Early Childhood Networked Improvement Community

What is EC NIC?

The Early Childhood Networked Improvement Community (EC NIC) is a collaborative initiative that brings together early childhood leaders, educators, practitioners, applied researchers, and university faculty and students to identify and solve persistent challenges in early education. EC NIC’s goal is to improve the lives of young children by transforming how we approach professional learning, innovation and improvement, and systemic change.

Whether you’re an early childhood leader, educator, mental health professional, applied researcher, faculty, policymaker, or caregiver, EC NIC is a space for shared learning, growth, and innovation.

Our Purpose

• Identify pressing problems in early childhood systems.  
• Understand root causes through inclusive dialogue and research.  
• Test and share promising solutions within real-world settings.  
• Build a professional learning community rooted in improvement science.  

Our Current Focus Areas

• Social Emotional Learning (SEL)
  • Strengthen adult modeling, co-regulation, and resilience-building practices.
  • Embed SEL into daily routines, rituals, and relationships in ways that honor children’s cultural contexts.
  • Build and sustain educator capacity for long-term SEL practices and mental health prevention and promotion.
• Inclusion and Intervention
  • Use authentic assessment and naturalistic, strength-based approaches.
  • Apply Naturalistic Developmental Behavioral Interventions (NDBIs) in inclusive classroom contexts.
  • Promote classroom adaptations and inclusive practices that reduce unnecessary labeling or referrals.
  • Strengthen team-based planning and shared ownership for supporting children with complex needs.
  • Build systems that partner with families and EI/IEP services without pathologizing difference.
• Family and Community Engagement
  • Advance relationship-based, culturally humble engagement practices.
  • Foster authentic co-creation with families as partners in children’s development.
  • Implement responsive communication and trust-building strategies that reduce family engagement fatigue.
  • Honor family voices and community strengths in program design and decision-making.
• Language and Literacy
  • Support early communication, vocabulary, and literacy growth in culturally sustaining ways.
  • Provide frameworks for dual language learners and multilingual families.
  • Incorporate literacy-rich routines and materials that reflect diverse identities.
  • Engage families in language learning and adapt strategies for children with varied communication needs.
• Systems Leadership
  • Promote evidence-based, culturally responsive SEL strategies in early childhood.
  • Apply Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) models and data reflection tools.
  • Use data for reflection, learning, and continuous improvement.
  • Embed findings into improvement planning.
  • Strengthen tiered systems of mental health and behavioral supports (MTSS).
  • Navigate system constraints to expand equitable access and dismantle structural barriers.

How EC NIC Works

• EC NIC organizes core members into learning cohorts.
• We partner with families, schools, and agencies to ensure solutions are practical and community-informed.  
• Projects are grounded in data, lived experience, and real-time feedback.  
• EC NIC offers coaching, reflective practice, and collaborative workshops.

Our Approach

• Networked Improvement Community Model: EC NIC is not just a professional learning network—it’s built on a Networked Improvement Community (NIC) framework, which uses continuous cycles of improvement, data-driven problem solving, and collaboration across multiple organizations to address persistent challenges in early childhood systems. Unlike typical professional development or meetings, it embeds a structured methodology for testing, refining, and scaling interventions.
• Leadership Development: Participation in EC NIC provides members with structured opportunities for leadership growth, including facilitating peer learning, co-designing solutions, and leading CQI initiatives across programs and agencies.
• Cross-Agency Collaboration: EC NIC brings together leaders, educators, families, researchers, and system-level decision-makers from multiple sectors (schools, early childhood programs, public agencies, and community organizations). This multi-stakeholder design allows the NIC to tackle systemic barriers that single agencies cannot solve alone.
• Embedded Continuous Learning: Members engage in ongoing cycles of data collection, reflection, and adjustment, using real-world classroom and program data to test strategies, assess effectiveness, and iterate. This allows for rapid feedback loops and continuous improvement, which is far more dynamic than traditional one-off training sessions.
• Evidence-Based Implementation: EC NIC combines research evidence, implementation science, and local knowledge to inform practice. It’s not just a networking or discussion forum—it provides a structured framework to apply, measure, and refine interventions in real-world early childhood settings.
• Focus on Equity and Systemic Change: EC NIC explicitly centers equity in early childhood education, targeting disparities in access, quality, and outcomes. Its work is not just about improving one classroom or site; it seeks to shift practices and policies across the system, supporting sustainable, scalable improvements.