Goal 6/ Part 2

1. NAEYC Accreditation Process

The National Association for the Education of Young Children’s (NAEYC) accreditation

process consists of three stages that must be completed in order to become a NAEYC accredited

program and one to maintain the accreditation status. The four stages include:

Stage 1: Enroll and Self-Study

Stage 2: Apply and Self-Assess

Stage 3: Candidate for Site Visit

-- Site Visit Overview

-- Accreditation Decisions

Stage 4: Maintain Accreditation

The first two stages require action by the program and its staff and can include the students,

families, and community. Stage 1 of the accreditation process consists of two parts, enrolling in

the Portal and conducting a self-study within the program. Stage 2 consists of two parts as well:

applying NAEYC standards in daily practices, and self-assessment. During Stage 2, the program

ensures that it understands and can apply NAEYC ideals and standards and that they are ready to

have a candidate visit their site. Both of these first two stages have an individual timeline of 12

months within which they must be completed before moving onto Stage 3.

Once this stage is completed, a trained assessor will visit the site and assess their

practices as well as the overall quality of their program, thus beginning Stage 3. Data from the

site visit as well as that of the program’s records will be used to make an accreditation decision.

After the data from both the program’s records and the site visit are assessed, the program can
either be accredited for a five year term or deferred. If the program gets deferred they can either

appeal the accreditation decision or be started again from stage 2 where they can try again.

Stage 4 is used to maintain accreditation after receiving it and requires continuous,

annual, and as-needed processes to be met. The program must continue to follow all

accreditation policies, continue to meet the accreditation standards and assessment items, report

all critical incidents to NAEYC within 72 hours, and submit their annual reports and fees.

Below are a few resources that can be used for this process according to the NAEYC

website and its resources:

● https://www.naeyc.org/accreditation/early-learning/process

● https://www.naeyc.org/sites/default/files/globally-shared/downloads/PDFs/

accreditation/early-learning/gearing_up_for_self_study_handout.pdf

● https://www.naeyc.org/accreditation/early-learning/tools

● https://www.elc-marion.org/

2. Three Local Accredited Centers

a. FantastiKids Academy of Ocala

b. Future Stars Academy of Ocala

c. Building Blocks of Ocala

 3. What Defines Quality Programs

Quality programs hold the child’s health, safety, and overall well being as their first priority

and make it the basis for all of their practices, ensuring they create environments and situations

that allow them to maintain these in order at all times. They also enforce equality and fair

treatment of all treatment without discrimination for any reason whatsoever, but make it their

mission to help all children as needed and in the best way possible, making sure to adapt and

adjust for individual needs or circumstances. Quality programs also understand the importance of

family and communication and how having open communication between educators and families

can enhance a child’s education significantly and encourage educators to actively pursue such

relationships.

Quality programs also employ bright and caring people who are goal oriented and strive to

make a difference in the lives of the children in their care and encourage them to do the same for

those around them. They also make sure to look at children as more than tiny humans that are

still developing but as growing humans whose voices should be heard and opinions taken into

account and used to enhance their learning experience. These programs also ensure that they are

using developmentally appropriate practices and that anything they are teaching is helpful,

useful, practical, and will help them to learn and grow as they should. Educators in these

programs also care for each child and tend to them as individuals, always making sure to give

more focused help when needed and reaching out to their family if any issues occur and provide

them with an abundance of resources they might need to to help their child and themselves.

A quality program will always provide for basic needs and then seek to give the child the

building blocks they need to go out into the world and function properly. They do this by giving
them opportunities to develop social skills, understand what emotions are and how to manage

them appropriately, and how to persevere when things get tough and solutions are hard to find

among many other necessary life skills.

4. Competency Standard #6- To maintain a commitment to professionalism

a. Functional Area #13- Professionalism

i. One of my goals in the functional area of professionalism is to always be
prepared and willing to learn more in order to benefit myself as well as the
children in my care and their families by knowing the best and newest
information in education to help their development across all domains.
This is an important goal for the age group of children in my care because
they aren’t really able to teach themselves and rely on outside information
from their teacher to be able to learn new skills and be able to implement
them in the appropriate situation and won’t know what information they
do or don’t need unless it is taught to them. One of the ways I do this is by
going to seminars and teacher workshops, as well as reading up on new
and improved teaching strategies and theories to make sure I am using
myself, my knowledge and the children’s preexisting abilities and
development levels in the most efficient and beneficial way possible.