From Fourth-Grade Teacher to National Policy Leader: Meet Elliot Haspel, author of Raising a Nation: Why Every American Has a Stake in Child Care for All
GlobalMindED is honored to feature Elliot Haspel, a nationally recognized child and family policy expert and commentator whose work bridges child care and the urgent connections between early childhood and climate change. He is the author of Crawling Behind: America’s Childcare Crisis and How to Fix It (Black Rose, 2019) and Raising a Nation: 10 Reasons Every American Has a Stake in Child Care for All (Oxford University Press, 2025).
Tell us about your personal journey.
I grew up in a middle-class suburb of Washington, D.C., the son of a federal government bureaucrat and a public school teacher who worked with lower-income populations. Perhaps because of that, I have always been fascinated with questions of how public policy intersects with life opportunities for children.
After college, I taught fourth grade in a public school and worked for several years in school reform organizations. However, I grew frustrated at the lack of systemic change despite all the money, person power, time, and energy that was going into schools-- it occurred to me that theory of change was incomplete, not in the sense that schools aren’t important (they’re vital!) but in the sense that there are more forces at play. That led me to start learning more about child development and child care, which are the issues I now focus on, as pillars of child and family flourishing.
What pivotal experiences shaped your current path?
When my wife was 15 weeks pregnant with our second child, she was diagnosed with brain cancer (she is doing OK now!). That terrifying experience, and the aftermath, convinced me more than any research paper ever could that care is a foundational human experience, and that we need to reclaim an ethic of care for humanity rather than try to overlay education or economic frames that make the inherent value of care invisible.
What are the most valuable lessons you've learned through your work?
Families matter more than programs. By that I mean, when you start with all of the influences that shape a family’s life, it gives you a much broader vantage point from which to approach public policy -- it’s not just about a given funding stream or age band, it’s about having a vision of the good life and the values which undergird that, and then backing out from those to a policy agenda. Humans are an emotional, values-driven species, and we care deeply about our families. That’s a good place to start that can cut through a whole lot of ‘sound and fury, signifying nothing.’ I hope that's what I brought to writing Raising a Nation.
What drives your desire to contribute and make a difference?
I am driven by my own values, which have been shaped both by my faith and my experiences. I am an unrepentant optimist: I believe that every person is imbued with dignity and deserves a chance to live a full, meaningful life. And I believe I can play a positive role in moving that vision a bit closer to reality. I am taken with the Talmudic aphorism that “You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.”
What are your highest hopes for democracy to unite and uplift and inspire?
Democracy is an expression of communal hope: it rests on the bedrock assumption that I and thou are both dignity-bearing humans who have a voice worth hearing and respecting. In our modern era, the ties that bind are fraying. I believe that if we reinvest in our connective tissue -- and I believe that care and family can be key sutures -- we can find a way to a brighter future and navigate the uncertain times ahead.
How can GlobalMindED support leaders like yourself in achieving your goals and advancing your aspirations,
Our world is large and complex. No person, and no country, is an island. GlobalMindED can help people like me connect with others around the globe who share a similar desire to improve conditions for humanity, and together we will be far stronger than we are alone.
Click here to get access to Elliot's book, Raising a Nation: 10 Reasons Every American Has a Stake in child Care for All.
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