Paying it Forward - Gesell Institute

OF CHILD DEVELOPMENT
65th ANNIVERSARY
October 2, 2015
OF CHILD DEVELOPMENT
65th ANNIVERSARY
Yale School of Management
$$
Paying it Forward
Leaders’ Forum on Economic
Development and Early Childhood
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INVEST
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YNHH Ad
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Our Special Thank You to All
Our Sponsors and Supporters!
Gold Sponsors ($10,000)
Gesell Friend Sponsors ($500)
Yale-New Haven Hospital
New Haven Promise
Silver Sponsors ($5,000)
Linda and Vincent Calarco
Yale Office of New Haven and State Affairs
Bronze Sponsors ($2500)
David Newton Elm Advisors, LLC
Dick and Marissa Ferguson
Strategem, LLC
Suzio York Hill
Supporter Sponsers ($250)
Bestcopy Printer
Chamber of Commerce (New Haven)
Karissa Van Tassel Photography
Mary Pepe
Copper Sponsor ($2000)
Relihan
Community Foundation of
Greater New Haven
S&S Worldwide
65th Anniversary Sponsors
($1000)
Contributor Sponsor ($100)
Jackie Haines
Albertus Magnus College
Moira O’Neill Aitro
CharterOak State College
New Paradigm Consulting
First Niagara Bank
Gesell Board of Directors
United Illuminating
Webster Bank
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WELCOME
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Sponsors ....................................1
Welcome Letter from
Executive Director ............... ................2
Proclamation from Governor .............3
Proclamation from Mayor ...................4
Letter from the US House
of Representatives .................................5
Agenda................. ..................................6
Speakers ............................................. 7-9
Gesell Staff, Interns, and
Volunteers ........................... ................10
History of Gesell Institute .................11
Dear Friends and Colleagues,
Welcome! Gesell Institute of Child Development
celebrates its 65th anniversary this year with a Year
of Advocacy, kicked off by today’s Leaders’ Forum on
Economic Development and the Early Years. What better
way to celebrate than to gather together community
leaders, elected officials, business leaders, researchers,
practitioners, and advocates to learn and discuss how
successful adulthood and tomorrow’s workforce starts
in the early years of life with sound educational policies
and practices based on research. Together, we can make a
difference for young children and for our future workforce.
Dr. Arnold Gesell, PhD and MD (1880-1961), came to Yale in 1911 and began
his ground-breaking, revolutionary research using cinematography to study the
sequences and patterns of behavior common to all human development. In 1911,
he founded a clinic that is known today as the Yale Child Study Center and was its
Director for 48 years. Gesell’s work is perhaps more relevant today than ever. The
Institute, founded in 1950, conducted its 2011 normative study of over 1300 three to
six year olds performance on Gesell’s original assessment items, which evidenced that
children today reach major developmental milestones approximately at the same time
as they did almost 100 years ago. This adds to the body of evidence that the academic
pushdown, such that Kindergarten becoming the “new first grade,” is unjustifiable.
Schools must know that you cannot speed up child development. Development takes
time, nurturing, and the understanding of what is developmentally appropriate in
helping the young child grow socially, emotionally, physically, and cognitively. Sooner
is not better, nor even possible in most instances.
Other very compelling research coming from the field of neuroscience is showing
that Kindergarten may be too late for many children. The earlier the child has a rich,
safe, healthy environment with nurturing interactions which promote optimal child
growth and development, the better chances the child will have, not only with school
success, but later success in adulthood as competent contributing members of the
workforce and society.
Dr. Gesell
There is also economic research, which shows investing in quality early childhood
programs have huge economic benefits to taxpayers (ROI) and to the lives of the
children who are in these programs. For every dollar invested in quality programs for
birth to age five, the payback is up to $14 to the community.
Today’s Forum was organized so that leaders, like you, can explore what this means
for your community. How does your community invest its dollars? Is the quality of
the first five years of life on par for all children? Do your fellow leaders know that the
principles of child development that should inform all your decision making about
young children?
Thank you for joining us at this very important event. We all share the
responsibility for creating a better tomorrow for our youngest members of the
community today. We can do it with sound economic programs that invest in quality
early childhood programs.
Sincerely,
Marcy Guddemi, PhD, MBA
Executive Director
Gesell Institute of Child Development
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PROCLAMATIONS
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PROCLAMATIONS
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AGENDA
Buffet Breakfast followed by Program beginning promptly at 8:30am.
8:00 – 8:30
Registration
8:30 – 9:15
Welcome
Marcy Guddemi, Executive Director
Gesell Institute of Child Development
Toni Harp, Mayor of New Haven
Honorary Co-Chair
Presentation of
Arnold Gesell Award
Marcy Guddemi, Executive Director
Gesell Institute of Child Development
for Outstanding Work for Young Children
to Governor Dannel Malloy
Acceptance
Nancy Wyman, Lt Governor
Remarks
Chris Murphy, US Senator
Rosa DeLauro, US Congresswoman
Honorary Co-Chair
9:15-10:00
Introduction of Speaker
Linda Calarco, Forum Chair, Board Emeritus
Keynote Address
Arthur Rolnick, PhD, Director
Human Research Collaborative of the
Humphrey School of Public Affairs
Paying It Forward: The Latest
Economics on the Earliest Years
10:00- 10:20
10:20 – 10:50
on High Quality Early Childhood Programs
Marcy Guddemi, Executive Director
Gesell Institute of Child Development
Panel Discussion
Marcy Guddemi, Moderator
Remarks
Beth Bye, CT State Senator
Myra Jones-Taylor, CT Commissioner
Office of Early Childhood
Lynn Kagan, Columbia University,
Yale University
Art Rolnick, Economist
10:50-11:00
Closing Remarks
Toni Harp, Mayor of New Haven
Honorary Co-Chair
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SPEAKER
HONORARY CO-CHAIRS
Arthur J. Rolnick,
PhD
Arthur J. Rolnick is a Senior
Fellow and Co-Director of
the Human Capital Research
Collaborative at the Humphrey
School of Public Affairs, University
of Minnesota. Rolnick is working to
advance multidisciplinary research
on child development and social policy. He previously served
at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis as a senior vice
president and director of research and as an associate economist
with the Federal Open Market Committee, the monetary
policymaking body for the Federal Reserve System. Rolnick’s
essays on public policy issues have gained national attention;
his research interests include banking and financial economics,
monetary policy, monetary history, the economics of federalism,
and the economics of education. His work on early childhood
development has garnered numerous awards, including those
from the George Lucas Educational Foundation and the
Minnesota Department of Health, both in 2007; he
was also named 2005 Minnesotan of the Year by Minnesota
Monthly magazine.
Rolnick has been a visiting professor of economics at Boston
College, University of Chicago, and University of Minnesota.
Most recently he was an adjunct professor of economics, MBA
program, Lingnan College, Guangzhou, China and University
of Minnesota’s Carlson School of Management. He is past
president of the Minnesota Economic Association. He serves on
several nonprofit boards including the Minnesota Early Learning
Foundation, Greater Twin Cities United Way, and Ready 4 K, an
advocacy organization for early childhood development.
A native of Michigan, Rolnick has a bachelor’s degree in
mathematics and a master’s degree in economics from Wayne
State University, Detroit; and a doctorate in economics from
the University of Minnesota.
Toni Harp
An abiding commitment to social
justice steers Mayor Toni Harp’s
career in public service. Over
time she earned a reputation as
“the conscience of the Senate”
at the Capitol. Her drive for
inclusiveness, equality, and
integrity is the byproduct of
resonant, across-the-board life experiences.
Toni was raised in Salt Lake City, Utah, the youngest of six
children; an African-American Baptist in a primarily white,
almost universally Mormon community. Both of her parents
worked to support the family. Her mother was a Teamster and
worked for Greyhound Bus Lines while her father worked for
the Santa Fe Railroad. Toni’s tireless work ethic is a function of
lessons learned from her parents.
In the 1960s, Toni moved to the south side of Chicago and
earned a degree and began working for the American Society of
Planning Officials. Her lifelong interest in urban planning and
how cities work can be traced to that first job. From there, Toni
was recruited to study at Yale’s School of Architecture where she
earned a Master’s degree.
While in the City of New Haven Toni helped organize
AFSCME Local 3144, a management union, and she became the
Human Resources Department’s first union steward.
Toni’s public service in elected office began, first as a member
of New Haven’s Board of Aldermen, and then, for the past 20
years, as Senator for the 10th District.
Rosa Delauro
Rosa DeLauro is the
Congresswoman from Connecticut’s
Third District. Rosa serves in the
Democratic leadership as co-chair of
the Steering and Policy Committee.
As the ranking member dealing with
appropriations for Labor, Health,
Human Services, and Education,
Rosa is determined to increase
support for education and innovation, to fully implement the
new health care reform law, to protect the rights of employees
and unions, and raise living standards. Rosa has led the fight in
Congress to achieve full pay equity for women and to ensure that
all employees have access to paid sick days.
Soon after earning degrees from Marymount College and
Columbia University, Rosa followed her parents’ footsteps into
public service, serving as the first Executive Director of EMILY’S
List. In 1990, Rosa was elected to the House of Representatives
and she has served the Third District since.
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MODERATOR
Marcy Guddemi,
PhD, MBA
As President and CEO of
the Gesell Institute of Child
Development on the Yale campus,
Dr. Guddemi leads in the Institute
in its mission of promoting the
principles of child development
in all decision-making for young
children worldwide. She earned
a PhD in Early Childhood Curriculum and Instruction at the
University of Texas at Austin and an MBA from Golden Gate
University in San Francisco.
Dr. Guddemi is a widely recognized expert in early childhood
education, assessment, and learning through play. She started
her career as a junior high school teacher and has had many
educational positions since. She has worked in Head Start, held
teaching positions at Texas State University, University of South
Carolina, and University of South Florida and then became Vice
President of Education and Training for KinderCare Learning
Centers’ corporate offices. Dr. Guddemi then shifted her
career focus to assessment and worked at CTB/McGraw-Hill,
Harcourt Assessment, Inc. and Pearson Learning Group. She was
appointed Executive Director of the Gesell Institute in late 2007.
Dr. Guddemi is a member of the National Association for
the Education of Young Children (NAEYC), and she has been
an active member and officer in the International (IPA) and
American Associations for the Child’s Right to Play (IPA/USA),
also serving as a representative at United Nations conferences
and other child advocacy gatherings.
PANEL SPEAKERS
Beth Bye
State Senator Beth Bye was first
elected to the Connecticut State
Senate in 2010. She represents
the 5th State Senate District that
includes Bloomfield, Burlington,
Farmington and West Hartford.
In 2001, Sen. Bye was named
one of Connecticut Magazine’s
“30 Young People of Influence,”
and in 2015 she was voted “Best Politician” in the Hartford
Magazine readers’ poll.
Sen. Bye serves as Senate Chair of the Appropriations
Committee and is also a member of the Education, Judiciary,
Children’s and Legislative Management committees. Her diverse
interests include education, economic development, services for
people with disabilities, mental health care and the environment.
In 2013, Sen. Bye led the effort to create The Office of Early
Childhood (OEC), one of the first such offices in the country.
As an early childhood professional, she saw Connecticut needed
a centralized system of early childhood education services for
families and young children. She has worked in the field since
1980 and has seen first-hand the power of preschool.
Most recently, Sen. Bye has been a moving force in bringing
high-speed broadband Internet access to Connecticut. She
understands the importance of building the state’s economy
on its strengths of technology and innovation. Connecticut
has top-notch universities, insurance companies, high tech
start-ups and bioscience research, including The Jackson
Laboratory in Farmington; all these entities rely on this essential
communications tool.
Sen. Bye received her BA and MA in Child Development from
the University of New Hampshire, and she has a deep interest in
early childhood education. She was the early childhood director
at Capitol Region Education Council and is the former director
of Trinity College’s Community Child Care and the School for
Young Children at Saint Joseph College.
Prior to the state Senate, Sen. Bye served as Vice-Chair of the
West Hartford Board of Education for five years and represented
West Hartford’s 19th State House district for two years. She has
coached various youth sports and is an active member of the
West Hartford Unitarian Universalist Church.
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Myra Jones-Taylor,
PhD
Dr. Myra Jones-Taylor is the
Commissioner of the Connecticut
Office of Early Childhood. The
Connecticut Office of Early
Childhood was established in
2013 to coordinate and improve
the various early childhood
programs and components in the
state to create a cohesive, high-quality early childhood system.
Governor Dannel P. Malloy appointed her to lead the new
agency in June 2013 after serving as the Director of the Office of
Early Childhood Planning, the office that create the plan for the
Office of Early Childhood. In this role Dr. Jones-Taylor oversees
an annual budget of approximately $350 million and 130 staff
responsible for early childhood education programs, child care
licensing, home visiting programs and early intervention in
the state that serve more 50,000 children each year. She and
Lieutenant Governor Nancy Wyman co-chair the Connecticut
Early Childhood Council, which currently focuses on applying
a two-generation approach to address the complex needs of
families with young children experiencing homelessness and
unstable housing.
Dr. Jones-Taylor previously served as an assistant professorfaculty fellow at McSilver Institute for Poverty Policy and
Research at Silver School of Social Work at New York University.
She is a cultural anthropologist with expertise in early care and
education policy. Her research focused on the effects of early
care and education reform on child care providers in lowincome urban communities and the children and families who
are intended to benefit from those reforms.
Sharon Lynn Kagan,
EdD
Sharon Lynn Kagan is the
Virginia and Leonard Marx
Professor of Early Childhood and
Family Policy and Co-Director
of the National Center for
Children and Families at Teachers
College, Columbia University
and Professor Adjunct at Yale
University’s Child Study Center. Author of 250 articles and 14
books, Professor Kagan is noted for her seminal research on the
institutions that impact the quality, equity and sustainability
of services impacting young children and their families. Using
research and working in conjunction with UNICEF, the World
Bank, UNESCO, and the IADB, Kagan has helped shape early
childhood policies in over 70 countries globally. Acknowledged
for these research and policy contributions, Kagan is a Fulbright
Scholar, and an elected Fellow of both the National Academy of
Education and the American Educational Research Association
(AERA). She is the only woman in the history of American
Education to receive its three most prestigious awards: the
2004 Distinguished Service Award from the Council of Chief
State School Officers (CCSSO), the 2005 James Bryant Conant
Award for Lifetime Service to Education from the Education
Commission of the States (ECS), and the Harold W. McGraw, Jr.
Prize in Education.
She received her doctorate in American studies and
anthropology from Yale University, where she also received
two master’s degrees: one in African American studies and
the other in American studies. Dr. Jones-Taylor is currently
a Pahara-Aspen Institute Fellow as well as an Ascend at the
Aspen Institute Fellow. She is a former Edward Zigler Center in
Child Development and Social Policy Fellow and a recipient of
the Ford Foundation Pre-doctoral Fellowship. She is a former
member of the New Haven Board of Education and the New
Haven Early Childhood Council, and former Board Secretary
of All Our Kin, a nationally-recognized organization that trains
and supports home-based child care providers. She was also an
Honorary Faculty Research Fellow at the Humanities Initiative at
New York University.
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OUR PEOPLE
BOARD OF DIRECTORS
NATIONAL LECTURE STAFF
Carole Weisberg
President
Judy August
Erin Akers, Director
Sally Coleman Keller
Barbara M. Stern
Vice President
Nancy Blackwell-Todd
Kiki Ammons
Cecilia Locke
Dr. Bill Crain
Bailey Bunch
Marilyn Mansberry
Kathleen Higgins
Suzy Ferree
Karlen Senseny
Michelle Golus
Sallie Wells
Norman Heimgartner
Cheryl Wolfe
Adele Edgerton
Treasurer
Gladys Deutsch
Secretary
Linda Calarco, Emeritus
Charlie Slaughter
Robert Windom, MD
Marcy Guddemi
Executive DirectorEx Officio
65TH PLANNING COMMITTEE
Linda Calarco, Chair
Judy August
Marcy Guddemi
Moira O’neill Aitro
Peg Oliveira
Cheng Zhao
Barbara Stern
ADVISORY COUNCIL
STAFF
Marcy Guddemi, PhD, MBA
Executive Director
Peg Oliveira
Deputy Director
Marina Cella
Office Assistant-til the end
of September 2015
Erin Akers
Director of National
Lecture Staff
Dominique DeLucia
Intern
Nell Zehner
Intern
Don Karecki
National Sales Manager
VOLUNTEERS
Joan Almon
Ming Li, MD
William Crain, PhD
Tina Mannarino, PhD
Brenda Calderon
Mary Pepe
Stanley Finkle
Dorothea B. Marsden, MEd
Shari Cassutt
Kathleen E. Fite, EdD
Linda Mayes, MD
Dominique DeLucia
Joe Frost, EdD, LHD
Rae Pica
Shirley Duong
Fona Osunloye and Yale
School of Management
Education Club
Martha Garcia-Sellers, PhD
Rima Shore, PhD
Joan Huwiler
Walter Gilliam, PhD
Dorothy Singer, PhD
Jim Grant
Jerome Singer, PhD
Carla Horwitz, PhD
Fred Volkmar, MD
Sharon Lynn Kagan, EdD
Mary Lee Weber
Karissa Van Tassel
Photographer
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A BRIEF HISTORY
Gesell Institute of Human Development and the Gesell Nursery School
Dr. Arnold Gesell (1880-1961)
retired from the Yale Medical
School faculty in 1950, just before
he would turn 70. In addition
to teaching, he founded in 1911
a clinic that would later be
renamed the Yale Child Study
Center. His pioneering research
made notable use of the then new
cinematographic technologies
to document the developmental
stages of over 10,000 children in
terms of verbal, motor, social,
Dr. Gesell
emotional and cognitive growth.
He created a developmental assessment of children birth to age
five, first published in 1925, and a revised version is still used in
today’s schools, hospitals, and clinics.
In addition to caring for children and creating an extensive
archive that would enable parents, teachers, and others to
understand better children’s ages and stages of development, he
also trained physicians, nurses
and research scholars who
would spend their careers with
children in other settings. Three
of his former students, Drs.
Frances Ilg, Louise Bates Ames,
Janet Learned (later to become
Rodell) seized the occasion of
his retirement to open a nursery
school and research institute
Dr. Ilg
that would continue to explore
child development through adolescence. Dr. Ilg with a sizable
inheritance was able to purchase the properties at 310 and 314
Prospect St. using 310 for research and 314 for the nursery
school. They called it the Gesell Institute for Child Development.
Dr Gesell served as a research consultant until his death in 1961.
Dr. Ames
Drs. Frances Ilg and Louise
Bates Ames, who wanted to
continue their respective areas
of research on early childhood
through adolescence as well
as launch the nursery school,
found in Janet Learned the
perfect teacher to organize the
nursery program. Dr. Gesell had
founded the Guidance Nursery
School at the Child Study Center
in 1918 and Janet Learned had
been its Director since 1938.
Learned agreed with Gesell that
children were most apt to thrive
best when parents and teachers
communicated well with each other. She left the directorship
when she married law professor Fred Rodell in 1956, but
continued to be supportively involved.
Teachers were mostly hired
from women’s colleges; some
also came from Europe as semistudents. The Nursery School
started with 2 and 3 year olds, but
Dr. Rodell
soon added 4’s. Every child was
given a development examination
which teachers and parents were expected to watch so that they
could better shape their curricular and behavioral expectations
to match the needs of their child. The Gesell Nursery School
soon became a model for other nursery schools and for students
in education programs at Southern Connecticut State and
Albertus Magnus Colleges. Gradually stories of its success spread
through the country, thanks in part to the syndicated column
Dr. Ames wrote weekly and in part to the extensive schedule of
lectures and consultations Dr. Ilg was called on to give. Among
the staff members trained by the Institute in the 60’s were Judy
August, now a board member and Dr. Sally Provence.
While the thriving and solvent Nursery School served a
training ground for early childhood educators and pediatricians,
the other research and treatment programs of the institute
were gradually absorbing the larger portions of availing dollars.
Among the early research programs was an investigation of
school readiness. With a grant from the Ford Foundation, Dr.
Gesell was able to show that a large number of the children
failing in elementary school had not been ready to start school
when they did, in other words, chronological age does not
necessarily coincide with developmental age. More attention
needed to be paid to the developmental differences of an
individual child or the wide disparity in school readiness
between a 5 yr old born right after the school entry cut-off date
(the oldest child in a class) and one born in the two or three
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A BRIEF HISTORY
months preceding the cut-off date (the youngest of the class)
of the same year. This research would have a wide impact,
and became the incentive for development and publication
of many similar developmental assessment programs, some
of which turned on their “parent,” so to speak, and built
reputations as competing versions. However, enough teachers
and administrators continued to rely on the original Gesell
Observation as the assessment that best served their children.
The Institute during the 50’s, 60’s, and 70’s was thriving and
was sought out for its research in vision and speech development
and their influence on the formation of personality. Many vision
school fellows did post doctorial work at the Institute. Multiple
clinical services were available for the public, for vision and
speech, and psychological counseling through adolescence. The
Medical Department was added in 1972. Because the Institute
was now working with older people, its name was changed in
1982 to the Gesell Institute for Human Development.
Despite its successes the nursery school was unable to sustain
itself, and closed at the end of its 29th year, June 1980. Dr. Ilg
died the following year; she was 81. Dr. Ames continued well
into the 1990’s to teach, to work with the National Lecture Staff
(NLS), and to update and publish the year-by-year guides to
child development (Your One Year Old, Your Two Year Old, etc
up to 14), which parents today still find as relevant as they were
when first issued in the 1940’s under different titles. Dr. Ames
died in 1996, aged 88.
One of Dr. Ilg’s most important legacies was the formation
of the National Lecture Staff in 1970. This network grew out of
Dr. Ilg’s work with Gesell-trained educators across the country.
Women and men who subscribed to Dr. Gesell’s approach to
child development and his assessment carried on workshops
for teachers, parents and others to introduce them to the Gesell
Developmental Assessment and show them how to administer
and interpret the results
properly. To assist her in
developing curriculum
guidelines, Dr. Ilg hired
Jackie Haines and Dr.
Norman Heimgartner in
1969, both from Colorado.
Dr. Heimgartner
conducted countless
workshops as a member
Jackie Haines
of the NLS and continued
to teach the Gesell philosophy at universities in the West, and
also in Thailand and China. Today the NLS is still doing the
work much as Dr Ilg had envisioned and has 12 staff members
conducting about 35 workshops a year in 45 states, with satellite
programs in Germany and China.
When the Medical Department and clinic closed in 1989 due
to financial hardships, Gesell sold its buildings to Yale University
and used a part of the proceeds to establish the Arnold Gesell
Professor of Child Psychiatry, Pediatrics, and Psychology. Dr.
Linda Mayes was first honored with that
appointment and continues to hold it. She also
serves on the Institute’s Advisory Council.
In 1990 Jackie Haines became Director of
the Institute. During the 90’s and early 00’s,
along with Annette Watert, who was hired as
the Administrative Assistant in 1982, were
Dr. Linda Mayes
the only staff left (after the death of Dr. Ames
in 1996). Somehow they kept the Institute and the NLS alive
through the ‘90’s and into the 21st century because loyal Gesell
Developmental Observation (GDO) customers continued to
buy the assessment and schedule workshops
across the country.
In 1996 the Institute learned that the
Theodor-Hellbrugge-Stiftung Foundation
in Munich, Germany, whose mission is
to support and promote developmental
rehabilitation worldwide, created the
Arnold Lucius Gesell Award. It is awarded
every two years or so “for outstanding
scientific research on child development .
1954
. . in memory of the great pediatrician and
developmental researcher, Arnold Lucius Gesell . . . in order
to honor long time research activities in the field of ethnology;
i.e., the development of behavior and language.” Dr. T. Berry
Brazelton, MD was its recipient in 2006.
After some tumulus times during the 90’s, the Board became
stronger and reorganized in the years after 2000. The Board
hired an outsider with a business background, Elyse Waterhouse,
in November, 2002 to lead the organization forward into the
21st C. Unfortunately without a child development background,
she only stayed not quite 5 years but was able to accomplish
developing strong business policies, job descriptions, and
policies and procedures. Jackie Haines retired in 2002.
Dr. Guddemi
In November of 2007, after a
national search, the Board hired Dr.
Marcy Guddemi, a nationally known
child development advocate and
expert with considerable experience
in educational assessment publishing
and an MBA to lead the Institute.
She immediately embraced the
job and with the help of the staff,
interns, and National Lecture Staff
accomplished the following in
subsequent years:
1. A much-needed national re-norming study for the GDO
with the psychometric supervision of McREL (Mid-Continent
Research for Education and Learning). This resulted in the
publication of Gesell Developmental Observation-Revised
(GDO-R) and the new Gesell Early Screener (GES) both in 2011.
2. A new professional image with new marketing tools and
publications, new website image along with social media,
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presence at NAEYC with a commercial display, television
appearances, a DVD Ready for Kindergarten, and the publication
of three new booklets, Ready or Not for Kindergarten, Gesell’s
Guide for Parents and Teachers: Understand the Relationship
between Families and Schools, and Pretend Play and Brain
Growth: The Link to Learning and Academic Success.
3. A national conference marking Gesell Institute’s 60th
anniversary. Over 300 gathered October 10, 2010 at the Omni
on the Yale Campus to participate in the Early Childhood
LEADership Conference. Featured speaker of the LEAD (Lead,
Educate, Advocate, and Do) conference was Dr. T. Berry
Brazelton, MD. The conference proceedings can be found on a
free DVD titled Community Early Childhood LEADership E-Kit
published in 2012 or downloaded at http://www.gesellinstitute.
org/e-kit/. The E-Kit also includes a 30 minutes video on the
“Crisis in Early Childhood Education” and a Tool Kit for how
to conduct your own community conversation. This E-Kit was
distributed to every member of the National Association of
Elementary Principals in September of 2013 along with their
journal of Principal.
4. Restoring name to Gesell Institute of Child Development in 2011.
5. National marketing study. In 2013, under the leadership
of Board President, Barbara Stern, the Institute hired Words
and Numbers, Inc. to conduct a national marketing study of
the organization. Their conclusions resulted in the hiring of a
National Sales Director and a detailed marketing plan.
6. Positioning the Institute as a major player in advocacy for
young children. Through numerous speeches nationwide;
articles in professional journals, trade publications, magazines,
and newsletters; expert advice for journalists seeking
information; and involvement in New Haven Early Childhood
Council; Gesell Institute has established itself as a thought leader
locally, statewide, and nationally.
Today the Institute is both 1) an advocate for young children
and, 2) a resource for teachers and parents nationwide and
internationally in some markets. The Institute’s mission is “to
promote the principles of child development for all decisionmaking for young children” with an emphasis on learning
through play and the rights of child as guaranteed by the
1989 United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
Meanwhile the Gesell Institute continues in the same building
at 310 Prospect Street, renting its office spaces from Yale and
sharing the building with Yale’s Edward Zigler Center in Child
Development and Social Policy, School of the 21Century, and
Academy of Arts and Science.
As Gesell Institute of Child Development celebrates its 65th
anniversary in 2015, the Institute is poised to launch the next
decade of leadership with its Leaders Forum on Economic
Development and Early Childhood and subsequent Year of
Advocacy. This all based on the pioneering work of its namesake
Dr. Arnold Gesell who once said, “The measure of a society is its
reverence to children.” The Gesell Institute is one such measure.
Congratulations
to Gesell Institute of Child Development
on its 65 years of work
for the benefit of your children.
sss Linda and Vincent Calarco sss
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Proud to Support
Gesell Institute
on their
65th Anniversary
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United
Illuminating
(need 1/4 pg)
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Strategem, LLC
A proud sponsor
of Gesell’s
65th Anniversary
and this important
Forum!
Goodcopy
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BOARD OF DIRECTORS
We are delighted to be
part of this fine organization.
Congratulations
Gesell Institute
on Your
65th Anniversary.
Congratulations to the
planning team who has
worked tirelessly on the
Leader Forum.
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NOTES
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NOTES
E
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Gesell Institute of Child Development
A child is more than a score.
NEW!
Gesell Developmental Observation-Revised
and Gesell Early Screener
Newly Revised and Updated!
Provides an effective multidimensional assessment system and
introduces an early screener
• Includes new normative data for children ages 3-6 years
• Helps assess social and emotional behaviors
with NEW forms and components
• Meets IDEA and RTI requirements
Find out how the Gesell Developmental
Observation-Revised and the Gesell
Early Screener are perfect for your needs.
OF CHILD DEVELOPMENT
tute.org
65thwww.gesellinsti
ANNIVERSARY
1-800-369-7709
Educating and supporting parents and teachers worldwide since 1950 2165
GesellProgram_9.25.15.indd 21
OF CHILD DEVELO
th
ANNIVERS
9/25/15 5:15 PM
Join Us for a Year of Advocacy!
2015-2016
Economics
Neuroscience
$$
Emotional Intelligence
INVEST
GAIN
Crime Prevention
The Latest Information on the Earliest Years
Visit www.gesellinstitute.org to find out about future events.
OF CHILD DEVELOPMENT
65th ANNIVERSARY
22
310 Prospect St, New Haven CT 06517
203-777-3481
800-369-7709
OF CHILD DEVELOPMENT
65th ANNIVERSARY
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