Taking the Pulse on ECE

In Spring 2011, several charitable foundations, including the Jimmy Pratt Foundation, joined forces to secure the services of Environics Research to conduct a series of focus group sessions across Canada. The sessions were considered to be exploratory – designed to get a clearer picture of what Canadians thought about early learning and child care, in hopes of informing future efforts to influence public opinion on this issue. The objective of this series of focus groups was to gain a clearer understanding of Canadians’ attitudes towards early learning and child care options currently available to them; to test receptiveness to a broader vision for early learning and/or identify the barriers to widespread receptiveness; to understand which elements of the broader vision for early learning are most attractive to Canadians. The Jimmy Pratt Foundation helped organize and plan focus groups in St. John’s so as to ensure our voice was a part of the national report.