Vermont Legislature SmartTranscripts:

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: You are live. Alright, so we're back. This is Senate Health and Welfare. We're continuing our meeting. We've also had a meeting with health. No, human services from the house on recovery centers. And so now we're coming back to two bills, S206 and then we're also gonna have a report on the work that's going on with H-two 37 and hope to get disclosure on both of those bills as soon as we can. So we have Leslie Johnson, who's the Associate Academic Dean of CCG on Zoom. Are you there, Doctor. Johnson?

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: I am here, yes.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Terrific, welcome.

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: Thank you, good morning. My name is Doctor. Leslie Johnson, for the record. I am Associate Academic Dean of Behavioral Science and Education at the Community College of Vermont. Part of my role at CCV is to oversee our early childhood education curriculum and academic programs. I also oversee the faculty who teach early childhood education courses at CCV, and I provide supervision for the Northern Lights at CCV. So thank you for the opportunity to be here today and to provide some testimony as relevant to S206. As we've been following along with testimony, we have seen that there's been several questions about the academic experiences available to early childhood educators in the state. And given CCV's role in supporting the field and as the only institution of higher education in the state granting associate degrees in early childhood education, we thought it might be useful for us to share a bit about what we offer at CCV to support early childhood educators. So I understand your time is limited today, and I did provide written comment that was submitted to the committee yesterday. Rather than go into all the details in that comment, I thought I might highlight for you a couple of the areas that seemed most salient to some of the conversations that have been ongoing. I'm certainly happy to speak to other areas as you might have questions as well, but I thought I might highlight our academic programs at CCV for early childhood educators with an emphasis on the general education curriculum, And then I also will talk a bit about prior learning assessment as an existing option for early childhood educators to document their professional learning experience for credit in their academic programs. So let me first talk about CCV's academic programs in early childhood education. So we have a really rich history of supporting Vermont's early childhood educators at CCV. In fact, some of the first courses that we offered at CCV back in the early nineteen seventies were courses on child development. So CCV is deeply committed to supporting early childhood educators. And today at CCV, our early childhood curriculum is really thriving. We offer three certificate programs in early childhood education focused areas at the college. Those certificate programs are 24 credit certificates, and they are the child care certificate, the Early Childhood Education Administrator Certificate, and the After School and Youth Work Certificate. Those three certificate programs stack seamlessly into our Early Childhood Head Associate Degree, which is our 60 credit associate degree program focused on early childhood education. So what that means is students could pursue that certificate program and move to the associate degree without any loss of momentum or credit and keep continuing on their academic journey. Enrollment in our early childhood education associate degree is consistently amongst the highest enrolled programs at the college. It's usually the top three highest enrolled program at TCV each semester. If we look to the twenty twenty four, twenty twenty five academic year, so last academic year, we had six fourteen students enrolled in our Early Childhood Ed associate degree program, and we had an additional 100 students enrolled in the certificate programs. So that's over 700 students who were served by our Early Childhood Ed curriculum at CCV last academic year. All of our certificate and degree programs at CCV include a combination of foundational academic skills and specialized early childhood education courses. Our curriculum is aligned with the National Association for the Education of Young Children's Professional Standards and Competencies, and students get a really robust education in both those certificates and the degree program. For our degree seeking students, in addition to their specialized early childhood ed program requirements, they also complete CCD's 33 credit general education curriculum, and that curriculum is focused on supporting students' development in the areas of communication, critical thinking, equity and inclusion, and technology through exposure to a broad based liberal arts education. Students take coursework in the general education that supports critical skills like written expression, quantitative reasoning, digital and computing literacy, the arts, and the natural sciences. One of the beautiful things about the general education is that it is built to provide students with choice and flexibility. So what that means is that students get to choose courses to meet their various general education requirements that are tailored to their career goals and their professional needs. So for example, Early Childhood Education students have to take a natural science course in the general education, but they could choose to take a course focused on nutrition or maybe freshwater ecology. Those courses can support their curriculum development work and their work supporting the development of children in their classrooms. So we did a survey of CCV recent CCV early childhood graduates in 2023. And at that time, 100% of the students who responded said that that general education curriculum, they were well prepared or prepared in all areas of that general education curriculum. So we see that as an important strength of our early childhood education curriculum, the general education. Once students finish their associate's degree at CCV, if they choose to continue their education, we have a number of articulation agreements and transfer pathways so that students can seamlessly move on to a bachelor's degree program. Our many partners, including Vermont State University and the University of Vermont. I wanted to also talk about Prior Learning Assessment. All of our academic pathways at CCV have prior learning assessment options. So CCV supports students to gain credit for prior learning and professional experience through the Vermont State College's Office of Prior Learning Assessment. In the Office of Prior Learning Assessment, we help nontraditional and traditional learners describe and document their learning for college credit. Since 2017, early childhood educators have accounted for approximately 50% of the students who we serve in this program. This is a very popular option for our early childhood educators. There are multiple pathways through the prior learning assessment process. The most popular choice for early childhood educators is our course challenge option, where they can focus on a specific course that they would like to demonstrate competency in. We see a success rate of more than ninety seven percent for our early childhood educators who go through the course challenge or competency based pathway option. We also have portfolio options that allow students to pursue credit for a larger number of courses. They are assisted by a faculty member to document their learning, and then they have their portfolio evaluated for credit. Since 2020, nearly 150 early childhood educators have received 2,811 college credit from our portfolio options. These awards have resulted in an average of $5,000 in tuition savings and two fifty hours of time saved per student who went through that portfolio review option. So I can't emphasize enough how prior learning assessment is a current existing option that exists for early childhood educators so that they can save time and money to reach their academic and professional goals. In summary, I just want to emphasize that CCV really prides ourselves on meeting students where they are at in their lives. This is particularly relevant to our early childhood educators because many of them are working in the field as they pursue coursework at CCV. We offer flexible course modalities and formats. Our degrees and certificates can be completed 100% online if students choose to do so. We offer wraparound support services, including academic advising and student support services. We have affordable tuition and we have deep partnerships that provide scholarship and grant opportunities for students to attend at low or no cost to CCV. And once students complete their education, CCV continues to support early childhood educators through career advising and professional development support through our program, Northern Lights at CCV. So we are very committed to supporting Vermont's early childhood education workforce here at CCV and to helping them meet their professional goals currently or in any future state that the system might take. Thank you.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Thank you, that was very thorough and helpful. So we really appreciate that. Sort of the principal question that we've been asking and that you've answered is how folks who have experience in early childhood work can benefit from their experience and gain a pathway to the next level, so to speak, or the ability to supervise in their workplace. So, yeah, so that's good. How many students have taken advantage of the prior learning assessment?

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: So I can speak to how many students who are early childhood educators. I have those data in front of me who have Yeah,

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: that's exactly, yeah.

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: Yep, so since 2017 we've had over 300 early childhood educators who have sought some form of prior learning assessment. So that includes options to provide credit through testing, which is one option. That includes a course challenge and our portfolio option. So over 300 students.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: That's a lot.

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: It is a lot, yes.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Then, of those 300, do you have a sense of kind of the range of experience that these folks have had?

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: Yeah, so I spoke with Melissa DeBloy, who's the director of Prior Learning Assessment. And Melissa's general observation is that the students who are early childhood educators who come through the program that are most successful are people who've had at least two years of experience in the field. But there's a wide range of people that she sees, from people who are early in their career, maybe have gone right into the field from high school and then want to get on their college pathway, to people who are career changers late in their careers. So there's a very wide variability of people who we see go through this program, and it's really designed to support people at all different stages of their careers.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Okay, and do you find that What's the biggest barrier to folks actually stepping into the program? Do you have a sense of that?

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: Yeah, so I think generally what we see at CCV is oftentimes the biggest barrier for people starting is finding a way to access higher education that meets them in their daily lives. So people have a lot of assumptions about things that prevent them from being successful. Sometimes it's cost, sometimes it's belief that higher education is not for them. Sometimes there are opportunities in their life prevent them from pursuing higher ed at that moment. So that's why we really strive to provide different pathways that are flexible to meet people at all different points in their life. In terms of prior learning assessment, Melissa would probably have a better sense of this, but my understanding is that oftentimes she sees folks who are early childhood educators come into the program who are folks who don't see themselves as pursuing higher education, and they're really looking for that first win, that first place that shows them that they can be successful. Prior learning assessment can be a really successful stepping stone for them, really helpful to get that confidence, get that momentum, understand that they can be college students, and then continue that win forward with their momentum.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: And then I think probably a last, it's probably never a last question, do they have to come into, say, the Manuski facility or another CCV facility to get started? Do you have any folks who go out to help people at the child care center? How does that work?

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: So in terms of getting started at CCV as a student, there are lots of options for people to connect with the college, either in person at one of our 12 academic centers or virtually through online options. So you could apply to be a student at CCV and schedule a virtual advising appointment and complete your entire education at CCV, including the prior learning assessment process without ever stepping foot in an academic center. We do have the Northern Lights at CCV team, their role, particularly the resource advisors who work on that team, their role is to support people in the field, any person who works in a regulated early childhood and after school setting, direction on their career goals. So the resource advisors do sometimes go out and visit program staff on-site at their programs. So they could be a touch point for someone, and then they would refer them to an academic advisor at CCB to start their academic journey.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Sounds very student friendly.

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: That's the hope, yes.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: That's the hope. You. And then I noticed that the Northern Lights, I told you it wasn't the last question, but the Northern Lights is funded by CDD. Can you talk a little bit about how that funding happens? Can you do that or is that another it's a little far out for what we're doing but it would be helpful to us to know this.

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: So are you interested in the funding streams for that program? Right,

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: how is it funded? Is this part of our base budget and state government, or is this a one time funding? Is it a grant? How does this work?

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: Sure, yes. So Northern Lights at CCV is a program funded, it's a grant. We receive a grant from the Child Development Division, which is a combination of several funding sources. So the Child Development Block Grant is one of the funding sources that comes down. We have Part C funding that is part of that program, and then there's other funding sources to support various programs as part of the Northern Lights work. So we support several different areas through that program. And it is a braided funding, I believe, the funding stream, but CDD would be able to answer more specific questions about the funding sources.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Yeah, good, thank you. We'll do that. They'll be coming in, I think, next week. They weren't available, I forgot when, but they'll be in soon. See people worried that they were going to be in long, far away, but safe. Questions committee, other questions? What have we missed? No, thank you. This is very helpful and it does answer some of the questions that we've had about people who have experience but don't have credentials.

[Dr. Leslie Johnson (Community College of Vermont, Associate Academic Dean)]: Absolutely. I'm happy to be here and thank you for the opportunity.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Okay, thank you. We're gonna move on to the Secretary of State if they become part of our committee. Jen.

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: Don't wanna sleep on my feet by myself.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: You're gonna have to square you in as honoring members. I love that.

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: What a

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: great That would be an honor for sure.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Don't be

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: happy with I'm gonna I think.

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: We are don't worry about it. So

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: I wanna get the the good turn of the boss. Good

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: morning. For the record, I'm Lauren Herbert, deputy secretary of state. And I'm Jen Colen, director of

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: the office of professional registration. Thanks for having me.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Good. So we've had discussion about the bill and maybe you could bring us up to speed about where you are and where we are with recommendations.

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: Yes, so we did email some revision language to lodge council last night. We've been working with CDD and with CCV, so a little bit of alphabet soup. But we've been working with partners who are interested in this legislation to just check-in with them to make sure operationally the language in the DOL works for them. We've also been doing quite a bit of work in terms of a new pathway that would be available during the transitional period. As you probably recall, there's an eight year window where OPR is going to be offering transitional licenses for ECE two and ECE three. So if someone is in the profession right now as a lead teacher, but they don't meet the qualifications that are required under S two zero six, they can get a transitional license and have that license for up to eight years as they work towards gaining the qualifications. So we call this kind of the eight year transitional period. We've come up with another pathway because we've heard the testimony in committee from folks who want a pathway that recognizes their experience. You just heard from Leslie Johnson at CCP. CCD has a lot of expertise in offering college credit based upon an individual's learning experience and professional work. And so this new pathway that we've created is less than an associate's degree. It's 21 core credits that relate to early childhood education. So it is that foundational knowledge that's specific to the profession, and we specify in that new language that those credits can be gained through an assessment of prior learning by an appropriately accredited hiring institution. So, we've been working on that pathway. And And if I could

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: just add, that would be available only during that eight year period, and then it would be phased out. So, after the eight years, you would need to meet the associate's degree, But we wanted to make sure that we didn't box anybody out who's currently practicing and we provided a softer on ramp. But once you have the ECE two, is really what we're talking about here, once you have that ECE two through that new alternative pathway, you would be in ECE two for the duration of time. You wouldn't need to seek an associate's degree, you would be in that path.

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: The other thing we've included is a report back, and we recognize that because this is such a significant and exciting change, that there are going to be things that this body will want to care back on periodically as we launch this program for the first few years. We've also provided lunch counsel with some report back language that I'm sure y'all will have some changes to, but just to make sure that that requirement is in there as well.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Okay. So and did you send the language to Katie last night?

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: Yes. I saw it. And I yeah. I wish

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: I was a whole lot of crossfire going with languages.

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: And next time I will bring my laptop in so that I can plug in and show it

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: to y'all on the computer. The other piece is we looked at the positions that we need to set up the profession, and we've whittled it down so that it candidly doesn't seem so overwhelming in terms of financial ask, and it's Well, more that would be helpful to hear. Yes, and so it's more clear what we actually are asking for, so it's the creation of two positions, the executive officer and the staff attorney. And we've made the money more accurate to today's time, because it's 280,000 in fiscal year twenty seven, and we took out all of the intent language around future staffing. We will come back if we need that we need that funding stream here, or if we just need the positions created, and we'll be able to cover it without general fund allocation. So, which would be ideal, right? So, we know that based on the way OPR is structured, we should be able to sustain this profession on its own with licensing fees. We think based on the number of people in the field, we will be able to do that.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: So, And we took out that future language. Hopefully that helps ease its path in its future committees. Let me ask you the other question. Obviously, with fees in the bill and then the appropriations pieces, its destiny is finance with Senator Cummings and Senator Gulick will be there. And then appropriations where we need to look at the balance between the revenue that comes in and the expenditures that go out. So have you looked at the fees? Yes. Also looking at the past few years. Yes, we

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: have and we have been in touch with Joint Fiscal and we're working on getting them data so they're able to provide a fiscal note both to this committee and to Yeah.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: We'll meet that. We're getting close to that. Okay. So the language, Katie may not be able to come in right now, which is problem, but not her fault. It's the fact that there's a house committee that meets her and they meet all day, and we're a senate committee that meets for a short time in the morning. So we're trying to hold on to her. Doesn't always work that way.

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: You know, I just tried to to see her stress, and I just said, remember, you're only one person. I know.

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: Would it be helpful if we forwarded the language to Calista? I I don't know if that helps. I forwarded it to you, so

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: I prefer she didn't have to put it up. Oh, okay. Right. We'll hold off until we've got either you or Katie here with a a lot of things or Great. Thing. I don't want

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: to muddy the waters, but I probably will. I we've gotten so many great emails from people out in the field, and so I I really want to honor them, and I and if they're watching, thank you very much. It's been very educating and illuminating. But one of the emails that I got was from a current practicing early childhood educator. And she was saying how she's got these renewals that she has to do, she was sending her AOE teaching license is every three years, her childcare registration is every three years, and her STARS application is every three years. And she was just making the point, it would be nice to have the written rule every three years, just to sort of be in line with all of those other things.

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: First and foremost, she won't need a license to OPR because she has an AOE credential. So she's exempted just by virtue of having an AOE license. I'm sticking for, like, ecosystem. Yeah. And we, at OPR, we put our licenses all on a two year cycle intentionally. First of all, it makes it much easier operationally if we have people on different cycles. It just is very challenging in for our staff. And we have to space with all of our different professions. We have to space them out over two years so that we don't have a particularly overwhelming time. I'll tell you when our nursing renewal is happening, it's basically all hands on deck because that's 26,000 people.

[Jen Colen (Director, Office of Professional Regulation)]: I just wanted to share it.

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: Yeah. No. I think I think it's very valid. The other reason that we do two years is with an individual, things can change in their lives, particularly around tax compliance, child support compliance, criminal records, and substance use. So we like to check-in on those four things because we can't issue a license if if there's issues that we haven't

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: been with Orange County. Okay. Great. Thank you. Yeah. Good question and something to think about, but we gotta understand. Any other questions at this point or comments you were gonna say something? Well, I'll just

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: say that there have been times when we've talked about moving to a three year cycle for all of our professions as a solution to more professions coming on and limited staff. And that could happen in the future. You could hear our office advocate for that. But we have felt really firm on every two years, and that is nationally sort of the standard for individual licensure. Good to know. Okay.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Any other questions while we have you? So, I will venture into rough waters because we have just a couple minutes here. But now I know that you could sit back there and I'll let him do a little bit of a conversation and it's regarding 02:37 and the hallway conversation. 02:37? We're going back to the psychologist. I'll go back. Before I go back to the psychologist today, if you poke forward here on the child care bill and you have comments to make on the language when we eventually see it on the transitional period for educational certification qualifications, that will be important to us. So now we're back to February and there was a huddle and I'm wondering if what if anything has come out of that huddle I'm not sure. I didn't see a whole lot of enthusiasm, so who would like to begin the conversation? Madam Chair,

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: if it's okay, I'll represent the huddle.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Oh, good. Sounds good. Brother Weber.

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: This is Lawrence Herbert, deputy secretary of state. I think we had a very productive huddle, although there are some still some differences. I think I can speak for everybody that there's interest in this bill moving forward. And well, relative interest. Not not a lot. And and but the big thing that we were hearing the committee talk about is if there could be an alternative collaborative provider pathway for someone outside of a psychiatrist. And we the medical society believes firmly that it should be a psychiatrist. OPR would be open to if the committee wanted to expand who can be a collaborative provider, that it could include an APRN with a psych specialty, and we think that could be written into the statute, not left to rulemaking, and that is the language that we provided to Katie. I want to make sure that this committee understands there was not agreement on that language. That is a decision point for this committee. And then the place where we did have agreement is that we provide a report back to this to this body and sister body in 2020 I mean, 2032, which is crazy that we're talking about 2032. But that will be three years after we are able to start issuing the credential, and it would be specific to the number of this specialty and also of the available collaborative providers and whether the qualifications for collaborative providers needs to be reassessed to improve access while also protecting the public.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: So my question is then if that report back would include the comments about collaborative providers for a period of three years, do we need to debate the expansion right now? And I'm I'm I'm really I'm thinking that it feels like we're building a resistance that we haven't felt in some cooperative movement.

[Lauren Herbert (Deputy Secretary of State)]: Yeah. I think that's a a decision point for the committee. Decision. Yeah. And but but if I idea. But but OPR would be supportive of not changing the language. But if the committee wanted to, that's our recommendation. And it would improve collaboratives. It would improve the number at that to who could be a collaborative provider. And we feel comfortable with that very narrow expansion, but we also feel comfortable with the bill as written. We don't want to add any opposition to this bill. It's not necessary.

[Senator Virginia "Ginny" Lyons (Chair)]: Okay, thank you for that report. I see redheads going this way and this way, and I know where we are with that and so we'll have to take it to bring it into us and we'll look at it. That's good. Sweet. Thank you all. We're gonna take a six minute break unless it's Mary Block. I'm here yet. I didn't hear you. So we'll take a six minute break. We'll go offline and then we'll come back and we're going to hear from Mary Blach on S-one hundred ninety, the Green Mountain Care for Record Space Pricing and Outsourcing Hospital