Interested in conducting research within the Schoenbaum Family Center?

The Crane Center for Early Childhood Research and Policy (CCEC) collaborates with students, researchers, faculty, and policymakers on research relevant to our mission. Our grants specialist team, data management core, and leadership team can guide you from the submission of your grant application through completion of your research project. By conducting research with us, you have access to an extensive network of community partners and school districts eager to participate in your project. You can also conduct your research with us at the Schoenbaum Family Center (SFC) in an high-quality early childhood education setting through our partners, the A. Sophie Rogers School for Early Learning and SFC Community Programs.
Read Our Research Guidelines to Learn More

Pre- and Post-Award Support

With research as the core of its mission, SFC/CCEC houses an extensive staff within outstanding facilities to facilitate numerous pre- and post-award activities. We boast 8,000 square feet of dedicated space including multiple conference rooms, a state-of-the art observation deck, dedicated transcribing and coding space, workstations and private offices.
Our grants specialist team assists Ohio State researchers pursuing external funding in navigating the grant application process from pre-submission development to post-award implementation and reporting. We can help you find funding opportunities, secure letters of support, identify data management and technology needs, determine the best methodological approaches and statistical analyses for your research question, and develop a project budget.  After you have been awarded funding, we can we can help connect you with our network of schools and community partners, offer technical and administrative support, provide research and events space, advise on your statistical analyses, and report your findings to key stakeholders. The CCEC has standardized protocols to implement all phases of research, including: (1) recruitment, screening, and assessments of children, (2) training of caregivers in intervention implementations, (3) MOA for partnerships with numerous educational institutions, (4) tracking of intervention implementations via logs transmitted over secure servers, (5) coding protocols and dedicated software for assessing treatment fidelity, and (6) training protocols for training field-staff on the reliable use of tools. To learn more contact Eric Schwendeman, schwendeman.2@osu.edu.

Data Management Core

The CCEC features a Data Management Core (DMC), consisting of four full-time staff members: a tech manager, data manager, assessment form specialist, and systems engineer. The DMC can help identify and budget for appropriate technical equipment and data management tools to meet the needs of your research project. The DMC offers technical support for an array of research equipment, including an inventory of assessment materials, tablets for data collection and Teleform for data processing, as well as computers equipped with video and multimedia production tools, web development, and programing software.

Archival Research

Ohio State faculty, researchers, and undergraduate or graduate students are welcome to work with children, families, and teachers in the School for Early Learning and through SFC Community Programs. We have two avenues for conducting research: archival and active.
Archival research is supported by the SFC Archival Data Repository, which includes de-identified data about the children enrolled at the School for Early Learning, and their parents and families. We collect data for the duration of children’s enrollment for three main purposes: 1) research projects, 2) to combine archival data with active research projects, and 3) teaching purposes.
Research topics using these data have included, exploring the growth of pre-reading skills across the academic year in preschool classroom and comparing teacher and parent reports of children’s developmental abilities.

Active Research

Active research may be observational, correlational, or experimental in nature and may combine actively collected data with archival data. Previous active research topics have included, investigating the ability and feasibility of a combined language and motor skill intervention, and examining co-teacher’s use of peer-coaching to improve practice in communication strategies for infants and toddlers.