The Role of Licensing in Early Care and Education: Front-Line Licensing Staff (TRLECE: FLLS)

The Role of Licensing in Early Care and Education (TRLECE): Survey of State Front-Line Licensing Staff

Child Trends, funded by the Office of Planning, Research, and Evaluation, Administration for Children and Families (ACF) in the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) will collect descriptive information for The Role of Licensing in Early Care and Education (TRLECE): Front-Line Licensing Staff project. The goal of this information collection is to deepen the field's understanding of child care and early education licensing systems, which play a critical role in supporting positive outcomes for providers, families, and children. The investigators will conduct one round of survey data collection with front-line child care licensing staff in all states.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Licensing Staff Perceptions of the Licensing System

Detailed Description

This study aims to advance understanding of the landscape of child care and early education licensing systems. State/territory child care and early education licensing agencies establish and monitor regulations that child care programs serving young children must meet to operate legally. These regulations and monitoring practices play a large role in the operations of child care programs but have received relatively little research attention. The field has limited information about features of state/territory licensing units; and no information directly from front-line licensing staff about their characteristics, experiences, training, and perceptions of licensing. Ultimately, TRLECE: Front-Line Licensing Staff findings can inform licensing policies, practices, and supports in the child care and early education field; guidance and technical assistance to state leaders; and future research.

The investigators will conduct a survey of front-line child care licensing staff, who are the individuals who routinely conduct inspections of licensed child care programs, for this descriptive study. The survey is designed to collect information about front-line staff members' roles, day-to-day responsibilities, demographic characteristics, career paths, professional development experiences, relationships with colleagues and providers, and burnout/work satisfaction, role in supporting quality and quality improvement, and perceptions of strengths and challenges of the licensing system. The investigators intend to invite all front-line staff from all 50 states and DC to participate (n=~3,000).

• Study Type: Observational
• Enrollment (Actual): 1159

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• United States
  • Maryland
    • Bethesda, Maryland, United States, 20814
      • Child Trends Headquarters

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Adult; Older Adult
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: N/A

• Sampling Method: Non-Probability Sample

Study Population

Front-line child care licensing staff

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• All front-line child care licensing staff in all U.S. states and DC

Exclusion Criteria:

• Individuals who are not front-line child care licensing staff in U.S. states and DC

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Front-line child care licensing staff survey	Survey developed by the study team to gather child care front-line licensing staff's demographic characteristics, background and experiences, job duties, perceptions of their role, burnout, relationships with providers, and ideas for improving licensing	one time

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Child Trends
• Collaborators: Department of Health and Human Services; ICF International, Inc.
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Kelly L Maxwell, PhD, Child Trends

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): May 23, 2023
• Primary Completion (Actual): July 24, 2023
• Study Completion (Actual): July 24, 2023

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: April 14, 2023
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: April 14, 2023
• First Posted (Actual): April 26, 2023

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): September 6, 2023
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: September 5, 2023
• Last Verified: September 1, 2023

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: Child care and early education; Child care licensing; Early care and education programs
• Other Study ID Numbers: 17187002; 233201500034I-75P00119F37007 (Other Grant/Funding Number: OPRE, ACF, US Dept. Of Health and Human Services (HHSP))

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: YES
• IPD Plan Description: Deidentified IPD collected in the survey will be shared with the Child & Family Data Archive (CFData).
• IPD Sharing Time Frame: The team anticipates submitting IPD and supporting information to Child and Family Data Archive (CFData) roughly 6 months after the end of data collection. Data will be available after being reviewed by CFData. No end date on the availability of the data.
• IPD Sharing Access Criteria: Most data from the front-line staff survey will be archived as public-use data with CFData and accessible on their website. Some data will be available as restricted-use only, following guidelines from CFData. Data will be shared with researchers for analyses related to child care licensing practices and experiences of front-line staff.

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No