Highest Quality Early Childhood Development through Honoring Relationships Rooted in Equity and Social Justice

girl playing with shapesFocus on Family and Children’s Strengths

The Family Development Program promotes the importance of building a strong foundation for early learning that begins by honoring each family’s home culture and first language.  We recognize the strengths every child and their family bring to educational success.

Cultivate Shared Understanding of How Young Children Learn

The Family Development Program integrates learning opportunities for teachers and parents, along with others who care about children, that is deeply rooted in each child’s unique cultural heritage. We work to build a common language of how young children learn that is well-informed by state-of-the-art research in child development.

Assure Access to the Highest Quality Early Childhood Development Knowledge

The Family Development Program assures that the highest quality child development knowledge is accessible to all families and early childhood professionals. We collaborate with state and local initiatives to strategically meet shared goals for high quality early learning.

Advocate for Play

The Family Development Program advocates for the importance of play in early education.  We marvel at children’s tenacity to discover, explore, experiment and figure things out as core skills for lifelong learning.  We see children’s natural delight in learning as a solid foundation for educational success.

Form Partnerships to Strengthen Communities

The Family Development Program believes that partnerships which are earnestly built between families, early learning programs, schools, and community resources are vital.  We cultivate bridge-building to strengthen resources so that our children have comprehensive community support.

Promote a Continuum of Learning that Begins at Birth

The Family Development Program advocates for understanding that all children are born learning. We are committed to build child-centered educational systems that honor this fact. We support the need to reform and align a continuum of early learning to public school education.

Champion Human Rights of ALL Children

The Family Development Program stands for the rights of young children and their families to live in communities that place concern for children’s health, well-being and high quality education at the center of our civic agenda.

Contact Us

Family Development Program
A Center for Excellence in Early Learning
MSC 06-3630
1 University of New Mexico
Albuquerque, NM 87131-0001
phone: 505.277.5800
email: fdp@unm.edu

About Us

“When as educators we expect to make profound changes in our students’ lives, we haven’t the right to begin without their parents at our side.” - Dr. Maria Chavez, Founder

The Family Development Program (FDP) is a community-based outreach program of the University of New Mexico’s College of Education.

 

The College of Education at UNM
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