Early Childhood Summit Brings Educators Together at CSU Pueblo

Early childhood educators from across Southern Colorado filled the Occhiato Student Center at Colorado State University Pueblo on Friday for the third annual Southern Colorado Early Childhood Summit, a daylong conference built around professional development and the growing call to take young children’s emotional lives seriously.

This year’s theme, “Big Feelings in Small Bodies: Strengthening Social and Emotional Development Through Meaningful Connections, Effective Regulation, and Supportive Relationships,” framed a full schedule of sessions running from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. The summit is a partnership between CSU Pueblo and the Early Childhood Council of Pueblo, which operates the Children First Department at Pueblo Community College.

Angie Shehorn, director of Children First at PCC, said the event exists to close the gap between research and practice. “This is our third year of offering this conference to the early childhood educators in Southern Colorado so that they can be up to date on the most recent research or new practices,” Shehorn said.

The Children First office provides childcare referrals for families across 11 counties in Southeast Colorado and manages universal preschool access across six. Shehorn said families facing difficulty finding childcare can reach their office directly at 719-549-3411. Staff gather basic information, including a child’s age, preferred location, and needed days, then generate a customized list of licensed providers.

Funding pressures were a recurring conversation throughout the morning. Shehorn noted that the state’s Childcare Assistance Program, or CCAP, which subsidizes care for low-income families, has been frozen in Pueblo and is projected to remain so through the end of 2026. Infant care costs run as high as $95 a day, while school-age care averages $35 to $40. With those costs and no assistance available, many Pueblo families rely on informal arrangements with friends, family, or neighbors.

Keynote speaker Prerna Richards, an Early Childhood Education consultant with 38 years in the field, set the tone for the day with an address rooted in brain science and the relationships at the center of it. Richards, who recently delivered a TED Talk at Oklahoma University and runs the platform togetherwegrow.online, told educators they are doing far more than supervision.

“Birth to five, 90% of brain development is happening,” Richards said. “We become who we are later in life because of what happens early in life.”

She described early childhood educators as “brain architects” and pushed back on the idea that what children need most in those years is compliance and structure. Her framework, which she calls SAIL, stands for safe, accepted, included, and learning. “You can’t expect the learning to happen unless you make me feel safe, accepted,” Richards said. “Inclusion is an emotion. Do I feel included in your classroom and your home? Only then is my brain trying to learn.”

Richards also addressed what she sees as a crisis of confidence among educators in the field. She said many programs operate under a fear of staff turnover, which leads leadership to overlook poor practices rather than correct them. The answer, she argued, is not more discipline, but stronger connection. “Connect before you correct,” Richards said. “If they feel seen and heard and understood, they’re more likely to comply.”

On the floor of the summit, Leslie Martinez, a teacher at Eastside Childcare Center in Pueblo, came out specifically because of Richards. Martinez, who has worked in early childhood for roughly 40 years, retired and then returned. She said the biggest misconception about her field is the one that follows it everywhere. “That we’re babysitters. And that’s why the pay is so low in some places.”

She and a colleague, Loretta Hernandez, attended alongside 13 others from their center, which closed for the day to make it possible. Both said they wanted to leave with tools to advocate for the field and better resources for their families.

“More families need to be involved in advocating for early childhood,” Martinez said. “I think some parents also feel that it’s just babysitting, and until they come to the center they don’t realize what’s really happening.”

Hernandez echoed that. A grandparent recently told her she could not believe how much a three-year-old had learned at the center, including numbers, colors, and better behavior at home. “We’re actually teaching the kids,” Hernandez said. “We’re professionals.”