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Fairness of Place for All Children
April 20, 2023
The sky, serene, or piled with white, slow-moving clouds, or full of wind and purple storm, is always overhead… You wait for that sudden sense of romance everywhere which is the touch of something big and simple and beautiful. It is always beyond the walls.
-Edna Brush Perkins, 1880–1930, poet
-Edna Brush Perkins, 1880–1930, poet
"Place Matters," a new working paper from the Center on the Developing Child at Harvard “examines how the built and natural environments—and the systemic factors that shape those environments—interact with each other and with a child’s social environment in deeply interconnected ways…The paper encourages us to think beyond the traditional early childhood sector in policy and practice. It explores how the latest science, combined with the lived expertise of communities and fresh thinking across an array of policy domains, offers promising opportunities for re-shaping environmental influences so that all children can grow up in homes and neighborhoods free of hazards and rich with opportunity.”
The authors note, “Ensuring 'fairness of place'—that vital conditions for well-being are available to all children, not just some—requires that a broader range of policy domains work together to redress racist and other discriminatory policies to achieve greater equity. Supporting healthy child development is still about caregiver-child relationships, and it’s also about communities, businesses, and governments working together to assure a supportive and healthy environment for all young children—with particular attention to natural and built environments that fall far short of that goal.”
Finding and creating spaces for connecting children with nature – indoors and out, in urban, suburban, and rural settings – provides one pathway to improved health and well-being for both children and adults. Start or continue your journey by joining the International Mud Day celebration on June 29. As you share your plans on social media, tag them #wfmudday!
Visit worldforumfoundation.org/mud to learn more.
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Comments (2)
Displaying All 2 CommentsEugene, OR, United States
Francis, I think the paper is calling for policy makers, business owners and others in decision-making positions to take more responsibility for equity and quality of life for young children.
And yes, employment fairness is foundational to fairness of place - relationships are central to environments! The document is, I believe, not unlike Exchange Every Day in that it's intended to stoke and enrich conversation.
The Center on the Developing Child has taken an interesting trajectory in recent years, increasingly broadening their perspectives on brain development, toxic stress and health to recognized the systemic issues and inequities at play. They have also broadened their scope of what 'counts' as authoritative information as a way to (slowly, imperfectly) move themselves and others beyond white western dominant tools and views. As an academic institution, I believe they see their role as providing information and analysis for those in policy, advocacy and action roles. I for one am happy to see these sorts of shifts emerge as part of a larger need for change.
University of Phoenix/ Red Rocks Community College
Denver, Colorado, United States
Beyond the obvious issues of toxins and racism, I am not sure what this paper is saying. Whose standards will be used? How is fairness of place defined? Sounds almost like another attempt by the developed societies to tell everyone else what is "proper". And, until we have taken care of the issue of "employment fairness" in our field, I think this is a stretch.
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