Children need teachers who stay.
So much of the conversation around the early childhood workforce focuses on questions like, ‘How do we recruit new teachers? How do we get them into the classroom to begin with?’
Those are important questions. Also important: What happens after a new teacher walks in the door? Focusing on that question is one of the most powerful things a program can do — both for the children and for new teachers themselves. What should we do to support teachers from day one?
That’s the question at the heart of LENA’s June 2026 webinar. And four experts brought real answers.
The conversation was moderated by Susan Butler-Staub, Senior Vice President of Network Impact at Childcare Aware of America, who started her own career as a toddler teacher and has spent decades since supporting the early childhood workforce. Joining her were Dr. Rebecca Vlasin of the Colorado Department of Early Childhood, Larissa Fullilove of Porter- Leath Head Start in Memphis, Erin Kissling of Early Learning Indiana, and LENA’s own Chief Research and Evaluation Officers, Jill Gilkerson. Here’s what they shared.
The Question We Should Be Asking
Susan Butler-Staub opened the webinar by gently flipping the script.
What if the most important question isn’t how we hire teachers, but how we support them once they arrive? Research from Ohio State University suggests that feeling supported at work can cut early childhood teacher turnover by nearly half. That’s an opportunity and motivation to improve supports for new teachers.
Support systems are something programs can actually control. Compensation, workforce policy, housing costs — those are real factors in teacher retention, and many of them sit outside any single program’s reach. But the experience a teacher has in their first days, weeks, and months? Programs shape that directly. The culture new teachers step into, the mentors they’re matched with, the feedback they receive early on — all of it is within reach.
Most programs have some form of onboarding. Pretty much all have some form of supervision. The opportunity is to make those existing touchpoints work harder. To build in the relationship, the belonging, and the early professional validation that, as the research shows, makes the biggest difference for teacher retention.
The Passion That Brought Them Here Is Worth Protecting
Almost everyone who enters early childhood education does so for the same reason: They love being with and helping children.
Dr. Rebecca Vlasin has seen this up close across Colorado’s early childhood workforce. New teachers step into the daily reality of classrooms and it often doesn’t look anything like what they imagined. Which means their passion can quickly diminish. Especially without the right support.
Her framing for what good early support should accomplish? “Preserving passion.”
That means creating conditions where teachers feel secure, seen, and genuinely valued from day one. It means access to fair wages, health benefits, and wellness supports — all things Colorado has invested in. The state currently sees 85% year-over-year retention among lead teachers, a number Vlasin credits to these layered investments.
It also means mentorship, coaching, and reflective supervision. The kinds of professional support that helps new teachers make sense of everything they’re experiencing in real time.
What Can Programs Do To Improve Early Childhood Teacher Retention?
Larissa Fullilove, who has spent five years coaching and supporting Porter Leath’s educators, in part through LENA Grow, put her finger on what’s usually missing: relationships.
Onboarding is where new teachers should have opportunities to start building the relationships they need to thrive in their role.
Research shows that connected teachers engage more deeply with feedback and professional development. Connection to a mentor, to peers, and to an organization invested in their success makes all the difference.
That sense of belonging is one of the most practical investments a program can make in early childhood teacher retention.
The strategies that help children thrive — responsive relationships, consistent support, a safe space to try and fail — are the same ones that help teachers thrive. Extending that same care to the adults in the room is the shift that makes everything else possible.
Belonging Is Built Before the First Staff Meeting
Erin Kissling thinks about onboarding the way great teachers think about the first week of school. What children experience first, they carry forward. The same is true for adults.
New teachers absorb the culture of a program from the moment they walk in. Who they shadow. How they’re welcomed. What they see modeled in the classrooms around them. Erin’s insight is that programs have enormous influence over those early impressions — but only if they’re intentional about it.
Good onboarding, she emphasized, is about introducing teachers to the organization’s approach to children, to learning, to each other. That means being deliberate about which classrooms new teachers observe, and which educators they’re placed alongside. New teachers repeat what they see first. Make sure they’re seeing the best of what the program can offer.
Programs of any size can decide what they want new team members to experience in their earliest days. And they can build a process to deliver it, even when things get busy.
What System Leaders Can Build Right Now
The work happening at the program level is powerful. But it doesn’t happen in a vacuum. Behind every strong onboarding process and supportive coaching relationship is a system that either makes the work easier or harder.
Rebecca spoke to what state and system leaders can do to make it easier.
In Colorado, one of the most significant recent moves has been shifting quality improvement away from direct classroom observation and toward embedded learning — peer mentoring, coaching, and teacher-driven goal setting. Instead of feeling monitored, teachers feel supported. They choose their own pathways. They own their growth.
Funding flexibility is another lever worth pulling. The programs doing the most for teacher retention are the ones that have found ways to direct resources toward embedded learning, peer support networks, and career pathway infrastructure. When state dollars can flow toward what actually works — not just what’s always been required — programs can innovate.
The Data That Changes the Conversation
All of that systems-level investment points to the same question: Does it actually work? LENA’s Dr. Jill Gilkerson came to the webinar with an answer.
What if one five-week program could make a teacher five times more likely to still be in their role a year later?
That’s exactly what LENA found when we looked at 60 teachers hired at Porter Leath — a Memphis-based Early Head Start and preschool nonprofit — between 2021 and 2024. Teachers who completed LENA Grow within their first six months stayed at dramatically higher rates: 96% at six months versus 63%, and 92% at nine months versus 54% for those who hadn’t completed the program.
The satisfaction numbers tell the same story. Grow teachers reported 91% increases in both job satisfaction and teaching confidence. They also noticed deeper connections with families and real improvements in children’s language development.
Strong Starts Matter Here
A child’s early years shape everything that follows. The early childhood field knows this better than anyone.
The same truth applies to the educators who walk into classrooms for the first time and every time. Their first days shape everything that follows.
Improving early childhood teacher retention is built through the daily practice of making teachers feel seen, investing in their growth early, and creating the systems that make all of it possible.
The good news? The expertise to do this well already exists in the field. This webinar is proof.
Watch the full webinar replay →
Ready to see how LENA Grow supports both teacher retention and child outcomes from day one? Submit an interest form!
