A Community-University Partnership to Develop and Implement an Enhanced Model of Coaching for Prekindergarten

The effects of high-quality pre-kindergarten programs are well documented, including improvements in cognitive, literacy, math, and social-emotional skills. Evidence shows that low-income and minority students tend to benefit most from these programs, potentially helping to reduce academic performance disparities. A commonly employed intervention to improve pre-k classroom quality is coaching; however, there is little consensus regarding what coaching should “look like” in early childhood education and a great deal of variability in coaching quality. This paper describes a community-university partnership to develop a coaching model for a publicly funded prekindergarten program, using a participatory research approach and seeking input from stakeholders at multiple levels to address the particular needs of the school district. This paper describes the origin of the partnership, the development and implementation of the coaching model, and the benefits of using this type of collaborative approach to pre-k coaching. Taking a collaborative approach to the development and implementation of a pre-k coaching model resulted in an intervention that met program needs, achieved buy-in from multiple levels of administrators and staff, and helped build the school district’s capacity to use data to guide decision-making. Challenges encountered throughout the project, how those challenges were addressed, and steps taken to ensure the sustainability of the coaching model are also discussed.