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Caring for Children in a Complex Society
Contemporary Issues Seminar
June 6-7, 2000

During the second Contemporary Issues seminar, ten advanced scholars, practitioners, policy experts, and administrators identified 28 major issues related to the seminar's topic, Caring for Children in a Complex Society. While six issues were selected as potential directions for further study and research at SAR, the need to develop a "cultural theory of childcare for the 21st century" emerged as an overall theme during the two days of discussion. The participants agreed on the importance of sensitivity to the diversity of home cultures in evaluating the quality of childcare.

The six key issues identified by participants were:

1. A cultural theory of childcare for the 21st century

2. Collaborative, community-based research, to include culturally and linguistically diverse populations in the development of childcare programs

3. A comparative approach to individualistic and collective pathways of development, emphasizing research on collective pathways

4. Teacher preparation for cultural and linguistic diversity

5. Recruitment of diverse early childhood providers and teaching them how to reconcile differences when cultural and developmental issues collide

6. Identifying exemplars of culturally-engaged childcare

This Contemporary Issues seminar was supported by a grant of $10,000 from the Ethel-Jane Westfeldt Bunting Foundation.
Childcare Seminar Standing (left to right): Mary Eunice Romero, Jorja Armijo Brasher, Miquela Rivera, Thomas Weisner, Fred Nathan, Ira Blake

Seated (left to right): Janet Gonzalez-Mena, Patricia Greenfield, Nancy Owen Lewis (SAR), Rodney R. Cocking, Emily Darnell-Nuņez 

Participants:

Ira Blake (Psychology, Susquehanna University)

Jorja Armijo Brasher (Office of Child Development, City of Albuquerque)

Rodney R. Cocking (National Science Foundation)

Emily Darnell-Nuņez (New Mexico Association for the Education of Young Children)

Patricia Greenfield (Psychology, University of California, Los Angeles)

Janet Gonzalez-Mena (Napa Valley College)

Fred Nathan (Think New Mexico)

Miquela Rivera (NM Children, Youth, and Families Department)

Mary Eunice Romero (Education, Language and Literacy, University of California, Berkeley)

Thomas Weisner (Anthropology, University of California, Los Angeles)