditation milestone easily.

We hope to submit all of our written materials to the NAEYC Accreditation Academy by the end of January, so we need your help now to meet that goal. Please complete the attached Family Questionnaire by December 12th and return it to the school office. I encourage you to be thorough and honest. What matters most to NAEYC is that we get a high response rate (ideal = 100% participation) and that the family and staff ratings agree. In other words, it's not a problem for you to say that something needs to be improved because the staff may be saying that too. During December, I will be working with each teaching team to observe and evaluate each program.

Because NAEYC is in the process of improving the accreditation system, I encourage you to add clarifying comments for your answers to the questions (particularly if you are unclear about how the question relates to our program). Also, since NAEYC focuses on minimum quality standards, there are many aspects of our program that are not covered by the printed questions (e.g., connection to psychology, interns, research, professional development offered to area teachers), so I suggest that you discuss strengths and make suggestions about those program features in the space provided or on additional sheets.

Thank you for helping us with our goal of continuous quality improvement by participating in the accreditation process.

The Children's School, MMC 17, Pittsburgh, PA 15213 (412)268-2199 Copyright 1999 Carnegie Mellon University