Dear Colleagues,
Immigrant children who don’t speak English are scared and struggle to cope after recently being placed at a New York City school. The lack of enough bilingual teachers who speak Spanish puts severe limits on what the children are able to learn in their classes. “They’re only in English. I don’t understand it, and it’s hard and scary for me,” explains Fernanda, a first grader at PS 33 Chelsea Prep. “I don’t talk to not one friend, so I stay quiet,” as does Lida, her mom. She, too, finds communicating with the school to be a huge challenge and frets that her daughter can’t understand what’s happening in class.
The struggles of children like Fernanda are making the news because of the ongoing flow of Hispanic families to the U.S. But our population of immigrant children is much more diverse. Far from New York, in Santa Fe, NM, the public school system is trying to welcome an influx of new arrivals. The schools are offering English language classes and bonding activities to better serve children, many of them refugees, who come from Afghanistan, Nigeria, and Russia, plus several Central American nations.
Meanwhile in Washington, DC, there’s a large Ethiopian population, as we discuss when we profile Desta Wendirade, an educator at a DC public school and a Professional Development Specialist for the Council. She earned her Child Development Associate® (CDA) Credential™ at CentroNía, a bilingual child care center that provides CDA® training in Amharic, the Ethiopian native language. And Desta now works with them to help Amharic speakers in also earning the credential. “The number of Amharic-speaking children keeps growing,” she says, “so we need more qualified bilingual teachers to serve them. The Amharic CDA program is good for the children and it’s good for the teachers, too.”
Earning a CDA, as you will read, launched Ines Ben Cheikh on a successful career path that has convinced her she can do anything through hard work. “I could barely speak English when I came to the U.S. from Tunisia in 2010. I was a stay-at-home mom and had never been out of my homeland before. Now, 12 years later, I have a master’s degree and I’m the site manager for Wayne Metro ACCESS Head Start in Dearborn, MI, where I empower other immigrant moms to enter the ECE field by earning their CDA, too. I mainly work with Arab American women, who remind me of myself, and I’m happy to do this since it’s a way to give back to the people and programs that helped me.”
Ines and Desta both have a strong sense of community, and not just because of their immigrant roots. A commitment to others is a hallmark of our profession and that was clear at our Early Educators Leadership Conference this month. The theme was equity for children and the teachers who serve them, an ideal that crosses continents and cultures to bring educators together. Over the years, our conferences have drawn educators from Jordan and Egypt, China and the UAE, along with states across the U.S. They come for information, inspiration—and fun—as you’ll see when you read about this year’s EELC.
Conferences like ours are a great place for educators to explore common goals, concerns and solutions, as Dr. Calvin Moore says in his blog. The chats that take place there can spark creative thinking and serious questioning of the status quo, as he points out. So, conferences build the community’s greater good by being catalysts for needed change.
As a profession, we’re committed to changing a system that fails to ensure equity in early learning. And that’s also the Council’s goal. All children deserve skilled, credentialed teachers, like those who earn a CDA. And that includes our immigrant children. They have a moral and legal right to high-quality education, regardless of where they come from or what language they speak. No child should ever struggle and be scared, like little Fernanda, because they just can’t understand what’s going on in school.
Saludos cordiales,
The Council for Professional Recognition
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Vice President of Strategic Alliances
Elisa Shepherd is the Vice President of Strategic Alliances at the Council, where she leads initiatives to advance the Council’s mission and strategic plan through designing, managing, and executing a comprehensive stakeholder relationship strategy.
With over 25 years of experience in early childhood education (ECE), Elisa has dedicated her career to developing impactful programs, professional development opportunities, and public policies that support working families, young children, and ECE staff. Before joining the Council, Elisa held numerous roles within the childcare industry. Most recently, she served as Associate Vice President at The Learning Experience and as Senior Manager at KinderCare Education, where she influenced government affairs and public policies across 40 states.
Elisa’s commitment to leadership is reflected in her external roles on the Early Care and Education Consortium Board of Directors, the Florida Chamber Foundation Board of Trustees, and as the DEI Caucus Leader for KinderCare Education. She has been recognized as an Emerging Leader in Early Childhood by Childcare Exchange’s Leadership Initiative.
Elisa earned a Bachelor of Science in Psychology with a focus on child development from Pennsylvania State University in State College, PA.
Chief Operations Officer (COO)
Andrew Davis serves as Chief Operating Officer at the Council. In this role, Andrew oversees the Programs Division, which includes the following operational functions: credentialing, growth and business development, marketing and communications, public policy and advocacy, research, innovation, and customer relations.
Andrew has over 20 years of experience in the early care and education field. Most recently, Andrew served as Senior Vice President of Partnership and Engagement with Acelero Learning and Shine Early Learning, where he led the expansion of state and community-based partnerships to produce more equitable systems of service delivery, improved programmatic quality, and greater outcomes for communities, children and families. Prior to that, he served as Director of Early Learning at Follett School Solutions.
Andrew earned his MBA from the University of Baltimore and Towson University and his bachelor’s degree from the University of Maryland – University College.
Chief Financial Officer (CFO)
Jan Bigelow serves as Chief Financial Officer at the Council and has been with the organization since February of 2022.
Jan has more than 30 years in accounting and finance experience, including public accounting, for-profit and not-for-profit organizations. She has held management-level positions with BDO Seidman, Kiplinger Washington Editors, Pew Center for Global Climate Change, Communities In Schools, B’nai B’rith Youth Organization and American Humane. Since 2003, Jan has worked exclusively in the non-profit sector where she has been a passionate advocate in improving business operations in order to further the mission of her employers.
Jan holds a CPA from the State of Virginia and a Bachelor of Arts degree from Lycoming College. She resides in Alexandria VA with her husband and dog.
Vice President of People and Culture
Janie Payne is the Vice President of People and Culture for the Council for Professional Recognition. Janie is responsible for envisioning, developing, and executing initiatives that strategically manage talent and culture to align people strategies with the overarching business vision of the Council. Janie is responsible for driving organizational excellence through strategic talent practices, orchestrating workforce planning, talent acquisition, performance management as well as a myriad of other Human Resources Programs. She is accountable for driving effectiveness by shaping organizational structure for optimal efficiency. Janie oversees strategies that foster a healthy culture to include embedding diversity, equity, and inclusion into all aspects of the organization.
In Janie’s prior role, she was the Vice President of Administration at Equal Justice Works, where she was responsible for leading human resources, financial operations, facilities management, and information technology. She was also accountable for developing and implementing Equal Justice Works Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion strategy focused on attracting diverse, mission-oriented talent and creating an inclusive and equitable workplace environment. With more than fifteen years of private, federal, and not-for-profit experience, Janie is known for her intuitive skill in administration management, human resources management, designing and leading complex system change, diversity and inclusion, and social justice reform efforts.
Before joining Equal Justice Works, Janie was the Vice President of Human Resources and Chief Diversity Officer for Global Communities, where she was responsible for the design, implementation, and management of integrated HR and diversity strategies. Her work impacted employees in over twenty-two countries. She was responsible for the effective management of different cultural, legal, regulatory, and economic systems for both domestic and international employees. Prior to Global Communities, Janie enjoyed a ten-year career with the federal government. As a member of the Senior Executive Service, she held key strategic human resources positions with multiple cabinet-level agencies and served as an advisor and senior coach to leaders across the federal sector. In these roles, she received recognition from management, industry publications, peers, and staff for driving the creation and execution of programs that created an engaged and productive workforce.
Janie began her career with Verizon Communications (formerly Bell Atlantic), where she held numerous roles of increasing responsibility, where she directed a diversity program that resulted in significant improvement in diversity profile measures. Janie was also a faculty member for the company’s Black Managers Workshop, a training program designed to provide managers of color with the skills needed to overcome barriers to their success that were encountered because of race. She initiated a company-wide effort to establish team-based systems and structures to impact corporate bottom line results which was recognized by the Department of Labor. Janie was one of the first African American women to be featured on the cover of Human Resources Executive magazine.
Janie received her M.A. in Organization Development from American University. She holds numerous professional development certificates in Human Capital Management and Change Management, including a Diversity and Inclusion in Human Resources certificate from Cornell University. She completed the year-long Maryland Equity and Inclusion Leadership Program sponsored by The Schaefer Center for Public Policy and The Maryland Commission on Civil Rights. She is a trained mediator and Certified Professional Coach. She is a graduate of Leadership America, former board chair of the NTL Institute and currently co-steward of the organization’s social justice community of practice, and a member of The Society for Human Resource Management. Additionally, Janie is the Board Chairperson for the Special Education Citizens Advisory Council for Prince Georges County where she is active in developing partnerships that facilitate discussion between parents, families, educators, community leaders, and the PG County school administration to enhance services for students with disabilities which is her passion. She and her husband Randolph reside in Fort Washington Maryland.
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