Policymaker and Practitioner Perspectives: Insights from Ohio: An Interview with Dr. Wendy Grove and Jennifer Vargo

• Published date: 01 March 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00027162231198985
• Author: Susan L. Moffitt
• Date: 01 March 2023

ANNALS, AAPSS, 706, March 2023 89

DOI: 10.1177/00027162231198985

Policymaker

and Practitioner

Perspectives

and Insights

from Ohio: An

Interview with

Dr. Wendy

Grove and

Jennifer Vargo

By

SUSAN L. MOFFITT

1198985ANN THE ANNALS OF THE AMERICAN ACADEMYPOLICYMAKER AND PRACTITIONER PERSPECTIVES

research-article2023

What supports do children need? What lessons have

been learned over the past decade to provide comple-

mentary services? For policymaker and practitioner

perspectives on these questions, we turned to experts

in the Ohio Department of Education: Dr. Wendy

Grove, the director of the Office of Early Learning and

School Readiness; and Jennifer Vargo, the former

director of the Office of Whole Child Supports. To

identify children’s needs, Ohio has developed processes

to elevate and learn from families’ voices and lived

experiences. Those insights have contributed to Ohio’s

cross-agency collaborations to support whole-child

approaches both through policymaking and integrated

data systems. Collaborations also point toward areas of

ongoing need, including more investment in early

childhood supports and preschool. The conversation,

led by Susan Moffitt, occurred on December 2, 2022,

and has been edited for length.

Keywords: service coordination; early care and edu-

cation; preschool; family; collaboration

Susan Moffitt:I wondered if you could begin by

talking with us about some of the highlights of

your approach in Ohio?

Wendy Grove:Since around 2016, we have had a

monthly meeting with the early childhood leads

across six child-serving state agencies, including

the departments of Health, Job and Family Ser-

vices, Education, Mental Health and Addiction

Services, and Developmental Disabilities. It also

has included the governor’s office staff oversee-

ing children’s initiatives or issues. We use that

two-hour meeting once a month to collaborate,

coordinate, communicate—just to make sure

that we are taking a systems approach to the

kinds of initiatives that we are investing in, the

kinds of things that we’re putting in our budgets,

Correspondence: susan_moffitt@brown.edu

Susan Moffitt is a professor of political science and

international and public affairs, and the director of

academic programs for the Watson Institute for

International and Public Affairs at Brown University.

Her research focuses on challenges confronting policy

development and implementation in government agen-

cies, especially in public education and public health.