Family, School, and Community Partnerships: Nurturing and Empowering All Young Children (Paperback) (ISBN-13: 9798891187801)

Pradnya Patet is passionate about preparing early care and education professionals to work with young children and their families and currently leads the Early Childhood Development Program at Brightpoint Community College in Chester, Virginia. She earned a B.A. in Psychology and an M.Sc. in Child Development and Family Relations from the University of Mumbai in Mumbai, India, and a Ph.D. in Family and Child Development from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University in Blacksburg, Virginia. She is a proud mother of a teenager who nurtures, challenges, and inspires her to view the world with multiple lenses. With more than 25 years of experience in the field of early childhood education as a teacher educator, professional development facilitator, and childcare director she has come to appreciate and value relationship-based pedagogy, practice, and leadership. She teaches with the conviction that experiential learning empowers pre-service teachers to discover their potential and make a difference by applying their learning to the real world. With much of her scholarly work focused on teachers' reflective inquiry and the design of early childhood spaces for optimal learning and living, she is dedicated to helping early care and education professionals to engage in practice that creates and sustains a sense of community through responsive interactions, thoughtfully planned environments, and the whole-hearted acceptance of the intricate connection between families, schools, and communities. She is the recipient of the Mortar Board Top Ten Professor's Award; the Dean's Award for Collaboration; the Gauri Char Scholarship for excellence in work from the University of Mumbai; and earned a place in Who's Who Among America's Teachers.