Investing in Our Future
The first few years of a child’s life can dramatically shape their future for years to come. When a child is raised with emotionally healthy caregiving, they develop the ability to trust in the people and relationships in their lives.
Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health (IECMH) professionals refer to this as the capability to experience, self-regulate, and express a wide range of emotions and to use those skills to help in interpersonal relationships and strong learning readiness. This impacts their future relationships and increases their ability to learn across all domains.
In 2019, MSPCC and Massachusetts Association for Infant Mental Health (MassAIMH) started our partnership to establish, strengthen, and diversify the IECMH workforce to ensure all of the Commonwealth’s children have access to comprehensive services supporting emotional wellness as well as combating trauma in young children.
During this time, we have worked together to develop a statewide early childhood workforce initiative through the Endorsement for Culturally Sensitive, Relationship-Focused, Practice Promoting Infant and Early Childhood Mental Health ® in Massachusetts. Endorsement is one of the country’s first and most comprehensive efforts to define best practices and guide professional growth at multiple levels and across disciplines in the field of infant and early childhood mental health. Endorsement is supported nationally by the Alliance for the Advancement of Infant Mental Health.
Through hard work and dedication, our work has reached a significant milestone that will positively impact Massachusetts children and families for generations: MSPCC and MassAIMH have endorsed more than 100 early childhood professionals.
These professionals represent the children and families we serve every day and are diverse in their ethnicity, race, gender, geography, and linguistic capabilities. Thanks to these caring professionals, more families will have access to services to help them promote emotional wellness in their children.
We are proud of our progress and are committed to continuing this work on behalf of the Commonwealth’s families. Thank you to the leaders, partners, communities, organizations, and individuals who have made this possible and to Boston Children’s Hospital Birth to Five Child Health and Development Initiative for funding this vital work.