Do the Quality Rating and Improvement System (QRIS) ratings of early care and education program sites increase over time?

 Determining whether average quality ratings of program sites (Site ID) increase from year to year involves first determining the change in the individual program site’s QRIS Score. Select programs with indicated “Active” category in the option set for the Operational Status data element to include only programs currently in operation. The data element QRIS Participation History can be used to isolate program sites (Site ID) participating in the state’s QRIS by selecting the option “Program site currently participates in the QRIS.” The quality level of a program is indicated in the QRIS Score data element.

If the state does not have a QRIS but has another quality improvement systems or initiative use the data element Quality Improvement Participation to isolate program sites (Site ID) participating in the state’s other quality improvement initiative by selecting the option “Program site currently participates in another QI initiative”.

If the state has neither a QRIS nor another QI initiative but does collect other observational measures of quality (e.g. ERS, CLASS), those can be used to determine which program sites are at the highest levels of quality. Using the example of the CLASS, the CLASS Average Score or the average scores from each of the three domains (Emotional Support, Instructional Support, Classroom Organization) can be used to make designations of high quality, although the specific cut-off points in making those determinations are left up to the state.

Select the time period desired to calculate a change in score. Rating scores should never be overwritten so there should be a QRIS Score for every time a program site was rated. If program sites are not rated every year, scores will have to be collapsed across time periods such that it is possible to compare the most recent score with the previous one regardless of what year the rating actually took place.

To calculate the change in scores, subtract the previous QRIS Score from the current QRIS Score. Negative scores indicate a decrease in rating while positive scores indicate an increase. Divide the number of program sites that increased by the total number of rated sites, for the percentage of sites that increased their quality scores. Average the scores across all program sites to determine the change in scores over time for all sites. Additional elements, such as Early Childhood Setting, can be used to examine changes in QRIS Scores for sub-groups of program sites.

7.2.5 How many child care providers had CCDF funding revoked as a result of an inspection during last fiscal year? To determine which program sites had CCDF funding revoked as a result of an inspection select the Program Sites with “Yes” indicated for the options set of the CCDF Termination data element. This can be narrowed down to programs who had CCDF funding revoked during the last fiscal year by selecting those program sites whose CCDF Termination Date is between the start date and end date of the most recently completed fiscal year. This can be further analyzed or disaggregated by various Program Site Level characteristics. A full list of Program Site Level data elements can be found in the data dictionary of this document.