History

The Edith B. Jackson Child Care Program was established in 1972 by a group of Yale parents and faculty members in response to the growing need for quality care for children of students, staff, and faculty at Yale. Dr. Deborah Ferholt, Pediatrician and Associate Professor of Pediatric Nursing, in consultation with  Dr. Sally Provence, Professor of Pediatrics, was  instrumental in developing the EBJ model. The strong support of the Yale Child Study Center contributed to its inception. 

The program is named in honor of Dr. Edith B. Jackson, a faculty member of the Yale Department of Pediatrics from 1923 to 1959, and responsible for many of the advances in the care of infants and children throughout the world. She became well-known for her work in trying to humanize the delivery of services to children and families in hospitals and other human services institutions.  She is best known for her success in establishing rooming-in for newborns so that they could be as close as possible to their mothers from the beginning.  Throughout her life, Edith B. Jackson was committed to providing the most sensitive care to parents and children. EBJ remains as a living memorial to her lifetime commitment to the welfare of infants, children, and families.

In its beginning the program offered child care for young children whose providers lived in the graduate housing apartments at Yale's Whitehall complex. Within her home, each provider cared for four children, offering nurturing, small-group care in a family setting. With the generous support of  Albert J. Solnit, M.D., through the Child Study Center, EBJ was able to secure Lola Nash as its first director.  She continues to be actively involved in child development and child care  issues and is the educational consultant for the program.     

In 1989 EBJ restructured its program and began providing center-based care for young children, three months to five years. The nurturing aspects of family care - small groups, continuity of care and consistency of care giving still remain the important qualities for which EBJ is so well known. Still in the Whitehall Graduate Housing complex, EBJ's program is carried out among four apartments, each with its own small group of eight or twelve young children and two to three experienced, well-trained teachers. In the last few years research has concluded that group size is a very important variable in defining a quality early childhood program, and that young children are better able to receive individualized attention and nurturing in small groups.